Not Guilty: Split Senate acquits Trump of impeachment
Published:Wednesday | February 5, 2020 | 4:49 PM
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump won impeachment acquittal Wednesday in the US Senate, bringing to a close only the third presidential trial in American history with votes that split the country, tested civic norms and fed the tumultuous 2020 race for the White House.
A majority of senators expressed unease with Trump’s pressure campaign on Ukraine that resulted in the two articles of impeachment.
But the final tallies — 52-48 favouring acquittal of abuse of power, 53-47 of obstruction of Congress’ investigation — fell far short.
A two-thirds “guilty” votes would have been needed to reach the Constitution’s bar of high crimes and misdemeanours to convict and remove Trump from office.
The outcome Wednesday followed months of remarkable impeachment proceedings, from Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s House to Mitch McConnell’s Senate, reflecting the nation’s unrelenting partisan divide three years into the Trump presidency.
What started as Trump’s request for Ukraine to “do us a favour” spun into a far-reaching, 28,000-page report compiled by House investigators accusing an American president of engaging in shadow diplomacy that threatened US foreign relations for personal, political gain as he pressured the ally to investigate Democratic rival Joe Biden ahead of the next election.
No president has ever been removed by the Senate.
A politically emboldened Trump has eagerly predicted vindication, deploying the verdict as a political anthem in his reelection bid.
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