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WASHINGTON – Senate Republicans rallied Tuesday against former President Donald J. Trump’s ruling for “inciting insurgency” on Capitol Hill, with just five members of his party joining Democrats in a vote to go from forward with his impeachment trial.
By a vote of 55 to 45, the Senate narrowly killed a Republican attempt to dismiss the procedure as unconstitutional because Mr. Trump is no longer in office. But the numbers have shown loyal Republicans are again ready to spare him any condemnation, this time despite his role in the unrest of a mob that fiercely targeted lawmakers and the vice president on Jan.6 as Congress met to finalize the vote.
“I think it’s pretty obvious from today’s vote that it’s extremely unlikely that the president will be convicted,” said Senator Susan Collins of Maine, one of five Republicans who voted. for the trial. “Just do the math.”
It would take two-thirds of the senators – 67 votes – to get a conviction, meaning 17 Republicans would have to cross party lines to side with the Democrats to convict Mr. Trump. If they did, a further vote to disqualify him from ever taking office again would take a simple majority.
Aside from Ms Collins, the only Republicans who joined Democrats in voting to reject the constitutional objection and prosecute were Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Patrick J. Toomey from Pennsylvania. All five had previously said they were ready to hear the House impeachment case, which passed in a bipartisan vote a week after the attack.
With the facts of the case still spreading and the meat of the trial delayed by two weeks, senators could still change their minds. Several Republicans who voted Tuesday to uphold the constitutional challenge, which would have effectively killed the trial, subsequently rushed to clarify that they remain open-minded about the trial, which will then meet on February 9.
In the weeks following the attack, Mr. Trump offered no apologies for his actions, including spreading lies about electoral fraud and urging his supporters gathered outside the White House on January 6 to march to Capitol Hill. , facing members of Congress formalizing his election. loss and “fight like hell”.
But most agreed that whatever window of possibility of a bipartisan condemnation of Mr. Trump by lawmakers evacuated from Capitol Hill amid the deadly assault just three weeks ago was quickly closing, as the Republicans once again remembered Mr. Trump’s remarkable hold. on their party and the risks of crossing it. The 10 House Republicans who broke with their party to support the impeachment charge are already facing a backlash, both at home and in Washington.
It turned out that Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, was among those making such a calculation. He had signaled twice in recent days – through advisers and then in a letter to his colleagues – that he was ready to condemn a former president whom he clearly despises, and he publicly asserted last week that Mr. Trump had “provoked” the crowd.
But if Mr McConnell tried to soften the playing field for a faction of Republicans to abandon Mr Trump and free him from the party, it had become increasingly clear that no such coalition was emerging.
When fellow Kentuck Senator Rand Paul filed a constitutional objection to the procedure minutes after the Senate convened as the impeachment tribunal, Mr McConnell voted with the vast majority of his conference in favor of the protest.
It seemed like recognition that Republicans weren’t so keen to move on from Mr. Trump, whether for fear of his promises of retaliation and overwhelming popularity with major party supporters, or a belief that the fight was no was just not worth having.
Democrats feared something more conspiratorial, pointing out that it was Mr McConnell who, as majority leader, refused Democrats’ pleas to start the impeachment trial two weeks ago, when Mr Trump was still president. On Tuesday, the Republican leader turned and sided with Mr Paul’s argument that trying a former president was unconstitutional.
Mr McConnell has not made any public comment on his views on the vote, nor has he spoken about the issue at a private Republican lunch beforehand, according to people familiar with the session.
The confrontation caught many senators off guard on a day they expected to be devoted largely to the carefully prepared ceremony and the logistics of a trial.
Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont and pro tempore president of the Senate, was sworn in as presiding officer and then asked all 100 senators to be sworn in to administer “impartial justice” during the trial. Senators were warned by the Sergeant-at-Arms “under penalty of imprisonment” to remain silent.
It was then that Mr. Paul, an outspoken supporter of Mr. Trump, filed his formal objection to the trial.
