Donald Trump undoubtedly imagined the end of his mandate differently. Accused by the Democrats of having incited his supporters to insurgency during the assault on the Capitol, the American president will face, Wednesday, January 13, a second historic procedure of“impeachment”. A week after the January 6 violence, which left five dead in Washington, a vote is scheduled for around 3 p.m. (9 p.m. in Paris) on his indictment in the House of Representatives.
Backed by a large number of Democrats, who control the lower house, and with notable backing from a handful of Republicans, it should pass easily. The 45th American president is expected to become the first in the country’s history to be indicted twice in Congress in impeachment proceedings on Wednesday.
On Tuesday, the president was nevertheless still convinced that no one would rush his exit from the White House before the end of his term on January 20. From Alamo, Texas, he tried to adopt a less aggressive posture than last week, evoking the weather “peace and quiet”. He also tried to reduce the procedure aimed at him to a maneuver by the Democrats, a new “witch hunt”.
Its vice president, Mike Pence, later definitively dismissed the other threat to his end of mandate: he refused to invoke the 25th amendment to the Constitution which would have allowed him to remove the outgoing president by declaring him unfit. to perform its function.
Despite this disqualification, the Democratic-majority House of Representatives approved a resolution, now symbolic, urging it to invoke this amendment. But if the latter was only supported by a Republican, the act of“impeachment” could receive the accolade of more members of the “Grand Old Party”. Already five had announced their support on Tuesday evening. Among them, Liz Cheney, one of the leaders of the Republican minority in the House and daughter of the former US vice president. “None of this would have happened without the president”, she estimated in a vitriolic press release (article in English).
The powerful Democratic President of the House, Nancy Pelosi, has revealed the names of her team of “prosecutors”, who will be responsible for bringing the case to the Senate, with a Republican majority, for the impeachment trial.
