How the Impeachment Trial Ends
The Lawfare Podcast
The Lawfare Institute
4.7 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 17 February 2021
⏱️ 50 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The second impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump is now over. It ended with a roar and then a whimper, and then a little bit of a roar again, as seven Republicans joined all of the Democrats to convict the former president. It wasn't enough, as the Senate needed 67 votes to convict and it only had 57, but it made a statement of sorts—or did it? To discuss the impeachment trial, its weird ending and where it fits in with the effort to hold Donald Trump accountable, Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare managing editor Quinta Jurecic, Lawfare chief operating officer David Priess, senior editor Scott R. Anderson and congressional guru Molly Reynolds. They talked about how the impeachment trial ended, what it meant that the Senate voted to call witnesses and then didn't bother, how to interpret the Senate's performance overall in the second impeachment trial and what the options are now that Donald Trump is a private citizen facing potential civil litigation, as well as criminal investigations and a possible 9/11-style commission.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The following podcast contains advertising. |
| 0:04.0 | To access an ad-free version of the LawFair podcast, |
| 0:08.0 | become a material supporter of LawFair at patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:14.0 | That's patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:18.0 | Also, check out LawFair's other podcast offerings, |
| 0:22.0 | rational security, chatter, law fair no bull, and the aftermath. |
| 0:29.0 | The Democrats only are guaranteed, and maybe not even guaranteed, |
| 0:37.0 | or only likely to have the Senate for two years, |
| 0:39.0 | and they have a lot they want to get done in that period. |
| 0:41.0 | And so it makes sense to me that they got what they could out of this, |
| 0:44.0 | and now they're moving on to the rest of the agenda, |
| 0:46.0 | and other processes are going to take on that accountability role, |
| 0:49.0 | because the Republican votes just weren't there for the Senate |
| 0:52.0 | and impeachment trial to have any other outcome than the one that did. |
| 0:55.0 | I'm Benjamin Wittes, and this is the LawFair podcast February 17, 2021. |
| 1:02.0 | The impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump, |
| 1:05.0 | that is the second impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump, is now over. |
| 1:11.0 | It ended with a roar and then a whimper. |
| 1:15.0 | And then a little bit of a roar again, |
| 1:17.0 | as seven Republicans joined all of the Democrats to convict the former president. |
| 1:23.0 | It wasn't enough, as the Senate needs 67 votes to convict, |
| 1:28.0 | and only had 57, but it made a statement of sorts, or did it. |
... |
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