Virtually all Democratic congressmen and even some Republicans condemned President Trump’s incitement to the Capitol insurrection. Virtually all Democratic congressmen and even some Republicans seem to want Trump out of office as soon as possible. The U.S. House of Representatives appears likely this week to accuse Trump for the second time, with at least five Republicans likely to vote in favor. Allies of Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, as first reported by the New York Times and later confirmed by ABC News, say McConnell believes Trump has committed impeachable offenses and supports Democrats in advancing impeachment.
Where does all this leave us? It’s complicated. It still seems quite likely that Trump will remain in office until January 20, with Trump’s impeachment Chamber in a majority-party vote, but the Senate not assuming impeachment until January 20, when President-elect Joe Biden takes office. Still, we will have to wait to see how it all unfolds to know for sure. Anyway, we know that a big step in this process took place on Tuesday night: The House passed a resolution calling on Vice President Mike Pence and the remaining members of the Trump Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment and remove Trump from the presidency.
This vote was historic – the House voted to impeach three presidents (including Trump), but has never before formally suggested that the president be removed from office. At the same time, the vote has no real impact. Pence said in a letter to Pelosi released before the vote that he and the Cabinet will not try to force Trump out of office through the 25th Amendment. So Tuesday’s vote was really just a prelude to a separate vote on Trump’s impeachment, which could take place as early as Wednesday. House Democrats have promised to propose Trump’s impeachment a second time if the Cabinet does not remove him.
Tuesday night’s vote on the 25th Amendment resolution, while symbolic, helps us understand some dynamics within the two parties – particularly if you consider this alongside last week’s votes on certifying the results of the November elections . Here are four things we learned …
Most House Republicans are still strongly aligned with Trump.
Only 83 of the 204 House Republicans who took part in the vote opposed last week’s effort to effectively disqualify presidential votes in Arizona. Only 64 of the 202 House Republicans who took part in the vote opposed the effort to disqualify Pennsylvania’s election results. In other words, a clear majority of Republicans in the House voted to block the presidential results from Arizona and Pennsylvania, joining Trump’s effort to disqualify votes from undecided states where he narrowly lost. And these were the votes cast after Trump supporters attacked the United States Capitol.
On Tuesday night, the number of Republicans in the House who were willing to ask Trump to be removed from office was even smaller – only one, Congressman Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, supported the resolution calling for Trump’s removal. There may be some Republicans who vote for impeachment, but not the 25th Amendment resolution (more on that below). But it seems likely that the overwhelming majority of Republicans will oppose any effort to remove Trump from office, no matter what the method.
The next impeachment vote will be the fourth vote in a week that is effectively an indication of how loyal a House Republican is to Trump and strongly pro-Trump voters. And it appears that most House Republicans will side with Trump all four times, despite an attack on the Capitol that was partly inspired by Trump’s words, resulted in the death of five people and could easily have resulted in members of Congress. and even Pence being killed.
It is important to note that the strong support for Trump among Republicans in the House cannot be shared in the Senate. Only eight of the 51 Republicans in the Senate supported efforts to challenge the results in Arizona, Pennsylvania or both states. Unlike McConnell, the allies of Congressman Kevin McCarthy, the main Republican in the House, did not suggest that McCarthy is open to Trump’s impeachment. That said, it is not clear whether many Senate Republicans support invoking the 25th Amendment or attempting to impeach and remove Trump. (More on that in a minute).
There was a big difference between claiming Biden’s victory and asking Trump to be removed.
The 63 Republican members of the House who affirmed the election results in both Arizona and Pennsylvania belonged to the ideological and geographic spectrum – some were reasonably moderate members of more liberally inclined areas, such as Congressman John Katko of New York, but some were also conservatives in more right-wing areas, especially the Republican No. 3 leadership of the party, Liz Cheney, from Wyoming.
But voting to remove Trump seems like a bridge too far, even for these Republicans. Representatives Fred Upton of Michigan, Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington, Katko and Cheney have indicated that they will support the impeachment, although they also did not support the 25th Amendment process as Kinzinger did. But overall, there is little evidence that the majority of those 63 members will vote for impeachment.
Impeachment in the House does not really need Republican votes, as Democrats are the majority and are probably universally behind impeachment. But this sentiment from the House may be an indication of things in the Senate too …
It is not exactly clear what the Senate Republicans will do.
McConnell, while claiming he is frustrated with Trump, also suggested that the Senate cannot actually start an impeachment trial until January 19, according to a memo he sent to Republican senators obtained by the Washington Post. If the Senate really wanted to expel Trump right away, I think they would find a way to do that. What is most likely is that McConnell wants to publicly spread the message that he is personally furious with Trump, but does not necessarily require Republican senators to officially vote. Remember that McConnell just won a six-year term in 2020 and is 78 years old. He is probably not so concerned about being considered insufficiently pro-Trump and losing a Republican primary in 2026 if he decides to run for another term at the age of 84. But younger Republican senators, those with presidential ambitions and / or candidates for re-election next year can avoid a vote defending Trump or removing him from office.
Therefore, it is not clear that McConnell would move to a vote before January 20. There is still no outcry from Republican senators asking the Senate to meet immediately after Trump’s impeachment in the House, nor is it clear that there is anything close to the 18 Republican senators that would be needed to remove him from office. So unless something changes drastically, in terms of the posture of Republican senators, Trump is likely to remain in office on January 20.
Later this month, with a 50-50 Senate and Vice President Kamala Harris as a tiebreaker, Senate Democratic leader Charles Schumer will be the majority leader. There are few precedents for this, but some jurists say the Senate could, in a two-thirds vote, convict Trump on impeachment charges, even if he is out of office. Then, with a simple majority, the Senate could vote to disqualify Trump from taking any office again. But I must emphasize: we have no idea if this is going to happen. With Trump out of office, would Democrats, particularly Biden, be eager to focus on the Democrats’ political agenda instead of trying to punish Trump? Would Republicans in the Senate agree to the attempt to condemn Trump and disqualify him from running for office again? Would Trump’s disqualification from other positions face legal challenges?
Democrats are scolding Trump like no other president has been scolded.
All 222 Democratic congressmen who took part in Tuesday’s vote supported the invocation of the 25th Amendment. Impeachment must also be a unanimous vote among Democrats. This is not surprising – in 2019, all but three of the House’s 232 Democrats supported Trump’s impeachment for his scheme to force the Ukrainian government to investigate the Bidens. There has been some change in membership, but the overwhelming majority of House Democrats have tried to get Trump out of office and are probably comfortable with casting such votes again, especially in light of last week’s terrible Capitol incident.
Combining today’s 25th amendment resolution with the 2019 impeachment, Democrats have ensured that Trump will be reprimanded by the House of Representatives in a way that no previous president was: both impeached and urged to be removed from office by the president’s office. No president was impeached in two different instances (Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton were impeached in several articles, but in the same series of votes in the House). House Democrats are almost certain to make Trump the first this week.