Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) threatened to block Senate Judiciary Committee nomination hearings for 78-year-old President Joe Biden’s Cabinet if House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) sends the Senate her impeachment article against 74-year-old former President Donald Trump. Johnson believes, as other Constitutional scholars, that it’s unconstitutional to impeach the president once he leaves office. House Article 1 impeachment authority applies to presidents in office, not a private U.S. citizen. Johnson signaled that Biden can’t have it both ways: Get his Cabinet officials approved while, simultaneously, conducting a new impeachment trial. Newly minted Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has been dogged to move forward with an impeachment trial sometime in mid-February. Schumer insists that the country can’t move on until after the Senate trial.
Johnson accepts the Constitutional analysis of 82-year-old emeritus Harvard University Constitutional Law Prof. Alan Dershowitz who says it’s unconstitutional to impeach a retired president. Dershowitz says, in reviewing the House’s Article 1 authority, that “removal from office” is the only consequence to impeachment, something that already happened since Trump left office Jan. 20. Democrats have tired to get Johnson and a host of GOP senators removed from office for not accepting the results of the 2020 election. With 75 million citizens voting for Trump, there are millions of people that question the results of the Nov. 3 election. Never before had universal mail-in ballots been used, mailing out millions of unsolicited ballots. Trump’s legal team questioned the collection, counting and tabulating mail-in ballots often ignoring state election laws in the process.
Yet if you listen to House and Senate Democrats they accuse anyone not accepting the results as traitors, worthy of censure and ejection from Congress. Democrats are currently pursuing ethics charges against Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tx.) for trying to reject certifying Electoral votes from battleground states. Cruz was laughed at by Senate Democrats for asking for a brief delay to investigate battleground Electoral College vote tabulations. Johnson believes an unconstitutional impeachment trial would “set a very dangerous precedent,” saying there’s “no provision in the Constitution for holding such a trial over a former president who is now a private citizen.” Johnson wants Pelosi to stop from sending the impeachment article to the Senate for trial in mid-February. Johnson thinks it’s unconstitutional to ban Trump from running for federal office.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made it clear that Trump did not deserve “a get out of jail card,” meaning he deserved to face charges for “incitement of insurrection” for the role he played in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot and mob scene. Johnson thinks that Congress has no “right to preemptively disenfranchise voters and overrule states?” when it has to do with convicting a president of “incitement of insurrection.” Charging Trump with “incitement of insurrection,” Democrat House impeachment managers have to prove that Trump incited the violence that stormed the Capitol Jan. 6. Trump made it clear in his Jan. 6 speech to roughly one million supporters that they needed to protest peacefully and lawfully. Democrats seek to hold Trump accountable to the lawbreakers that stormed the Capitol, trespassed and vandalized government property. Democrats have a weak case built on circumstantial evidence.
Sen. Linsey Graham (R-S.C.), Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has already confirmed Biden’s picks for Director of National Intelligence 51-year-old Avril Haines and 67-year-old retired four-star Gen. Austin Lloyd for Defense Secretary. If the impeachment goes forward, Johnson said all of Biden’s nominees should stop. Democrats and their friends in the press reported that Republicans are ready to throw Trump under he bus, voting in the Senate trial to impeach the 45th president. McConnell only said he wanted a fair trial and for members of the Senate to vote their conscience. McConnell never said he would vote to convict Trump best on the best evidence available. He only said he would listen to all the evidence and vote his conscience. Democrat open-shut-case could go up in spoke once Trump defense Atty. Butch Bowers digs in and presents his best case.
Democrats will have a rude awakening in any Senate impeachment trial forced to hear real evidence, not listen to partisan pundits on cable and network news. Pelosi thought she had an airtight case Jan. 16, 2020 when she charged Trump with (1) abuse of power and (2) obstruction of Congress. When the dust settled after all the evidence was presented, Trump was acquitted along party line votes. When it comes to administering justice whether in a court or the U.S. Senate, Senators still have to act like faithful jurors hearing the facts before rendering judgments. Like the last impeachment trial, it’s clear the Democrat senators have already made up their minds before opening arguments. Butch should take Democrats of mountain of evidence against Trump and turn it into cotton candy. When it comes to the facts, Butch has the evidence: That Trump never told anyone to commit any crimes.
