"Conviction immediately removes the defendant from office. Following conviction, the Senate may vote to further punish the individual by barring him or her from holding future federal office, elected or appointed. As the threshold for disqualification is not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution, the Senate has taken the position that disqualification votes only require a simple majority rather than a two-thirds supermajority. The Senate has used disqualification sparingly, as only three individuals have been disqualified from holding future office.
Conviction does not extend to further punishment, for example, loss of pension. After conviction by the Senate, "the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law" in the regular federal or state courts. However, the Former Presidents Act of 1958, which provides a pension, and other benefits, does not extend to presidents who were removed from office following an impeachment conviction. Because of an amendment to that law made in 2013, a former president who has been removed from office due to impeachment and conviction is still guaranteed lifetime Secret Service protection. " wiki
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IMO impeachment from federal office exists for the purpose of removal from office. A former official cannot be "removed from office." IMO the Belknap case will be treated as freakish. pl
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impeachment_in_the_United_States
Query: Why are “they” so afraid of Trump? Solve for “they”.
Outrage at their actions is not pre-emption of their motivations. Solve for “they”. And then systematically dismantle.
My favorite candidate for one of the “theys” is the teachers unions. Game plan follows to dismantle the power and control of the teachers unions. Step by step.
Attend school board meetings, Get to know each school board member. Write letters. Field slates of alternate candidates and support their election. Then work on state legislators who are not tools for the teachers unions. Elect a state superintendent of education who is not a tool of the teachers unions.
Elect key state officers who are not members of the teachers unions. Support Freedom Foundation who works to get teachers to opt out of the teachers unions, denying the teachers unions their annual dues ($1000 plus every year for teachers in California.
Or in the alternative, accept the fact it is too late to sweep back the sea. And hand this over to the next generation. They will experience the consequences and the costs. Not us ho are well into the last chapters of our own dotage. I hear my own call to action, and I now find myself too lazy to carry it out. It is no longer my fight. And somehow it is also my fault since my generation collectively delivered this fateful harvest.
…. So we can now only………. rage, rage against the dying of the light …..
Record our own voices for posterity in case a new generation wants to learn what life on planet earth was like before BigTech defined and controlled its every waking moment. For future amusement, if nothing else. Look, they played Pick-Up-Sticks for fun after a sit down family dinner.
But much like Mr Willet’s splendid translations from times long past, we owe future generations to also leave written personal histories. Just make sure it is non-biodegradable hard copy.
Forget the First Amendment or the Second Amendment ….. I am going for the Fifth Commandment. Honor thy father and mother. These kids today, if only they would listen to us.
Wasn’t that Socrates or Plato’s lament too? I remember in high school in the late 1950’s reading this lament against the “young people” of Ancient Greece presented as a letter to the editor. I was perplexed, because I did not know what we as teenagers were doing that was so wrong back then that generated this ancient reminder.
I see over at the Daily Mail that my Republican Senator Pat Toomey agrees with me and is calling for Trump to resign. Good.
I also see Nancy Pelosi has declared she has no understanding of Trump supporters and has no desire to understand them. I just saw on CNN that House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn agrees with her.
This is what she said:
“The California Democrat used an online video meeting Saturday with her hometown San Francisco constituents to criticize the overwhelmingly white mob that attacked Congress on Wednesday as it met to formally finalize Joe Biden’s presidential victory over Trump.
‘It has been an epiphany for the world to see that there are people in our country led by this president, for the moment, who have chosen their whiteness over democracy,’ Pelosi said.”
I don’t think people around the world think what happened at the capital was about whiteness. It’s really too bad the Democratic Party leadership has such a simplistic view. It also shows how anti-white some white people can be and why they want so much immigration we don’t need.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9131437/Nancy-Pelosi-accuses-MAGA-mob-stormed-Capitol-choosing-whiteness-democracy.html
I don’t know what the law is but I certainly have assumed that you had to be in office to be impeached.
So I do not know what to make of this statement from House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn on CNN today;
“We’ll take the vote that we should take in the House, and (House Speaker Nancy Pelosi) will make the determination as to when is the best time to get that vote and get the managers appointed and move that legislation over to the Senate,” Clyburn told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union.”
