Impeachment to Trump: What are the chances that he will be found guilty? (and 5 other key questions about the impeachment of the former US president)
It is an unprecedented process for several reasons.
The United States Senate launched a political trial against former President Donald Trump on Tuesday, a procedure that could potentially lead not only to a conviction but also to a ban on him from holding public office in the future.
This is the second process of its kind that Trump has undergone in a year.
Its evolution and outcome may mark the first 100 days of Joe Biden's new government, but it may also have an effect on the future of the Republican Party.
1. What is Trump accused of?
Formally, Donald Trump is on trial for incitement to insurrection.
This charge is related to his performance on January 6, when he led a rally near the White House against the results of the November presidential elections, which he, without evidence, qualifies as fraudulent.
That day, Trump told his followers to make his voices heard "peacefully and patriotically" as they prepared to go to protest on Capitol Hill, where congressmen were certifying the election of Joe Biden as the new president.
He also told his followers that they had to fight with all their might otherwise they would be without a country.
After the rally, a crowd of his supporters surrounded Congress, overwhelmed security forces, and forced their way inside the Capitol, causing chaos in which four protesters and a police officer were killed.
The indictment approved by the House of Representatives argues that the former president falsely repeated that the results of the presidential elections were fraudulent and that they should not be accepted by the American people or certified by state or federal authorities.
It also considers that the former president incited the mob attack on Congress and that, with this, he seriously endangered the security of the United States and its government institutions, threatened the integrity of the democratic system, interfered with the peaceful transfer of power, and it endangered an equivalent branch of government.
2. Why is it a historical process?
This impeachment trial began with an unprecedented decision when on January 13, Trump became the only president in the history of the United States to be the subject of two impeachments during his term.
That day, the House of Representatives approved by 232 votes to 197 a resolution to accuse him of "incitement to insurrection" for the violent assault on Congress carried out by hundreds of his followers.
Between the end of 2019 and the beginning of 2020, Trump had already been subjected to an impeachment related to his alleged attempts to pressure the government of Ukraine in mid-2019 to open an investigation against Joe Biden, who at that time was already emerging as his main rival in the Democratic ranks facing the presidential elections.
The impeachment trial against Trump is also historic because it is the first time that a president has undergone such a procedure after leaving the White House.
3. Who are the protagonists?
The impeachment trial against Trump takes place before the Upper House of Congress.
The 100 senators that make it up will play the role of jury and must decide whether or not to convict the former president.
In a traditional impeachment, the sessions would be led by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Justice John Roberts.
However, since Trump no longer occupies the White House, this time that role will fall to the pro tempore president of the Upper House, Patrick Leahy.
The accusation is in the hands of the so-called "managers" of the impeachment: 9 congressmen that the House of Representatives appointed to present the arguments against the ex-president.
They are all attorneys and many of them have experience as litigators. They are led by Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin.
Trump's defense is led by two attorneys known for recent controversial cases: Bruce Castor and David Schoen.
Castor was the district attorney who in 2005 refused to file a charge against comedian Bill Cosby for the sexual assault against Andrea Constand, arguing that there was no evidence.
Just over a decade later, however, Cosby was sentenced to three to ten years in prison for drugging and sexually abusing Constand. The ruling was made possible thanks - among other things - to a revealing statement made by the comedian himself during the process.
Schoen, for his part, has been involved in two recent processes involving people close to his new client.
The lawyer served as an advocate for Roger Stone, Trump's friend and former adviser who, after being sentenced to 40 months in prison for lying to Congress, was pardoned by the White House in July 2020.
Schoen's other recent high-profile case was that of Jeffrey Epstein, who consulted with him just days before he was found dead in his prison cell.
Epstein, a billionaire who was friends with Trump and other well-known personalities such as Prince Andrew of England and former US President Bill Clinton, was accused of sexually abusing several teenage girls.
Although his victims were between 14 and 16 years old when the events occurred, he always maintained that he believed that the girls were of legal age and that they were consensual relationships.
In a first indictment in 2008, Epstein managed to get out of federal sex trafficking charges with a controversial settlement with the prosecution in which he agreed to 13 months in jail and be entered on the federal sex offender registry.
