If You Thought the First Impeachment Was a Circus, Just Wait for Impeachment 2.0
By Stacey Lennox Jan 25, 2021 8:51 PM ET
In a spectacle that is almost certainly not going to be the ratings grabber that Democrats might hope for, President Trump’s second impeachment trial is shaping up to be a dumpster fire. Without the daily outrage cycle fueled by whatever the former president was tweeting, America seems prepared to move past the rancor. Democrats seem determined to cling to it.
However, even their impeachment manager can’t figure out what constitutional authority they are using to proceed. In an interview with CNN, the host asked Representative Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) how she would respond to critics saying it is unconstitutional to hold an impeachment trial for a former president. In response, she refers to a precedent she never cites and asserts that there must be accountability for bad acts in the last days of a presidency.
The House has impeached non-presidents, but they were all still in their role as public servants at the time. If the purpose of impeachment is to remove someone from the office they hold, the voters ousted President Trump, who left the White House peacefully on January 20th. The Senate has also not proceeded to trial in the one case where the impeached individual resigned. There is not a single case where the Senate has tried a private individual in the list of impeachments.
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