“It just so happens that if it didn’t go over there for 100 days, it could — let’s give President-elect Biden the 100 days he needs to get his agenda off and running, and maybe we’ll send the articles sometime after that,” the South Carolina Democrat added.”
He’s talking about waiting more than three months to get the Senate involved which would mean no trial until the summer. This makes no sense. Nobody should want us still dealing with Trump’s presidency in DC after January 20.
https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2021/01/10/politics/james-clyburn-impeachment-senate-trial-biden-cnntv/index.html
Whilst an Impeachment in the House is probably a foregone conclusion, the Senate is a different matter. McConnell has apparently already said that they won’t vote on it until 13.00 on the 20th, an hour after Biden may well have taken over. At which time Trump will be an ex President and as a private person beyond the reach of Congress. But, if somehow he were to remain in power, interesting.
I assume that McConnell doesn’t want to touch it with a bargepole due to the damage it will do to those of his Senators who hope to get reelected in 2022/24.
Also Pelosi must be driving it forward in an attempt to get him disbarred from being an opponent in the future.
@jerseycityjoan
“[Summer trial] makes no sense.”
George Orwell warned us. Pres. Trump is to become (or rather continue as) the ‘Object of Two Minute Hate.’ These evil globalists are trying to ‘Build Back Better’ the early Soviet Union. They mean us all great harm, including the vast majority of their foolish supporters. While they are transforming our society into open-borders neofeudalism, they need something to distract the leftist Outer Party.
Whatever unhappiness leftists have is not going to be alleviated. Their masters will have FULL control over every institution but will not deliver to them an end to their existential suffering. Even the dumbest of them will notice, if their attention is not directed elsewhere. “Don’t look at the oligarchy! Look at the Evil Orange Man Bad!”
They have been taught, if not conditioned, to hate themselves and the civilization that produced them. Then they are given a partial out: just hate those the NarrativeMasters point out as approved BadWhites and you can be forgive yourself a little for a little while. Permanent absolution is however never on the table.
I don’t see how this can’t but end with the hormonal release of slaughter, maybe next year, maybe in 20 years if there is not a political separation. Hopefully the underway voluntary physical separation will buy us some time for new leadership on both right and left that won’t be tools of the greatest obstacle to peaceful political settlement: transnational finance.
The worst thing that Trump did on the 6th, was not “walk down Pennsylvania Avenue” with the protesters, as he repeatedly said he would do during the rally. Things could have turned out very differently
“This makes no sense. Nobody should want us still dealing with Trump’s presidency in DC after January 20.”
I beg to differ. You and I and all sensible Americans would want to move forward. But there are many who have interest in this. First, there is the unbearable thirst for vengeance among the Dems, media, and their electorate that must be quenched. If they go through with this, they will not stop there. They may want to hound this man to oblivion, some of them. For the sheer petty joy of the exercise.
Also, I can’t imagine how the MSM thinks they will maintain their ratings at their current levels without the boogie man to feed to their audience. It will be difficult to keep eyes on the screen with daily reports of “Joe Biden chose Vanilla ice cream for dessert this evening, Republicans are still Nazis, the COVID will still kill all of you, and Democrats are doing everything right. Over to you, Don.” They need Trump as subject matter to keep the 24/7 content flowing and compelling. They are Ahab and he is their orange Leviathan.
On November 4, 2020 – TWO MONTHS AGO – one day after the election respected writer Thomas Lifson on American Thinker warns about Antifa’s public plans to create a false flag disruption. dressed up as Trump supporters.
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/11/antifa_gearing_up_for_false_flag_violence_disguised_as_trump_supporters.html
Promises made; promises kept. I know this is not rocket science to make this connection, but the brazen plotting and now confirmed tactics need wider and now very timely exposure. Where was the FBI – besides enjoying more deep state bedevilment of Trump?
Many clues indicated the bloody pig and garage door graffiti on Nancy Pelosi’s driveway ..with zero surveillance camera videos posted ever for this event … was also an Antifa false flag for the upcoming US Capitol event.
American Thinker has some good authors staying ahead of a lot of these issues.
What did Nancy Pelosi know and when did she know it?
