Today is Wednesday, January 27th, and you're listening to The Morning Announcements.

I'm Sammy Sage.

First, we have a rather disappointing update on the Senate trial of Donald Trump.

Yesterday, the Senate held a vote in response to an objection raised by Senator Rand Paul

that questioned the constitutional basis for Trump's trial since he is now out of office.

Only five Republican senators joined the Democrats to go forward with the trial, including

Mitt Romney, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, Ben Stass, and Pat Tumi, who is retiring this

year.

While this vote does mean that the Senate trial will go forward, this vote count definitely

does not vote well for the likelihood that Democrats will be able to pick up an additional

12 senators who are willing to vote to can make Trump and bar him from holding office

again.

It's really frustrating that I even have to bring this up, but the only reason that

Trump is being tried as a former president is because Mitch McConnell refused to start

the trial until January 19th, even though the insurrection happened on January 6th.

I really feel like I'm taking crazy pills.

Also, I should point out that the Republican's argument about Trump being a private citizen

requires a major fact check.

The Congressional Research Service, which is the public policy think tank for the U.S.

Congress, has twice reported that most constitutional scholars say a Senate trial of an impeached

former official is constitutional.

But what do they care?

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