The United States Senate on Saturday acquitted former president Donald J. Trump on the charges of inciting the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol. Following four days of impeachment trial, the 100-member Senate voted to impeach Trump by 57-43 votes, 10 votes short of the two-thirds majority needed for conviction.
The nearly weeklong impeachment trial—the first in the case of a president who has already demitted office—delivered a grim and graphic narrative of the Capitol Riot and its consequences in ways that senators, most of whom fled for their own safety that day, acknowledge they are still coming to grips with.
House prosecutors have argued that Trump's rallying cry to go to the Capitol and "fight like hell" for his presidency just as Congress was convening January 6 to certify Biden's election victory was part of an orchestrated pattern of violent rhetoric and false claims that unleashed the mob. Five people died, including a rioter who was shot and a police officer.
Trump's lawyers countered in a short three hours Friday that Trump's words were not intended to incite the violence and that impeachment is nothing but a witch hunt designed to prevent him from serving in office again.
Hundreds of rioters stormed into the building, taking over the Senate. Some engaged in hand-to-hand, bloody combat with police.
Seven Republicans vote against Trump
Even as seven Republican Senators voted in favour of impeaching Trump, the Democrats, who have 50 members in the Senate, failed to get the necessary two-thirds or 67 votes to impeach the former president. Trump is the first-ever president to have been impeached twice and the first president to have faced impeachment after leaving office.
Seven Republican senators—Bill Cassidy, Richard Burr, Mitt Romney, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Ben Sasse and Pat Toomey—voted in favour of impeaching him.
Trump released a statement soon after the acquittal, saying "no president has ever gone through anything like it".
"It is a sad commentary on the times that one political party in America is given a free pass to denigrate the rule of law, defame law enforcement, cheer mobs, excuse rioters, and transform justice into a tool of political vengeance, and persecute, blacklist, cancel and suppress all people and viewpoints with whom or which they disagree," he said.
"I always have, and always will, be a champion for the unwavering rule of law, the heroes of law enforcement, and the right of Americans to peacefully and honorably debate the issues of the day without malice and without hate," he said.
"No president has ever gone through anything like it, and it continues because our opponents cannot forget the almost 75 million people, the highest number ever for a sitting president, who voted for us just a few short months ago," Trump said.
The Washington Post reported that the result underscored Trump's continued grip on most Republicans despite the party losing control of both the White House and Congress during his tumultuous tenure. "I want to first thank my team of dedicated lawyers and others for their tireless work upholding justice and defending truth. My deepest thanks as well to all of the United States Senators and Members of Congress who stood proudly for the Constitution we all revere and for the sacred legal principles at the heart of our country," Trump said in the statement.
-Inputs from agencies