“A letter sent late on Sunday, Nancy Pelosi confirmed that the coming week will be focused entirely on removing Trump out of office, when she informed colleagues that the House will pass a resolution calling on Pence to invoke the 25th amendment. This will be followed by impeachment.”…….”In other words, the second impeachment of Trump will begin on Tuesday if Pence refuses to invoke the 25th amendment, for which Pelosi has given the VP 24 hours.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/house-impeachment-vote-could-come-soon-tuesday-according-senior-democrat
Joan: While there may be opposition to waiting to send the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate, for a variety of reasons, should the House wait to do so, that action can be explained in part by the process itself.
As I see it, impeachment has four separate phases, one in the House of Representatives, and three in the Senate. The Senate actions would be trial of the allegations contained in the Articles, voting on conviction after trial, and a separate vote on the question of whether Trump should be barred from positions of honor in the government in the future.
There appear to be at least four current members of the Senate that would vote in favor of conviction today. Senators Romney, Sasse, Murkowski, and Toomey. Waiting to send the Articles to the Senate would increase the number of Democrats to 50, and thus conviction would only need 13 additional Republicans. Probably wouldn’t happen, but with the delay, a possible result. Sending the Articles over next week would not result in a trial before Biden is sworn in on January 20 anyway, given that McConnell has pretty much ruled that out.
The delay would also allow things to settle down somewhat, and also avoid the pressure on Republican Senators to take Trump’s side to prevent his ouster from office. Senators who would most probably vote against conviction before January 20 might not feel constrained to vote for conviction if Trump is already out of office. A politically more palatable course of action.
If no conviction occurred, then there would be no vote on banishment from public office, but if conviction occurred, that vote might be an easier pill to swallow for Republicans as well after a delay.
And the delay would allow everyone involved to treat the entire Senate process as expected and proper, with less sturm und drang (sp?).
Of course, for those who feel he has indeed committed incitement to insurrection, his resignation would be viewed as the most reasonable solution to the current problem. But given the past four years, that does not seem likely.
Trust, but verify.
Posted Nov 2, 2020 – the night before the election. Alleged government employees in a leaked “Sunrise” video plotting their next moves in the event Trump wins – take down DC, break into federal building, break windows and surround the White House – even if means using guns…….
https://www.blackandblondemedia.com/2020/11/02/u-s-braces-for-post-election-trump-victory-democrat-violence/
With the chilling caveat from their group’s lawyer member – they might lose their jobs if they “strike”, but looks like violence, chaos and deep state administrative resistance is AOK
NB: Trust, but verify. Nov 2, 2020 videos
But this video is all the more interesting now in retrospect after the unfolding of this week’s events, and the use of a gun by a “government bureaucrat”. Almost as if they did not want all that good deep state Election Night anti-Trump training and logistics go to waste.
In my opinion any statement barring somebody from running for office in future would be unconstitutional as a Bill of Attainder, explicitly proscribed by in the original constitution prior to any amendments.
Trump started this mob violence. Andy Ngo says it wasn’t antifa and he should. Trump needs to move to Israel. He can present his golden toilet to Nutinyahoo for tribute.
https://www.bitchute.com/video/77XyGYDvEXLk/
Hmmm. If a private individual can be impeached *after* leaving public office (why? to what purpose?) then it is not much more of a stretch to claim that it is also possible to impeach someone *before* they get elected to a public office.
A sort of pre-emptive strike against someone for the High Crime and Misdemeanor of being a deplorable.
I mean, why not?
Pelosi and her cohort are clearly making up the rules as it suits them, and if they are going to impeach Trump after he leaves office so he can’t run again then they may as well carry out a pre-emptive impeachment of Don Jnr and Ivanka because…. you know…. ya’ can’t be too careful.
I believe that the Nye County chairman of the GOP has explained the real situation in the following:
https://nyegop.org/2021/01/10/a-letter-from-the-chairman/
Because his analysis concludes that POTUS will smoothly transition to his second term, I am not worried about impeachment. Even if POTUS is impeached in his second term, numerous enemies of the USA will have been exposed. In roughly ten days I will find out whether I have been excessively optimistic.
I am not particularly worried about the idea of rushing a vote for Articles of Impeachment in the House in the few days that remain of Trump’s Presidency. That makes perfect sense to me from a procedural point of view, precisely because impeachment is a process designed to remove an incumbent from office.
It would therefore be manifestly absurd to impeach someone after they leave office.
What really concerns me is the assumption that having secured that vote the House can then sit on its arse for 100 days before going to the Senate.
