The former President of the United States, Donald Trump, was acquitted by the Senate during his second impeachment trial: only 57 senators, including 7 Republicans, voted to condemn it, but 67 votes were needed for the sentence. The accusation was that he had fomented the attack on the US Congress, which took place on January 6 at the hands of his most extremist supporters, and led to the deaths of five people and the suicide of two police officers in the days following the attack. Trump had already been impeached in February 2020, but was acquitted of blackmailing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to obtain sensitive material on current President Joe Biden, threatening not to provide economic and military aid; it should be noted that Trump is the first US President to be subjected to impeachment twice. No one expected a different outcome, as it was unlikely that enough Republican senators would vote in favor of sentencing, but it is noteworthy that in no previous impeachment trial had so many senators from the president's party voted in favor of sentencing. The seven senators who voted in favor of Trump’s conviction all belong to the moderate wing of the Republican Party, and they are: Mitt Romney, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Ben Sasse, Patrick Toomey, Bill Cassidy and Richard Burr. Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell voted against the condemnation, but shortly after he delivered a very harsh speech condemning Trump's behavior, stating that he holds the former President "practically and morally responsible" for encouraging the attackers. The trial lasted only five days because the Democrats decided, despite the Senate having approved the hearing of some witnesses, not to call any; this decision was probably determined by the fact that extending the duration of the trial would have postponed President Biden's political agenda, which has as a priority the introduction of new economic support measures for the population affected by the pandemic, moreover, without any guarantee that the witnesses would change the position of the Republican senators opposed to the sentence. We can reflect on the reasons that led 43 republican senators to vote against the conviction of Donald Trump: although Trump supporters believe there were no compelling reasons to condemn him, many believe there are more opportunistic ends behind the decision by many senators not to vote in favor of his conviction. By voting in favor of the impeachment of the former president, the Republican senators would in fact also have condemned the motivations that pushed those who attacked the congress, namely the belief that the presidential elections had been rigged and that Biden was an illegitimate president; in doing so, however, they would contradict what they themselves had been saying for months, hoping to remain in the good graces of Donald Trump. It must also be considered that condemning the previous president would probably have reduced the electoral consensus of the republican senators, who must keep the favor of their voters to maintain their position in the congress. There are two main negative consequences that could derive from this impeachment: the first is that a potentially very dangerous precedent has been created, namely the circumstance of an outgoing President who, in order not to accept the electoral defeat, encourages his supporters to attack democratic institutions, as the senators who voted against his sentence also admitted.
The second consequence is the creation of the so-called “January exception”, on the basis of which an outgoing President can basically do whatever he wants in January because there would be no time to impeach him before the end of his term. But we can also expect a reaction from the more moderate voters of the Republican party, who do not feel represented by the extremists who attacked the Congress and saw their elected representatives vote against the conviction of this act.
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