Who Is Being Impeached?, 3479

Good afternoon, I’m still reporting on the coup.
The US Senate is set to take up the impeachment of private citizen Donald J. Trump the first week in February.
The Senate is not trying President Donald J. Trump because at noon on Jan. 20, 2021 Trump went from being president, to just a regular old citizen.
If the Senate were sitting in an impeachment trial for President Trump, then Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts would be presiding and he is not.
The Constitution is unequivocal on who presides at the impeachment trial of a US President, it states, “When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside.”
“Shall” is an order. It doesn’t mean, will preside if it is convenient or will preside if he wants to, it means the Chief Justice presides, period. There is no backup plan. The chief justice presides, but in the trial of Trump, the Chief Justice isn’t presiding which means the President of the United States of America isn’t being tried.
So if the president isn’t being tried, who is being tried, the Senate has no authority to try a private citizen that’s what courts are for.
The main purpose of impeachment is to remove someone from office. Trump cannot be removed from office because he’s not in office. So how can you have a trial to remove someone from office who isn’t holding office.
Article I Section 3 of the Constitution states, “Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States.”
It doesn’t read removal from office or disqualification to hold office. The plain reading of that clause would be that the Senate can remove a president from office and if that is not deemed punishment enough then the Senate can tack on disqualification from holding office in the future.
But there is no indication that if you don’t remove a president from office that the Senate has the power to disqualify that person from ever serving in any public office.
Constitutional scholars, of course, disagree on this. Some say that Trump absolutely cannot be tried because he is a private citizen and the Senate has no authority to try a private citizen for any reason.
Others say that Trump can be tried and if found guilty, the Senate can then by a simple majority vote to prohibit Trump from ever holding office again. However, they do seem to be in agreement that Trump first has to be found guilty by a two thirds vote of the Senate which is 67 Senators.
That seems entirely unlikely. First they are trying Trump for exercising his First Amendment right to free speech. Trump never said, “Go storm the Capitol.” He asked the crowd to go and peacefully let their voices be heard.
The facts show that the violence at the Capitol started long before Trump had finished speaking and even longer before anyone who listened to Trump’s speech to the end could have possibly made it over to the Capitol. When most of the Trump crowd arrived at the Capitol the radicals and evidently they were from both the left and the right had already forced their way into the Capitol Building.
The Democrats should be careful about getting what they want. If the Senate can try private citizen Donald Trump for impeachment, when the Republicans regain control of Congress what is to stop them from trying former President Barack Obama, and former president Joe Biden.
If Biden were smart for his own protection he’d put a stop to all of this, but Biden has been accused of many things during his long political career, but being smart isn’t one of them.
I'm still reporting from just outside the Citadel of American freedom. Good day.