Trump acquitted in impeachment trial

Though he was acquitted, seven Republicans voted to convict him, making it easily the largest number of senators to ever find a president of their own party guilty of an impeachment charge. "The former president tried to overturn the results of a legitimate election-and provoked an assault on our own government-and well over half of the Senate Republican conference chose to condone it!" he said on the Senate floor. Republican Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania joined in voting that Trump was guilty of inciting the insurrection at the US Capitol on January 6.

Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said, "This was the most egregious violation of the Presidential oath of office and a textbook example, a classic example of an impeachable offence, worthy of the constitution's most severe remedy in response to the incontrovertible fact of Donald Trump's guilt".

"There is no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for promoting the event of that day", he said. Five people died in the chaos.

It was a stunningly bitter castigation of Trump by McConnell, who could have used much of the same speech had he instead chose to convict Trump.

Even before the November election, Trump repeatedly claimed that if he lost it would be due to fraud by Democrats, a false accusation that he continued to assert until leaving office.

He said Trump used the presidency to "inflame" the rioters rather than urging them to stand down.

He said there was no evidence that Trump incited an "armed insurrection" to "overthrow the US government" and to think that Trump would have wanted that is "absurd".

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, a former ally of Trump who has blamed him for the insurrection, also warned Saturday the ex-president could be prosecuted in the future. "That's when, according to McCarthy, the president said: 'Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are'".

Cassidy, in a brief statement following his vote Saturday, said: "Our Constitution and our country is more important than any one person".

"President Trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office", McConnell said. By any standard, managers from the House of Representatives established that Trump bears responsibility for the violent assault on the Capitol by crazed supporters eager to stop Congress from ratifying Joe Biden's victory in a free and fair election.

"No president has ever gone through anything like it, and it continues because our opponents can not forget the nearly 75 million people, the highest number ever for a sitting president, who voted for us just a few short months ago". "The entire spectacle has been nothing but the unhinged pursuit of a long-standing political vendetta against Mr Trump by the opposition party". Ideally the powerful case mounted by the House will persuade voters and the Republican Party to bring about the same result.