Erin Schaff/The New York Times
“Donald Trump was acquitted of inciting the Capitol Hill riot despite the strongest bipartisan support for conviction in U.S. history.
On the trial’s fifth and final day, seven Republican senators joined all 50 Democrats in finding Mr. Trump guilty of the House’s single charge of ‘incitement of insurrection.’ But the vote fell short of the two-thirds needed to convict him and allow the Senate to move to disqualify him from holding future office.
Here’s how each senator voted, and key takeaways from Day 5 of the trial.
In a statement, Mr. Trump called the proceeding ‘yet another phase of the greatest witch hunt in the history of our country,’ offered no remorse for his actions and strongly suggested that he planned to continue to be a force in politics for a long time to come.
Minutes after voting to acquit Mr. Trump, Senator Mitch McConnell harshly berated the former president in language that could have come from the prosecution, holding him ‘practically and morally responsible’ for the Capitol riot. But he said the Senate should not have tried a former president. Watch his remarks.” Read more at New York Times
Pete Marovich for The New York Times
“Defeated by Joe Biden, stripped of his social media megaphone and twice impeached — still Donald Trump remains the dominant force in right-wing politics.
‘The determination of so many Republican lawmakers to discard the mountain of evidence against Mr. Trump,’ The Times’s Alex Burns writes in an analysis, ‘reflects how thoroughly the party has come to be defined by one man, and how divorced it now appears to be from any deeper set of policy aspirations and ethical or social principles.’
Even with the acquittal, the trial will hardly be the last word on Mr. Trump’s level of culpability. Using evidence that emerged in the impeachment trial, our reporters stitched together the most comprehensive account to date of Mr. Trump’s actions during the hours in which the Capitol was being ransacked.
And the Justice Department’s criminal investigations related to the attack may ultimately provide a clearer portrait of Mr. Trump’s role.” Read more at New York Times
“The acquittal of former President Donald J. Trump at his second impeachment trial will hardly be the last or decisive word on his level of culpability in the assault on the Capitol last month.
While the Justice Department officials examining the rash of crimes committed during the riot have signaled that they do not plan to make Mr. Trump a focus of the investigation, the volumes of evidence they are compiling may eventually give a clearer — and possibly more damning — picture of his role in the attack.
Case files in the investigation have offered signs that many of the rioters believed, as impeachment managers have said, that they were answering Mr. Trump’s call on Jan. 6. The inquiry has also offered evidence that some pro-Trump extremist groups, concerned about fraud in the election, may have conspired together to plan the insurrection….
As the sprawling investigation goes on — quite likely for months or even years — and newly unearthed evidence brings continual reminders of the riot, Mr. Trump may suffer further harm to his battered reputation, complicating any post-presidential ventures. Already, about a dozen suspects have explicitly blamed him for their part in the rampage — a number that will most likely rise as more arrests are made and legal strategies develop.” Read more at New York Times
“Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Saturday unleashed blistering criticism of former President Trump, blaming him for sparking the attack on the Capitol while also explaining why he didn't vote for a conviction.
McConnell also suggested that Trump could face criminal prosecution for his actions.
‘There's no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day. No question about it. The people that stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their president,’ McConnell said.
‘And having that belief was a foreseeable consequence of the growing crescendo of false statements, conspiracy theories and reckless hyperbole, which the defeated president kept shouting into the largest megaphone on the Earth,’ McConnell added.
McConnell's remarks came after the Senate fell short of the 67 votes needed to convict Trump. Though McConnell voted to acquit him, arguing it fell outside the Senate's jurisdiction, his remarks are a stinging rebuke of Trump's actions and rhetoric.
McConnell said the mob breached the Capitol because it was fed ‘wild falsehoods’ by Trump, who was ‘angry he had lost an election.’
McConnell, like most Senate Republicans, refused to acknowledge for weeks that President Biden had won the election. But he publicly congratulated Biden on the floor in mid-December after the Electoral College certified the victory.
McConnell marked the day as when Trump ‘opened up a new chapter of wilder and more unfounded claims.’
‘The leader of the free world cannot spend weeks thundering that shadowy forces are stealing our country and then feign surprise,’ the GOP leader said, adding that Trump ‘seemed determined to either overturn the voters decision or else torch our institutions on the way out.’
Trump's legal team defended his actions on Jan. 6, when he repeated false claims that the election was ‘stolen’ and encouraged his supporters to march on the Capitol just as former Vice President Mike Pence and lawmakers were counting the Electoral College votes.
Trump's team also argued that the former president did not realize that Pence was in danger.
McConnell rejected those claims, noting that attack played out on live television.
‘We know that he was watching the same live television as the rest of us. A mob was assaulting the Capitol in his name. ... The president did not act swiftly. He did not do his job. He didn't take steps so federal law he could be faithfully executed and order restored,’ McConnell said.
But the GOP leader also said that impeaching Trump falls outside the Senate's jurisdiction because Trump is no longer in office. McConnell voted twice previously to try to declare the trial unconstitutional, an argument that has been rejected by a swath of legal scholars.
