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What does the US Constitution say about removing a president who is out of office?
FR ^ | 1/23/21 | Sidebar Monitor

Posted on 01/23/2021 12:38:04 AM PST by Sidebar Moderator

What does the US Constitution say about removing a president who is out of office?

And who presides over this farce? The Constitution says the Chief Justice will preside over a trial of the "president". BUT TRUMP is now a private citizen. Joe Biden is president.


TOPICS: Free Republic Policy/Q&A
KEYWORDS: constitution; impeachment
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To: ifinnegan

That’s an interesting way to look at this.
If the Democrats are so hell-bent on impeaching Trump while he is out of office, they must be going under the assumption that he is still president and that Biden is illegitimate due to voter fraud perpetuated by the Democrats.

Of course, we are all assuming that the Democrats care about the constitution. It’s quite obvious that they don’t.

If we have no constitution, we have no rule of law.
If we have no rule of law, we have anarchy.
And the Democrats have happily taken us down this path.


21 posted on 01/23/2021 1:07:38 AM PST by RandallFlagg (Only a moronic, suicidal group would try a Great Purge 2021 on an armed American. We're ready!)
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To: Sidebar Moderator
“When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside.”

Roberts will use pretzel logic to say its a tax, thereby making it constitutional.

22 posted on 01/23/2021 1:07:56 AM PST by BiglyCommentary
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To: SoCal Pubbie

But President Trump did not resign.


23 posted on 01/23/2021 1:08:11 AM PST by familyop
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To: Starstruck

True, but the reason for the resulting acquittal was because enough senators didn’t think they had jurisdiction. That can hardly serve as a precedent for moving forward in Trump’s case. If anything, it buttresses the point of how pointless this whole exercise is.


24 posted on 01/23/2021 1:11:27 AM PST by Sidebar Moderator
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To: mrsmith

What else is there to do on the graveyard shift other than listen to George Noory and get all excited about UFO’s and space aliens?


25 posted on 01/23/2021 1:12:41 AM PST by BiglyCommentary
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To: BiglyCommentary

😂😂😂😂👍


26 posted on 01/23/2021 1:13:19 AM PST by Sidebar Moderator
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To: Starstruck; SoCal Pubbie; Sidebar Moderator

Pubbie informed me about Grant’s Secretary of War. It appears he was guilty and resigned but was found innocent. Life is strange.


27 posted on 01/23/2021 1:13:40 AM PST by Starstruck ( Since I'm old I don't whether I'm senile or brilliant. Or happily both.)
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To: Starstruck

Yesterday, some count was done, and it only appears that 7 Republicans are in some pro-impeachment mode.

I suspect that even when it’s convened....neither Trump or his lawyers will attend, and once the ‘prosecution’ phase ends...McConnell will move to just an immediate vote. In the end, they won’t go past sixty.

I will add that the bulk of Republicans up for re-election in 2022 are fairly scared of what is coming and they need to venture out of this mess and avoid antagonizing Trump any more.

A lot of this will be remembered, and somewhere over the next decade, with the RINOs removed...impeachment will be used against the Democrats (possibly even Obama might be dragged in over the misuse of intelligence collection against Trump).


28 posted on 01/23/2021 1:13:46 AM PST by pepsionice
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To: BiglyCommentary

LOL!


29 posted on 01/23/2021 1:15:01 AM PST by Sidebar Moderator
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To: pepsionice

It will either pass quickly or Trump and his lawyers will decide to drag some rancid meat through the swamp.


30 posted on 01/23/2021 1:17:39 AM PST by Starstruck ( Since I'm old I don't whether I'm senile or brilliant. Or happily both.)
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To: Starstruck

Hope it’s the latter. What a show that would be.


31 posted on 01/23/2021 1:21:08 AM PST by Sidebar Moderator
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To: Starstruck

Interesting that the political betting site has 67+ votes for conviction at only 15% odds. It is infested with college libtards who skew the odds in that direction so not even the other side thinks the odds are great that Trump would get convicted.


