WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump was impeached by the U.S. House for a historic second time Wednesday, charged with “incitement of insurrection” over the deadly mob siege of the Capitol last Wednesday.
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With the Capitol secured by armed National Guard troops inside and out, the House voted 232-197 to impeach Trump. The proceedings moved at lightning speed, with lawmakers voting just one week after a violent mob stormed the U.S. Capitol.
Ten Republicans joined Democrats who said Trump should be considered responsible for the mob, and warned ominously of a “clear and present danger” if Congress should leave him unchecked before Democrat Joe Biden’s inauguration Jan. 20.
BREAKING: The House has voted to impeach President Trump for incitement of insurrection, with 10 Republicans supporting the resolution. He is now the first president in U.S. history to be impeached twice https://t.co/AOSBKrUbre pic.twitter.com/N1kkJvgb44
— CBS News (@CBSNews) January 13, 2021
Trump is the only U.S. president to be twice impeached.
The Capitol insurrection stunned and angered lawmakers, who were sent scrambling for safety as the mob descended, and it revealed the fragility of the nation’s history of peaceful transfers of power.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi invoked Abraham Lincoln and the Bible, imploring lawmakers to uphold their oath to defend the Constitution from all enemies, foreign “and domestic.”
She said of Trump: “He must go, he is a clear and present danger to the nation that we all love.”
Speaker Pelosi: "The President of the United States incited this insurrection… He must go. He is a clear and present danger to the nation that we all love." #ImpeachmentDay pic.twitter.com/7n6DpDmeZW
— The Hill (@thehill) January 13, 2021
President Trump issued a statement on Wednesday urging “NO violence, NO lawbreaking and NO vandalism of any kind,” amid rumors of new planne demonstrations.
In the face of the accusations against him and with the FBI warning of more violence, Trump said, “That is not what I stand for, and it is not what America stands for. I call on ALL Americans to help ease tensions and calm tempers.”
Trump was first impeached by the House in 2019 over his dealings with Ukraine, but the Senate voted in 2020 acquit. He is the first to be impeached twice. None has been convicted by the Senate, but Republicans said Wednesday that could change in the rapidly shifting political environment as officeholders, donors, big business and others peel away from the president.
The soonest Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell would start an impeachment trial is next Tuesday, the day before Trump is already set to leave the White House, McConnell’s office said. The legislation is also intended to prevent Trump from ever running again.
McConnell believes Trump committed impeachable offenses and considers the Democrats’ impeachment drive an opportunity to reduce the divisive, chaotic president’s hold on the GOP, a Republican strategist told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
McConnell told major donors over the weekend that he was through with Trump, said the strategist, who demanded anonymity to describe McConnell’s conversations.
In a note to colleagues Wednesday, McConnell said he had “not made a final decision on how I will vote.”
In making a case for the “high crimes and misdemeanors” demanded in the Constitution, the four-page impeachment resolution approved Wednesday relies on Trump words he used regarding Biden’s election victory, including at a rally near the White House on the day of the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
A Capitol Police officer died from injuries suffered in the riot, and police shot and killed a woman during the siege. Three other people died in what authorities said were medical emergencies. The riot delayed the tally of Electoral College votes that was the last step in finalizing Biden’s victory.
Ten Republican lawmakers, including third-ranking House GOP leader Liz Cheney of Wyoming, voted to impeach Trump, cleaving the Republican leadership, and the party itself.
Cheney, whose father is the former Republican vice president, said of Trump’s actions summoning the mob that “there has never been a greater betrayal by a President” of his office.
The president’s sturdy popularity with the GOP lawmakers’ constituents still had some sway, and most House Republicans voted not to impeach.
Security was exceptionally tight at the Capitol, with tall fences around the complex. Metal-detector screenings were required for lawmakers entering the House chamber, where a week earlier lawmakers huddled inside as police, guns drawn, barricade the door from rioters.
“We are debating this historic measure at a crime scene,” said Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass.
During the debate, some Republicans repeated allegations spread by Trump about the election and argued that the president has been treated unfairly by Democrats from the day he took office.
