WASHINGTON (AP) – As the House prepares to file a lawsuit against the impeachment charge against Donald Trump, a growing number of Republican senators say they oppose the proceeding, decreasing the chances of the former president being convicted by the prosecution which led to a siege of the United States Capitol.
House Democrats will carry the only charge of dismissal for “inciting insurrection” through the Capitol on Monday evening, a rare and ceremonial walk in the Senate by prosecutors who will argue their case. They hope Trump’s strong Republican denunciations after the Jan. 6 riot will translate into a separate conviction and vote to prevent Trump from taking office again.
But instead, the GOP’s passions seem to have cooled since the insurrection. Now that Trump’s presidency is coming to an end, Republican senators who will serve as jurors at the trial are meeting to defend their legal defense, as they did during their first impeachment trial last year.
“I think the trial is stupid, I think it’s counterproductive,” said Senator Marco Rubio, R-Fla. He said “the first chance I have to vote to end this trial I will” because he believes it would be bad for the country and further inflame partisan divisions.
Trump is the first former president to face the impeachment trial and will test his control over the Republican Party and the legacy of his term, which ended when a crowd of loyal supporters heard his rally shouting the Capitol and trying to annul Joe Biden’s election. The proceedings will also force Democrats, who have full control of the party over the White House and Congress, to balance their promise to hold the former president accountable while rushing to meet Biden’s priorities.
The arguments of the trial in the Senate will begin the week of February 8th. Leaders on both sides agreed to the brief delay in giving Trump’s team and House prosecutors time to prepare and the Senate a chance to confirm some of Biden’s cabinet candidates. Democrats say the extra days will allow for more evidence on Trump supporters’ riots, while Republicans hope to work out a unified defense for Trump.
Senator Chris Coons, D-Del., Said Sunday in an interview with The Associated Press that he hopes the evolving clarity about the details of what happened Jan. 6 “will make it clearer to my colleagues and the people of the north -American that we need some accountability. “
Coons questioned how his colleagues who were at the Capitol that day could see the insurrection as anything other than an “impressive violation” of the tradition of peaceful transfers of power.
“It’s a critical moment in American history and we have to look at it and look at it hard,” Coons said.
An early vote to dismiss the trial would probably not be successful, given that Democrats now control the Senate. Still, growing Republican opposition indicates many Republican senators would end up voting to acquit Trump. Democrats would need the support of 17 Republicans – a high bar – to condemn him.
When the House indicted Trump on Jan. 13, exactly one week after the siege, Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., Said he did not believe the Senate had the constitutional authority to convict Trump after he left office. On Sunday, Cotton said that “the more I talk to other Republican senators, the more they will start lining up” behind this argument.
“I think a lot of Americans will think it’s weird that the Senate spends its time trying to convict and dismiss a man who left office a week ago,” Cotton said.
Democrats reject this argument, pointing to a 1876 dismissal of a secretary of war he had already resigned and the views of many law scholars. Democrats also say it is necessary to make a calculation of the first invasion of the Capitol since the 1812 war, perpetrated by riots instigated by a president who told them to “fight like hell” against the election results that were counted in that moment. the country can move forward and ensure that such a siege is never carried out again.
Some Republican senators have agreed with Democrats, though they do not come close to the number it will take to condemn Trump.
Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said he believes there is a “preponderance of opinion” that a removal order is appropriate after someone leaves office.
“I think what is alleged and what we saw, which is incitement to insurrection, is a contested crime,” Romney said. “If not, what is it?”
But Romney, the only Republican who voted to convict Trump when the Senate acquitted then-president in last year’s trial, seems to be an atypical value.
Senator Mike Rounds, South Dakota, said he believes a trial is a “questionable point” after a president’s term ends, “and I think it’s a difficult time to try to do so in the United States.” Senate “”.
On Friday, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a close ally of Trump who has helped build a legal team, urged the Senate to reject the idea of a post-presidential trial (potentially with a vote). to dismiss the indictment), and suggested that Republicans examine whether Trump’s January 6 words were legally “inciting.”
Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell, who said last week that Trump “provoked” his supporters before the riot, has not said how he will vote or argue any legal strategy. The Kentucky senator has told his Republican Party colleagues it will be a vote of conscience.
One of the nine ousted managers in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Trump’s encouragement to his loyalists before the riot was “an extraordinarily heinous presidential crime.”
Representative Madeleine Dean, D-Pennsylvania, said, “I mean, think about it. Just two-and-a-half weeks ago the president gathered a crowd at the White House ellipse. He incited them with his words. And then he turned on the light. ”
Trump supporters invaded the Capitol and disrupted the election count, falsely claiming that there was massive election fraud and that Biden stole it. Trump’s claims were flatly rejected in the courts, including Trump-appointed judges and state election officials.
Rubio and Romney appeared on “Fox News Sunday,” Cotton appeared on Fox News Channel’s “Sunday Morning Futures,” and Romney also appeared on CNN’s “State of the Union,” as Dean. Rounds was interviewed on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
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Associated Press writer Hope Yen contributed to this report.