The reasons given (give Biden’s inauguration some air… blah blah… let Biden settle in… blah blah…) are all partisan-political with no basis in the Constitution nor does it have any precedent. It amounts to saying that the House can simply pocket a vote of impeachment and only take it out again at its convenience.
Well, think long and hard at the implications of that.
Because this is undeniably true: there is nothing in the Constitution that sets a 100 day use-it-or-lose-it limit.
So Pelosi can mouth all the let-bygones-be-bygones homilies she likes, do nothing, and if in three years time Trump announces he is standing again she can pull that impeachment out of her arse and take it to a Democrat-controlled Senate to have The Donald disbarred from the office of POTUS.
I defy anyone to come up with a mechanism that would stop her from doing that.
Because if 100 days is a perfectly acceptable delay between voting for impeachment in the house and taking that to the Senate for trial then so is 365 days. Or 1,095 days.
This proposal for a 100 day delay makes a mockery of the US Constitution. If Pelosi gets away with this then she will do more damage to democracy in in the USA than Trump ever did in four years in office.
jerseycityjoan, that really does seem like kicking the can so far down the road that it has rusted away. Clearly Chinese steel not US.
You would expect the House Majority Whip to be up to speed on the plans so is this their cover recognising that the Senate is unlikely to move on the issue by the 20th? If so, Pelosi’s frantic activities in puffing it up are surely a great big distraction exercise probably intended to bury any uncomfortable information that Trump might release.
I am of the view that the US PTB got such a shock that an Outsider, Trump, won in 2016 that they decided to make sure that only ‘anointed’ ones had a chance in the future, as in the past. What is happening now is the over-reaction to the unexpectedly large vote cast again to the Outsider along with a determination to ensure that he will no longer be a threat post 20th Jan.
The events at the Capitol on the 6th look to have been a very successful part of that operation and the next stages of the plan are well underway.
What seems to be happening is far more strategic than a bit of public deplatforming here and there. It is all about eliminating meaningful uncontrolled opposition.
Wars and their battles, be they political or physical, are only won with the interchange of information, logistics and communications leading to organisation and co-ordinated plans followed by actions. Those controlling the future of the US seem now to be well down the path of eliminating this as a risk to their plans. As in, how in the situation that seems to be unfolding, will this be possible any more?
In particular, how can you organise and set up supplies for an event, or even perhaps a meeting, when almost the only way of securely communicating will be by word of mouth, hand passed letters or maybe CB radio? In effect, nothing out of your local community.
The situation unfolding is that the IC and the three letter agencies will be in the 21st Century, the unauthorised opposition will barely be in the 17th.
Whilst it looks unstoppable, the DC power base may be overestimating their power over the people. Americans tend to be a pretty independently minded bunch that don’t bow down, they give the third finger to authority. The runes point towards the US being headed towards a period of very messy people versus the Government.
Optimax,
what were the precise words Trump used? Punch “back twice as hard”, like Obama? I sure didn’t hear anyone say drag those cops out and beat them to death. Just curious as you didn’t link to Trump’s speech.
“According to sources familiar with the matter, authorities believe Sicknick’s death was driven by a medical condition.”… “Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund resigned on Thursday afternoon in the wake of the riots. Pelosi was among those calling for his resignation.
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/capitol-police-officer-dies-injuries-suffered-riots/story?id=75124131
That news story was posted on the 8th. The FBI ‘solved’ the Nashille bombing in just 48 hours. So far what has happened here? Maybe they need Mueller back to run a real investigation for them.
We watched all summer as NG units were told to stand down, police were ordered to stand down and now this. Every Democratic office holder and Biden said those were ‘mostly peaceful’ events, ones that got groups involved millions in corporate donations. Of course this is all Trump’s fault and all present are collectively guilty of sedition? I’m sure that will sway the opinion of all the people who voted for him.
I agree with Deap about the Teachers’ Unions and their role in the mess our country is now in. However, instead of going after the teachers’ unions, go after the school boards that have usually been in the pocket of the teachers’ unions.
In the last large (largest in our state) district in which I taught, the parents took control of the school board by electing a majority on the board who were in favor of schools of choice. When those board members started showing their favor towards establishing schools of choice, the teachers’ union became quite angry.