Years later, in July 2019, the financier was arrested again and died in prison while awaiting trial. Suicide was determined as the cause of death.
4. How long can the process take?
The duration of the process is not defined in advance.
Trump's first impeachment trial lasted about three weeks.
This time, in principle, experts expect the procedure to be short since the Democratic Party, which controls the Senate, has no interest in a long process that could hinder Biden's first weeks in the White House, occupying the Upper House in matters other than the confirmation of the high officials of the new government.
The process began this Tuesday with the vote in the Senate of a resolution on the structure and rules of the trial, which was approved with the vote against by 11 Republican legislators.
Then a four-hour debate began on the constitutionality of the trial.
Then, Senator Jamie Raskin - who is leading the accusation - showed a video with a selection of scenes about the events of January 6 and assured that Trump should be held accountable for his actions.
"We risk that January 6 will become our future," he warned.
In his intervention, Bruce Castor, one of Trump's defenders, argued for the dismissal of the process and affirmed that the true motivation of the trial lies in that the Democratic Party does not want to face Trump again in an election.
After the debate, a vote was held on the constitutionality of the trial, in which it was approved to continue the process by 56 votes to 44. This result was possible because 6 Republican senators voted alongside the Democrats.
Starting this Wednesday at noon, each party may present their arguments for the remainder of the week without exceeding a maximum of 16 hours.
If this stage has not concluded on Saturday, the Senate - exceptionally - will also meet on Sunday.
Next week, the senators will have at least one day to ask questions of the defense and the prosecution.
From there, what happens will depend on whether the prosecution wants to present a motion to summon witnesses and whether this possibility is approved by the majority of the senators.
If the presentation of witnesses is requested and approved, the trial could take a little longer.
In any case, once this matter is resolved - whether witnesses appear or not - the parties will present their final arguments and the Senate will proceed to vote on whether or not to condemn Trump.
5. Will Trump appear during the trial?
In early February, the "managers" of the impeachment - responsible for the prosecution - sent Trump a letter inviting him to testify in the process.
However, the former president's legal team soon dismissed this possibility, dismissing the invitation as a "public relations maneuver" and reiterating their arguments against the trial as unconstitutional.
The ex-president, on his part, has always denied having acted badly and has described these processes against him as a "witch hunt".
6. What must happen for a conviction to occur?
To obtain a conviction against Trump requires the favorable vote of two thirds of the senators.
This means that 67 of the 100 senators must support this decision.
Currently, the upper house is divided into two equal blocks of 50 senators from each party, which would require 17 members of the Republican caucus to vote alongside all Democrats against Trump.
Although it is not impossible, that sum seems unlikely in the current political conjuncture.
At the end of January, the Upper House voted on a proposal presented by Senator Rand Paul for a debate on the constitutionality of the process before the impeachment begins.
Although the initiative was defeated, it obtained the favorable vote of 45 of the 50 Republican senators.
This result cast shadows on the possibility that the 17 conservative votes that are needed for a conviction will be added during the trial.
"My vote is based on the fact that the impeachment was designed to remove an official from office. The Constitution does not give Congress the power to impeach a private citizen," Senator Shelley Moore Capito said in a statement in the one that justified his rejection of the process.
From the Democratic ranks it is pointed out that numerous jurists have endorsed the constitutionality of the process and that, although there is no precedent of this type for a trial against a former president, there is a precedent in the 19th century, when a member of the cabinet was subjected to a similar procedure under the corruption charge after he had left office.
In the event that Trump is convicted, the Senate could agree to take a second ballot to ban him from future public office, something that would end his options to run again for the presidency in 2024 as some of his supporters hope.
However, it must be remembered that this is a remote possibility because although many Republican congressmen condemned the assault on Congress by Trump's followers, the former president remains a very influential figure among the conservative bases and many fear that his conviction could lead to a division of the republican ranks.
These considerations could weigh heavily on voting.
At the end of the day, as Jon Sopel, the BBC's North American editor, points out, "Although the language of the indictment is full of quasi-legal terminology, the jurors are the 100 Democratic and Republican senators. This is political."
"How many of those who will value the evidence presented for and against Donald Trump will be influenced by it? It is difficult for me to imagine that there is only one", concludes Sopel
