SPOTLIGHT – Democrats should struggle to convince the 17 Republicans needed to secure a conviction of the ex-president in his impeachment trial which opens in the Senate on Tuesday.
Asecond “impeachment”, almost a year to the day after Donald Trump’s first impeachment trial . The former US president will again be on Tuesday February 9 in the position of accused in the Senate. Elected officials will have to say whether the former President of the United States encouraged the murderous assault on Capitol Hill in the last days of his term.
In many ways, this new trial will also go down in history. Never before has a president been indicted twice, and neither has a president been tried after leaving office.
Donald Trump, who will be absent, will probably be acquitted like the first time. The reason: the 50 Democratic senators will have a hard time convincing 17 Republicans to get the two-thirds majority of the 100 Senate members needed for a conviction.
A lawsuit contrary to the Constitution?
The violence of the attack on January 6, when elected officials certified Joe Biden’s presidential victory, aroused such dread that Democrats reactivated the impeachment process, even though Donald Trump’s tenure touched on its end. A week later, the House of Representatives, controlled by the Democrats, indicted him for “incitement to insurrection”.