They began marching with signs on the one boulevard that ran north-south through our county asking people to vote for a recall of the board members. Many stupid parents in our county allowed their children to take days off of school (for credit) to march with the teachers. It was absolutely ridiculous for them to allow that. Our students’ state test scores had been in long decline. Yet the test scores of the students in the schools of choice were rising.
I pity those parents. They are all products of the teachers’ unions themselves. Group think all the way. Be nice and don’t expect that subject matter content should be taught. Teach only social skills and give credit for trying but don’t reward excellence since it makes other’s who are not so bright feel bad.
Schools of Choice run by parents–that is what we need. Vote only for school board members who will hold firm on that issue. Or if parents can afford it, send your students to a school of choice that fits your child’s needs and actually educates him/her in content knowledge rather than in just social skills and that sort of blather.
I think you can make the argument that its valid to hold the trial in the Senate after leaving office as long as the House impeaches before someone leaves office.
If the only punishment was removal then it would be totally pointless. But the lifetime ban on federal office it some meaning.
At this point, I’d prefer that Trump remains eligible, run for President and get crushed by the voters, the ultimate punishment for a narcissist. Making him a martyr is a gift. If he actually got elected, well, we certainly can’t say we didn’t know what we bought in 2024.
[Is that a ban on federal or federal & state office? Those Founders were Wiley, I won’t take a position on that, but it means one or both]
Christian J Chuba, the “total pointlessness” of a Senate trial once an incumbent leaves federal office has legal implications i.e. it means the Articles of Impeachment become “moot”.
That is an important consideration because the Senate has always adopted the precedent that you convict *first*, and only then have a *second* vote to secure a lifetime ban.
So if the first stage is moot (which I believe it is) then the second stage becomes a non-starter.
But then again the USA is rapidly descending into the world’s biggest banana republic, and in a banana republic rules are for losers and the generalissimo gets to change the rulebook on a whim.
Fred
I live in Portland and after 160 nights have lost count of number of riots. I’ve blamed BLM for giving antifa cover for their destruction, for incendiary rhetoric, for knowing there would be riots and then acting as if they were completely innocent. I’ve gotten in heated arguments, first, with a woman I’ve been friendly with when she called Trump a fascist and another with a woman telling me the cops invited the mob into the Capitol Building. I’ve linked to two videos of the cops bravely fighting off the vicious attacks of the mob.
Trump inflamed the protesters, most did’nt even march to the capitol bld and I commend them but condemn the rightie rioters as much as the leftie rioters. What sickens me is seeing rioters in Portland getting arrested and let go without charges. Some have been arrested 3,4 times and still released.
Trump was naive or just plain stupid to not realize there were agitators in the crowd ready to rumple. I want to see equal treatment by the law of all rioters no matter their cause.
If my choice is between Trump or Biden I say fock em both. I voted for Trump because he was the lesser of two evils. I will support evil no more. That is my choice.
Chris Chuba – to nitpick, the actual language of the Constitution does not prescribe those penalties. Rather it limits the penalties to removal from office and prohibition against holding office in the future.
“Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States:…”
Of course, Pelosi et al intend to use the full penalties.
The Constitution also prohibits an impeached president from granting pardons. Could this be a consideration in the rush to impeach a President less than 10 days from his expiration date? No need for Senate conviction.
If a prez who has left office can still be tried by the Senate, does that mean that we can retroactively impeach any living president, who has already left office?
The founders were above all men of hard-won practical and common sense. They surely intended none of this tortured exploitation of the mechanism they established to protect the Community, as Madison described it, from unworthy leaders, by relieving them of power sooner than their Constitutionally mandated term.
In constitutional discussions, some worried that giving the Legislature power to impeach the Executive would render the Executive a subservient, not independent, branch of the government. Thus giving the Legislature tyrannical power, possibly even a tyranny of partisanship.
That certainly seems to be what the current leadership of the House has in mind. Although they appear, in the present time, as servants or partners to extra-constitutional powers hardly imagined by the writers of the Constitution.
Smoke: “If a prez who has left office can still be tried by the Senate, does that mean that we can retroactively impeach any living president, who has already left office?”
I believe it is a given that Pelosi must secure a vote of Impeachment before Trump leaves office.
The question is this: having secured that impeachment BEFORE Trump leaves office can that case still be taken to the Senate for trial AFTER he leaves office?
I’d say “no”.