Impeachment, because this process is so important to the future of Trump and the GOP
Barring a very convincing performance from Democratic prosecutors, Donald Trump's impeachment trial, kicking off this week, will almost certainly end in his acquittal. Democrats need the vote of 17 Republicans to condemn the Tycoon for the January 6 assault on Congress: Republican support is very unlikely. The aspect to consider of the second Trump impeachment trial, however, does not concern the present, but the political future of the Tycoon and the Grand Old Party
President Joe Biden and the Democrats are keenly aware of this and are pushing for the process to be swift and fair. The one on which the Republicans are also concentrating, who consider all this "a gimmick, unjust and unconstitutional".
But even if the outcome is almost predetermined, both sides will do their best to use the process as an opportunity for new political narratives: Democrats and Republicans hope these will influence next year's midterm elections and perhaps the upcoming elections as well. of 2024.
The strategy of the democrats
They call it "lesson learned" and it is the element on which the Democrats' strategy is based to better address this second impeachment process.
When Adam B. Schiff, a Democrat from California, was preparing to prosecute the Tycoon for the first time for a campaign of pressure on Ukraine, he concentrated on reading the 605 pages of President Bill Clinton's 1999 impeachment trial.
A strategy that, however, did not turn out to be successful.
That's why on this second occasion everything will be simpler and leaner: the prosecutors will make a shorter presentation and above all full of videos, with the aim of recreating, as far as possible, the fury of the assault of last January 6 “Relive” to those who saw it up close that day. And above all, the arguments for discussion and accusation will be brief, to prevent the jury from losing attention.
How Trump's lawyers will respond
It will be a largely technical defense, arguing that the Senate "has no jurisdiction" to judge a former president after he leaves office because the Constitution does not explicitly say so. Although many legal scholars and the Senate majority disagree, Republicans have focused on this as a justification for dismissing the case without weighing on Trump's conduct.
Possible reactions to the verdict
The post-trial script is probably already written for Trump and his supporters. It will sound a lot like the script he used after he was acquitted in the impeachment trial last February: "We went through hell, unfairly. I didn't do anything wrong ... It was all nonsense."
A sort of popular mantra within the GOP, which blames the Democrats, the media (and others) for trying to "silence" Trump and other Republicans.
The Republican Party will come out very divided by the outcome of the impeachment process. So what will its future be? What will be the legacy, the legacy of what happened and of the Trump presidency? Will the impeachment allow the GOP to start from scratch or will it give a new image to Donal Trump?
What is currently known is that the result of this process will certainly serve to outline the political future of the Tycoon which, from January 20 onwards, has moved to its residence in Mar-a-Lago. And he created the former President's office, through which he maintains relationships with his, many, supporters and financiers. Now it remains only to understand what (if any) his role within the GOP will be and how he can influence the mid-term elections in 2022.
