The prosecution team of Donald Trump’s impeachment trial is expected to wrap up their case on Thursday in the US Senate. They have backed their arguments with bone-chilling evidence in the form of footage that shows senior politicians huddling and hiding from the violent protestors during the Capitol Hill violence on February 6, AFP reported.
The footage shook many senators because of the graphic presentations and video that was mostly collected from security cameras and police bodycams. It was for the first time that these videos were being aired.
The Democrats will be arguing for a second day that the riot was deliberately incited by the former president.
Also Read: Donald Trump was ‘inciter-in-chief’ of deadly January 6 Capitol riot, says trial prosecutor
The ensuing mayhem left five people dead, including one woman shot after she invaded the Capitol and one policeman killed by the crowd.
The violence is believed to have occurred after Trump told in a rally that his failure in the presidential election, was a result of vote-rigging.
However, Trump’s lawyers will argue that Trump cannot be held directly liable for the violence at Capitol Hill. Moreover, the entire trial, according to them is unconstitutional because Trump is no longer in office.
Video played on the Senate floor Wednesday showed then vice president Mike Pence — who was in the Capitol to preside over the certification of Joe Biden’s defeat of Trump — being hurried down back stairs to safety by security officers, along with his family.
Top Democratic senator Chuck Schumer is seen narrowly dodging a rampaging throng of pro-Trump rioters. And Senator Mitt Romney, a Republican who often opposed Trump and was turned into a hate figure by the president, is seen being steered away by an officer at the last moment as an angry crowd approaches.
In another segment, the mob can be seen smashing into the offices of Nancy Pelosi, speaker of the House of Representatives and another frequent target of Trump’s most violent rhetoric.
“Nancy, where are you Nancy?” protesters call out as they search, not knowing that eight of her staff were barricaded behind a door in the same corridor. Pelosi herself had already been urgently whisked away.
“We know from the rioters themselves that if they had found Speaker Pelosi, they would have killed her,” said impeachment manager Stacey Plaskett, a House delegate from the US Virgin Islands.
The impeachment managers laid out their case over several hours arguing that the links are clear between Trump, his lies about election fraud, the violence, and the then president’s inaction as the riot unfolded.
Lead impeachment manager Jamie Raskin said Trump “completely abdicated” his duty.
“Donald Trump surrendered his role as commander-in-chief and became the inciter-in-chief of a dangerous insurrection,” Raskin said.
Holed up in his luxury Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, Trump has been gone from power for three weeks.
But the trial has put the flamboyant and deeply polarizing Republican once more at the center of the national conversation — and underlined his still-powerful hold over the base of the Republican electorate.
Some Republican senators have expressed disgust with the pro-Trump riot, openly blasted Trump’s refusal to accept defeat to Biden, and acknowledged the compelling case made by the Democrats with the aid of extensive video — an unprecedented development on the Senate floor.
“The evidence that has been presented thus far is pretty damning,” Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski said.
“Of course it’s powerful,” Senator Bill Cassidy, who with Murkowski was among six Republicans in supporting the trial’s constitutionality, said of the chilling footage. But “how that influences final decisions remains to be seen.”
It is highly unlikely that enough Republicans will join the Democrats to secure a conviction in the impeachment trial.
This requires a two-thirds majority, meaning 17 Republicans would need to go along with the 50 Democrats.
Forced off Twitter and other social media platforms following his unprecedented attempt to foment a conspiracy theory about his election defeat, Trump has fewer outlets where he can vent.
But it is also believed that advisors are pressing him to keep back, fearing his reappearance could turn Republican senators against him.
According to US media reports, Trump was privately furious on the trial’s opening day Tuesday at what he saw as his own lawyers’ lackluster performance.
This is Trump’s second impeachment. However, unlike the first that lasted for weeks, this one is expected to be over in a few days.