“Private citizens are not indicted. The indictment concerns the removal from office, and the accused here has already left office, ”said Mr. Paul shortly before, calling the trial“ deranged ”and vindictive.
New York Democrat and Majority Leader Senator Chuck Schumer quickly ended the request.
“The theory that the indictment of a former public servant is unconstitutional is totally flawed in every respect,” said Mr Schumer. “He has been completely debunked by constitutional scholars from all political backgrounds.”
The Senate has clearly taken this position in the past. In 1876, as the House prepared to impeach him for corruption, William Belknap, Ulysses S. Grant’s Secretary of War, rushed to the White House, where he resigned in tears just before Congress failed. can act. The House proceeded anyway, and when the matter got to the Senate, a majority of the body ruled it retained jurisdiction to hear it, despite Belknap’s departure.
Support for a constitutional argument against holding the trial had grown in the Senate in recent days, especially among Republicans who showed little interest in mounting a substantive defense of Mr. Trump’s conduct. But the overwhelming level of Republican support has surpassed what almost everyone expected.
Mr Paul declared the victory saying: “Forty-five votes means the impeachment trial is dead on arrival.”
Ms Murkowski, who hailed the impeachment from the House and called Mr Trump’s actions “illegal,” reluctantly agreed. She told reporters she feared that it might be impossible for most of her fellow Republicans to actually consider supporting a conviction after they came out on the record arguing that the trial shouldn’t even have location.
“That’s why I thought it was a bit unfortunate that we had this very spontaneous vote on an extremely important issue without thoughtful debate and analysis,” she said. “People had to make very quick decisions.”
But other Republicans have said their votes in support of Mr. Paul’s objection should not be interpreted as opposing the hearing of the case against Mr. Trump.
Senator Rob Portman of Ohio said he voted with Mr Paul because he wanted a “full discussion” on the issue of constitutionality, not necessarily to kill the lawsuit.
“I am not decided,” he said. “I am sworn.”
He and South Dakota Sen. John Thune, the Republican whip, have suggested that Mr McConnell might feel the same way.
“I don’t think it binds anyone once the trial starts,” Thune said.
Far from being settled, the constitutionality argument will reappear when the trial resumes in February, when senators may seek to use it as a justification for the acquittal vote. House officials have already started to prepare a constitutional rationale for the procedure, and Mr. Trump’s lawyers will be asked to argue otherwise as a key part of their defense.
The debate stems from the fact that the Constitution does not explicitly address the impeachment of former public servants or tell Congress how to handle a case like Mr. Trump’s, where the president was impeached while he was still in office but is not judged before the expiry of his mandate. .
Senate Republicans have adopted a legal theory that the document’s silence means the Senate lacks the power to try former officials, even though the first step in the process, impeachment, took place before they left.
Just before the vote, Mr. McConnell invited Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University, to speak at the regularly scheduled Republican lunch on the constitutional debate. Mr Turley has taken a more nuanced position than some who argue that trying a former public servant is strictly unconstitutional. Rather, he argues that it is “constitutionally insane” to proceed and could set a dangerous precedent whereby a Congress of one party could accuse and punish the leaders of another at will.
But other prominent constitutional scholars say this view is retrograde, and the trial of a former public servant – especially one who has just left office – is very much in line with the authors’ intentions to hold public officials responsible. If this were not the case, they say, officials could regularly commit serious crimes and misdemeanors in the final weeks and months of their tenure, confident they would avoid sanctions.
“If an official could only be disqualified while he or she was still in office, then an official who betrayed public confidence and was removed could avoid accountability simply by resigning a minute before the condemnation vote. Senate final, ”a group of 150 prominent jurists, including a founder of the conservative Federalist Society, wrote last week. “The drafters did not design the checks and balances of the Constitution to be so easily undermined. History supports a reading of the Constitution that allows Congress to impeach, try, convict and disqualify former officers.
Emily cochrane and Katie benner contribution to reports.
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