U.S. Senate kills Republican move to upend Trump impeachment trial

Source:- newzee


The U.S. Senate on Tuesday (January 26) rejected a Republican effort to stop former President Donald Trump's upcoming impeachment trial on a charge that he incited the deadly Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol.

Republican Senator Rand Paul on Tuesday forced a vote on whether the trial is unconstitutional because Trump is no longer president.

Paul presented the point of order after lawmakers were sworn in as jurors for trial proceedings that are expected to begin Feb. 9.

There is a debate among scholars over whether the Senate can hold a trial for Trump now that he has left office. Many experts have said "late impeachment" is constitutional, arguing that presidents who engage in misconduct late in their terms should not be immune from the very process set out in the Constitution for holding them accountable.

The Constitution makes clear that impeachment proceedings can result in disqualification from holding office in the future, so there is still an active issue for the Senate to resolve, these scholars have said.

Paul, a Trump ally who calls the impeachment a "sham," is among those Republicans who say it would be unconstitutional to try Trump, who left office on Jan. 20. He also opposes plans to have Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy preside at the trial instead of U.S. Chief Justice John Roberts.

Trump is the only president to have been impeached by the House of Representatives twice and the first to face a trial after leaving power, with the possibility of being disqualified from future public office if convicted by two-thirds of the Senate.

The House approved a single article of impeachment - the equivalent of an indictment in a criminal trial - on Jan. 13, accusing him of inciting an insurrection with an incendiary speech to supporters before they stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6. A police officer and four others died in the melee.

At least 17 Republican would need to join all 50 Democrats in the evenly divided Senate for Trump to be convicted, a two-thirds threshold that appears unlikely to be reached. Trump remains a powerful force among Republicans and his supporters have vowed to mount election challenges to lawmakers in the party who support conviction.

Some Republicans have criticized Trump's false claims of voting fraud and his failed efforts to overturn President Joe Biden's Nov. 3 election victory. But no Senate Republicans have said definitively that they plan to vote to convict him.

Although the Constitution calls on the chief justice to preside over presidential impeachment trials, a senator presides when the impeached is not the current president, a Senate source said. First elected to the chamber in 1974, Leahy, 80, is the most senior Democrat in the chamber and holds the title of Senate president pro tempore.

The nine House Democrats who will serve as prosecutors set the trial in motion on Monday by delivering the article of impeachment to the Senate.