Though the House impeached Trump while he was still in office, the Senate trial didn't start until after Biden was sworn in. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) tried to get McConnell to bring the Senate back into session early to start the trial before Trump left office, but the GOP leader shot down the request.
‘The question is moot because former President Trump is constitutionally not eligible,’ McConnell said.
McConnell, however, hinted that Trump could still face legal repercussions.
‘President Trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office, as an ordinary citizen, unless the statute of limitations has run. ... Didn't get away with anything yet,’ McConnell said. Read more at The Hill
“After the Senate voted to acquit former President Trump, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Saturday ruled out censuring the former president — an idea that several Republicans had floated in recent days.
‘Censure is a slap in the face of the Constitution. It lets everybody off the hook, it lets everybody off the hook,’ Pelosi told reporters following the Senate impeachment trial at the Capitol.
‘Oh, these cowardly senators who couldn’t face up to what the president did and what was at stake for our country are now going to have a chance to give a little slap on the wrist?’ Pelosi said while slapping her own wrist.
‘We censure people for using stationery for the wrong purpose,’ said Pelosi, referring to an episode that led Democrats to censure former Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-N.Y.) in 2010.
‘We don’t censure people for inciting insurrection that kills people in the Capitol.’
Moments earlier, the Senate voted 57-43 to acquit Trump, short of the two-thirds needed to convict him.
Seven Republicans voted with all 50 Democrats that Trump was guilty of inciting a violent insurrection against the Capitol on Jan. 6 in a failed bid to halt the certification of President Biden’s election victory.
Pelosi also took a couple jabs at Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who gave a blistering floor speech after Saturday’s acquittal calling Trump ‘morally responsible’ for the Jan. 6 attack, but arguing that an impeachment trial of a former president was unconstitutional.
The speaker sought to correct the record, pointing out that the House had voted to impeach Trump on Jan. 13, while Trump was still in office, and that McConnell had declared the Senate would not accept the article of impeachment to be delivered by the House managers until after Trump left office.
‘We’re told it could not be received because Mitch McConnell had shut down the Senate,’ Pelosi said.
‘For him to get up there and make this indictment against the president, and say, ‘I can’t vote for it because it’s after the fact’ — [it was ] the fact that he established … that it could not be delivered before the inauguration…’
‘Oh my gosh,’ she added.” Read more at The Hill
“The executive committee of the Republican Party of Louisiana voted on Saturday to censure Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) over his vote to convict former President Trump for inciting the Jan. 6 riots at the U.S. Capitol.
‘The Executive Committee of the Republican Party of Louisiana has unanimously voted to censure Senator Bill Cassidy for his vote cast earlier today to convict former President Donald J. Trump on the impeachment charge,’ the party said in a brief statement.
Cassidy was one of seven GOP senators who joined Democrats in voting to convict Trump for ‘willfully inciting violence against the Government of the United States.’
The Louisiana Republican tweeted on Saturday that he voted to convict because ‘Our Constitution and our country is more important than any one person. I voted to convict President Trump because he is guilty.’” Read more at The Hill
“Liberals on and off Capitol Hill are up in arms after Democratic impeachment managers abandoned their effort to compel new witness testimony in the trial accusing former President Trump of inciting last month's attack on the Capitol.
The progressive critics contend that Democratic prosecutors, by accepting a deal to exclude those witnesses and wrap up the trial, missed a unique opportunity to highlight Trump's involvement in the assault, particularly his refusal to defuse the violence after it had begun.” Read more at The Hill
Jun Hirata/Kyodo News, via Associated Press
“A large earthquake shook a broad area across eastern Japan, leaving nearly a million households without power. More than 100 people were injured.
The quake’s epicenter was off the coast of Fukushima, near where three nuclear reactors melted down after a quake and tsunami almost exactly 10 years ago. The company that is still cleaning up that nuclear complex said it had detected ‘no major abnormalities.’
Japan’s meteorological service reported the quake’s magnitude as 7.3 but said there was no danger of a tsunami. Rattled residents braced for aftershocks. One expert said a quake of this size could be followed by another of similar scale within two or three days.” Read more at New York Times
“TJ Ducklo, a deputy press secretary in the White House, resigned from his position on Saturday amid controversy over threats he made to a reporter for Politico.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement Saturday evening that the White House accepted Ducklo’s resignation after a discussion with him. Ducklo had been suspended on Friday after Vanity Fair reported that he threatened a Politico reporter over a story she was pursuing regarding his relationship earlier this week.” Read more at The Hill
“Chris Harrison, the longtime host of ‘The Bachelor,’ announced on Saturday that he would be ‘stepping aside for a period of time’ from the flagship reality television show, which he helped develop into a national obsession, after coming under fire for making comments that he acknowledged were dismissive of racism.
In an Instagram post, Mr. Harrison said he had made the decision after consulting with ABC and Warner Bros. and would also not participate in the ‘After the Final Rose Special.’
Media representatives for ABC, which broadcasts the show, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. It was not clear what exactly Mr. Harrison’s ‘stepping aside’ would entail.
The move by Mr. Harrison and the controversy surrounding his remarks are likely to send shock waves through ‘Bachelor ‘Nation and dampen a trailblazing season that features the first Black bachelor, Matt James. Read more at New York Times