Top conservative lawyer says Constitution does allow for Trump impeachment trial
Charles J. Cooper, a conservative constitutional attorney, says in an op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal on Sunday that Republicans were wrong to argue that it is unconstitutional to hold an impeachment trial for a former president.
All but five GOP senators backed former president Donald Trump in a vote late last month after Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) challenged the constitutional basis for the the Senate impeachment trial of a former president.
“Impeachment is for removal from office, and the accused here has already left office,” Paul argued.
The vote signaled that the trial proceedings scheduled to start Tuesday are likely to end with the former president’s acquittal on the charge that he incited the Jan. 6 Capitol riot that left five people dead, including a Capitol Police officer.
In the op-ed, Cooper points to a provision of the Constitution that states: “The president, vice president and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”
“The trial’s opponents argue that because this provision requires removal, and because only incumbent officers can be removed, it follows that only incumbent officers can be impeached and tried,” he wrote. “But the provision cuts against their interpretation. It simply establishes what is known in criminal law as a ‘mandatory minimum’ punishment.”
He wrote that the argument would be “compelling” if removal from office were the only punishment, adding that the Constitution allows the Senate to disqualify those convicted of impeachable offenses from holding office again.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/cooper-trump-impeachment/2021/02/08/1fc83bb2-6a14-11eb-9ead-673168d5b874_story.html