32 posted on 01/23/2021 1:23:52 AM PST by BiglyCommentary
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To: Sidebar Moderator
https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artII_S4_2_3_3/

Excerpt:

"The first and only time a Cabinet-level official was impeached occurred during the presidential administration of Ulysses S. Grant. Grant's Secretary of War, William W. Belknap, was impeached in 1876 for allegedly receiving payments in return for appointing an individual to maintain a trading post in Indian territory. Belknap resigned two hours before the House unanimously impeached him, but the Senate nevertheless conducted a trial in which Belknap was acquitted. During the trial, upon objection by Secretary Belknap's counsel that the Senate lacked jurisdiction because Belknap was now a private citizen, the Senate voted 37-29 in favor of jurisdiction. A majority of Senators voted to convict Secretary Belknap, but no article mustered a two-thirds majority, resulting in acquittal. A number of Senators voting to acquit indicated that they did so because the Senate did not have jurisdiction over an individual no longer in office. Notably, although bribery is explicitly included as an impeachable offense in the Constitution, the impeachment articles brought against Secretary Belknap instead charged his behavior as constituting high crimes and misdemeanors. Bribery was mentioned at the Senate trial, but it was not specifically referenced in the impeachment articles themselves."

33 posted on 01/23/2021 1:30:46 AM PST by BiglyCommentary
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To: Starstruck

About a week ago...some journalist noted that SCJ Roberts had made a private comment (I assume to McConnell/Schumer) that he had zero interest in being the sitting judge on this particular impeachment. No details were given but I suspect he knows it’ll drag up to be a case before the court within twelve months.

I think the Constitution says that the presiding official should be the Chief Justice. It doesn’t really say what happens if he counters them to say ‘no, I won’t do the job’.

They (the Democrats) might make up a rule out of thin air....bringing in some retired Senator or former federal judge to act in this capacity...but all it’d do is provide more problems in dumping the conviction if it went to the Supreme Court for review.

In simple terms....it just makes everything appear more like a government in Paraguay, than a legit government.


34 posted on 01/23/2021 1:33:44 AM PST by pepsionice
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To: BiglyCommentary

Exactly. That’s real thin gruel for the impeachers to lap up as their precedent for moving forward on a retroactive presidential impeachment case.


35 posted on 01/23/2021 1:36:48 AM PST by Sidebar Moderator
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To: BiglyCommentary
And the Chief Justice doesn't preside when it's not the President.

What will Roberts' presence say about the constitutionality of it if he agrees to participate?

-PJ

36 posted on 01/23/2021 1:37:46 AM PST by Political Junkie Too (Freedom of the press is the People's right to publish, not CNN's right to the 1st question.)
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To: pepsionice

Don’t think impeachment is subject to judicial review though. Not a legal beagle, so I could be wrong.


37 posted on 01/23/2021 1:39:23 AM PST by Sidebar Moderator
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To: familyop
The excuse for impeaching William W. Belknap was that he resigned for the purpose of evading impeachment.

Isn't that what Nixon did?

If the goal of impeachment is removal from office and the Cabinet member voluntarily removes himself from office, isn't the goal achieved?

If they are afraid that the person will be appointed to office again, the Senate can always refuse to confirm that person. They don't need an ex post facto impeachment.

-PJ

38 posted on 01/23/2021 1:41:21 AM PST by Political Junkie Too (Freedom of the press is the People's right to publish, not CNN's right to the 1st question.)
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To: Sidebar Moderator

I think it would be a brilliant move for Trump’s attorneys to let it be known that they intend to subpoena Bill Ayers (Capitol Building bomber, Obozo’s ghost writer, fund raiser, and BFF) as a witness. Make them “just not want to go there...”


39 posted on 01/23/2021 1:42:06 AM PST by BiglyCommentary
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To: Starstruck

“Sorry about that. Murkowski and Collins are women so them having gonads would be inappropriate.”

In men, testicles = gonads. In women, ovaries = gonads. As long as you don’t have a job that requires an understanding of human anatomy or physiology, I guess the rest of us don’t need to worry.


40 posted on 01/23/2021 1:42:25 AM PST by T-Bird45 (It feels like the seventies, and it shouldn't.)
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