SHOW TRIAL: The Senate Can’t Even Hold an Impeachment Trial For a President Who Has Left Office
Richard Moorhead
|
As the Democratic House of Representatives rams through a sham impeachment with unprecedented speed, constitutional lawyers have stepped forward to reveal that vindictive plots to convict President Donald Trump in a Senate trial after he leaves office are unconstitutional.
Civil liberties lawyer Alan Dershowitz explained how the prospective impeachment trial of a President who has left office to become a private citizen is outside of Congress’ jurisdiction.
“The jurisdiction of Congress doesn’t contend to private citizens. If it did, if you can impeach and remove a private citizen in order to prevent him or her from running against the president, then you can impeach me.”
So under the absurd notion that’s being put forward by some Senators and pundits, you can try somebody after they leave the office of the president, it would mean that 350 million people would be subject to impeachment and ‘removal or disqualification from office.”
The first day the Senate can realistically convene to begin trial proceedings would be January 19th, a day before Trump leaves office. The President has the right for a time period to select his attorneys and prepare a defense, ensuring that any proceedings would be litigated well after he leaves office.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell acknowledged that any impeachment plot would have to take place well after President Trump leaves office in a Wednesday statement. Reports from earlier in the week had suggested the establishment politician was inclined to move forward with an impeachment of Trump in a final betrayal of the President.
NEW: Senate Majority Leader McConnell statement:
"Given the rules, procedures, and Senate precedents that govern presidential impeachment trials, there is simply no chance that a fair or serious trial could conclude before President-elect Biden is sworn in next week." pic.twitter.com/pZ1t4Left6
— NBC News (@NBCNews) January 13, 2021
In a nakedly anti-democratic action, the House and Senate may try to ram through a legally dubious prohibition on President Trump running for federal office again. It’s a vindictive plot with the hopes of embarrassing President Trump and his supporters, feigned by establishment politicians with the political credibility of a damp rag.
Follow me on Twitter @Wildman_AZ, on Parler @Moorhead, and on Gab @WildmanAZ.
Share: