WASHINGTON — As the House prepares to bring the impeachment charge against Donald Trump to the Senate for trial, a growing number of Republican senators say they are opposed to the proceeding, dimming the chances that former president will be convicted on the charge that he incited a siege of the U.S. Capitol.<\/p>\n
House Democrats will carry the sole impeachment charge of \u201cincitement of insurrection\u201d across the Capitol late Monday evening, a rare and ceremonial walk to the Senate by the prosecutors who will argue their case. They are hoping that strong Republican denunciations of Trump after the Jan. 6 riot will translate into a conviction and a separate vote to bar Trump from holding office again.<\/p>\n
But instead, GOP passions appear to have cooled since the insurrection. Now that Trump\u2019s presidency is over, Republican senators who will serve as jurors in the trial are rallying to his legal defense, as they did during his first impeachment trial last year.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think the trial is stupid, I think it\u2019s counterproductive,\u201d said Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla.. He said that \u201cthe first chance I get to vote to end this trial, I\u2019ll do it\u201d because he believes it would be bad for the country and further inflame partisan divisions.<\/p>\n
Trump is the first former president to face impeachment trial, and it will test his grip on the Republican Party as well as the legacy of his tenure, which came to a close as a mob of loyal supporters heeded his rally cry by storming the Capitol and trying to overturn Joe Biden\u2019s election. The proceedings will also force Democrats, who have a full sweep of party control of the White House and Congress, to balance their promise to hold the former president accountable while also rushing to deliver on Biden\u2019s priorities.<\/p>\n
Arguments in the Senate trial will begin the week of Feb. 8. Leaders in both parties agreed to the short delay to give Trump\u2019s team and House prosecutors time to prepare and the Senate the chance to confirm some of Biden\u2019s Cabinet nominees. Democrats say the extra days will allow for more evidence to come out about the rioting by Trump supporters, while Republicans hope to craft a unified defense for Trump.<\/p>\n
Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., said in an interview with The Associated Press on Sunday that he hopes that evolving clarity on the details of what happened Jan. 6 \u201cwill make it clearer to my colleagues and the American people that we need some accountability.\u201d<\/p>\n
Coons questioned how his colleagues who were in the Capitol that day could see the insurrection as anything other than a \u201cstunning violation\u201d of tradition of peaceful transfers of power.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is a critical moment in American history and we have to look at it and look at it hard,\u201d Coons said.<\/p>\n
An early vote to dismiss the trial probably would not succeed, given that Democrats now control the Senate. Still, the mounting Republican opposition indicates that many GOP senators would eventually vote to acquit Trump. Democrats would need the support of 17 Republicans — a high bar \u2014 to convict him.<\/p>\n
When the House impeached Trump on Jan. 13, exactly one week after the siege, Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., said he didn\u2019t believe the Senate had the constitutional authority to convict Trump after he had left office. On Sunday, Cotton said \u201cthe more I talk to other Republican senators, the more they\u2019re beginning to line up\u201d behind that argument.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think a lot of Americans are going to think it\u2019s strange that the Senate is spending its time trying to convict and remove from office a man who left office a week ago,\u201d Cotton said.<\/p>\n
Democrats reject that argument, pointing to a 1876 impeachment of a secretary of war who had already resigned and to opinions by many legal scholars. Democrats also say that a reckoning of the first invasion of the Capitol since the War of 1812, perpetrated by rioters egged on by a president who told them to \u201cfight like hell\u201d against election results that were being counted at the time, is necessary so the country can move forward and ensure such a siege never happens again.<\/p>\n
A few GOP senators have agreed with Democrats, though not close to the number that will be needed to convict Trump.<\/p>\n
Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said he believes there is a \u201cpreponderance of opinion\u201d that an impeachment trial is appropriate after someone leaves office.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe that what is being alleged and what we saw, which is incitement to insurrection, is an impeachable offense,\u201d Romney said. \u201cIf not, what is?\u201d<\/p>\n
But Romney, the lone Republican to vote to convict Trump when the Senate acquitted the then-president in last year\u2019s trial, appears to be an outlier.<\/p>\n
Sen. Mike Rounds, R-South Dakota, said he believes a trial is a \u201cmoot point\u201d after a president\u2019s term is over, \u201cand I think it\u2019s one that they would have a very difficult time in trying to get done within the Senate.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Friday, GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a close Trump ally who has been helping him build a legal team, urged the Senate to reject the idea of a post-presidency trial — potentially with a vote to dismiss the charge \u2014 and suggested Republicans will scrutinize whether Trump\u2019s words on Jan. 6 were legally \u201cincitement.\u201d<\/p>\n
Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who said last week that Trump \u201cprovoked\u201d his supporters before the riot, has not said how he will vote or argued any legal strategies. The Kentucky senator has told his GOP colleagues that it will be a vote of conscience.<\/p>\n
One of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi\u2019s nine impeachment managers said Trump\u2019s encouragement of his loyalists before the riot was \u201can extraordinarily heinous presidential crime.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rep. Madeleine Dean, D-Pennsylvania., said \u201cI mean, think back. It was just two-and-a-half weeks ago that the president assembled a mob on the Ellipse of the White House. He incited them with his words. And then he lit the match.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump\u2019s supporters invaded the Capitol and interrupted the electoral count as he falsely claimed there was massive fraud in the election and that it was stolen by Biden. Trump\u2019s claims were roundly rejected in the courts, including by judges appointed by Trump, and by state election officials.<\/p>\n
Rubio and Romney were on \u201cFox News Sunday,\u201d Cotton appeared on Fox News Channel\u2019s \u201cSunday Morning Futures\u201d and Romney also was on CNN\u2019s \u201cState of the Union,\u201d as was Dean. Rounds was interviewed on NBC\u2019s \u201cMeet the Press.\u201d<\/p>\n