Other Republicans argued the impeachment was a rushed sham and complained about a double standard applied to his supporters but not to the liberal left. Some simply appealed for the nation to move on.
Rep. Tom McClintock of California said, “Every movement has a lunatic fringe.”
Yet Democratic Rep. Jason Crow, D-Colo. and others recounted the harrowing day as rioters pounded on the chamber door trying to break in. Some called it a “coup” attempt.
Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., contended that Trump was “capable of starting a civil war.”
Conviction and removal of Trump would require a two-thirds vote in the Senate, which will be evenly divided. Republican Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania joined Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska over the weekend in calling for Trump to “go away as soon as possible.”
Fending off concerns that an impeachment trial would bog down his first days in office, Biden is encouraging senators to divide their time between taking taking up his priorities of confirming his nominees and approving COVID-19 relief while also conducting the trial.
The House had first tried to persuade Vice President Mike Pence and the Cabinet to invoke their authority under the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office. Pence declined to do so, but the House passed the resolution anyway.
While some have questioned impeaching the president so close to the end of his term, there is precedent. In 1876, during the Ulysses Grant administration, War Secretary William Belknap was impeached by the House the day he resigned, and the Senate convened a trial months later. He was acquitted.
I’m tired of all this winning.
Fakers,liars and hypocrites! When BLM and antifa were destroying swaths of our major cities, Dems didn’t care or even justified it as it was politically expedient.
Crazy Nancy cheapened and made a mockery of the whole impeachment. Would likely be used now right and left and would have no significance or meaning.
At the end of the day Trump will be in office for the full 4 years. Whats more, once he leaves you’ll be yacking about him for another 4 years. Double win you fools.
Impeachment is the new angry press release.
All I will say is, what goes around, comes around. Especially, to UA.
Its no time to be a republican these days the democrats won all three chambers of government in this country, fakestream media, social media, and the elites
I think they have time for one third impeachment!! Wow! that would really be something!!
Schumer should announce that since Trump will no longer be in office, that although he may have committed a crime, the senate will exercise its discretion to not proceed with a trial. Then they should censure him, not that he cares.
As for people on the hill who may have newn complicit in the planning of the rioting, there needs to be a discrete investigation.
I stopped reading at this lie:
“The Capitol insurrection stunned and angered lawmakers, who were sent scrambling for safety as the mob descended, and it revealed the fragility of the nation’s history of peaceful transfers of power.”
This is such utter stupidity.
First, the leftist terrorists who invaded the Capitol did not stage an “insurrection”.
Second, there is nothing “fragile” about the “nation’s history of peaceful transfers of power”.
The lying AP (that phrase is getting to be redundant) makes it sound like it’s some delicate process to transfer from one administration to the next when it’s nothing of the sort.
With these lies and many, many, many more, the media is trying to propagandize the citizens into believing that the “right” tried to rise up against Mr. Biden.
These liars also can’t have it both ways.
If the proceedings in the Capitol were only “ceremonial” and could not change the electors, then they shouldn’t be “cancelling” Mr. Hawley and others for their “ceremonial” objection.
But if (and this is the reality) the constitution actually allowed the legislators to send back some electors, when they met that day in the Capitol, then it is the media that is being un-American and suppressing the constitution here, as usual.
At least the USSR propaganda was FOR the State. The propaganda by the media here is AGAINST the State.
Historic moment when impeachment becomes a joke
Wow, I didn’t know Archy was such a sore loser.
Delusional Defeated Donald will go down in history as the only President to be twice impeached, the only President to lose the popular vote in 2 elections, the only President to pardon war criminals, the only President to instigate an insurrection, the only President not to read briefings and the only President to place trust in a foreign leader over our intelligence services.
I would like to extend my condolences to Educated Archy. You fought tooth and nail against impeachment. It’s obvious from your statements that you’re hurting badly.
המקום ינחם אןתך בתוך שאר אבלי ציון וירושלים
Soros got what he wanted, HE is in charge of the House.