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Democrats Cannot Impeach Trump, and You Can’t Impeach Him After Leaving Office: Prof. Alan Dershowitz
Epoch Times ^ | 01/10/2021 | Jack Phillips

Posted on 01/10/2021 9:09:31 PM PST by SeekAndFind

Harvard Law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz said Democrats have virtually no chance of successfully impeaching and removing President Donald Trump before Inauguration Day on Jan. 20.

“The case cannot come to trial in the Senate. Because the Senate has rules, and the rules would not allow the case to come to trial until, according to the majority leader, until 1 p.m. on January 20th, an hour after President Trump leaves office,” Dershowitz said in a Fox Business interview on Sunday.

Dershowitz, who defended Trump during the Senate impeachment trial about a year ago, suggested that the Constitution does not allow for impeaching a former president.

“And the Constitution specifically says, ‘The President shall be removed from office upon impeachment.’ It doesn’t say the former president. Congress has no power to impeach or try a private citizen, whether it be a private citizen named Donald Trump or named Barack Obama or anyone else,” he said.

It comes as House Democrats have proposed articles of impeachment after Trump made a speech to protesters near the Capitol. Some critics have claimed Trump incited the crowd into violence before a group stormed the Capitol building.

Trump told the crowd beforehand that their protest shows “the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country” and “let us walk down Pennsylvania Avenue.” The president did not tell the protesters to breach the Capitol or commit acts of violence and later condemned them.

At one point, Trump told the protesters to “peacefully and patriotically make your voices be heard.”

Another Trump defender during the House impeachment inquiry, law professor Jonathan Turley, explained that impeaching Trump over his speech would set a dangerous precedent.

(Excerpt) Read more at theepochtimes.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Editorial; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 2020; alandershowitz; biden; constitution; contraindicated; democrats; impeachment; kag; maga; oftenwrong; pelosi; thedersh; trump
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To: Right_in_Virginia

We will just change the name: God Bless the USA Rallies.


21 posted on 01/10/2021 10:23:48 PM PST by madison10 (Trump's greatest accomplishment is getting all the cockroaches to come into the light.)
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To: SeekAndFind

Imagine if the left had read the Constitution, a document they swore to uphold and defend?


22 posted on 01/10/2021 10:41:34 PM PST by Cobra64 (Common sense isn’t common anymore.)
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To: SeekAndFind
“And the Constitution specifically says, ‘The President shall be removed from office upon impeachment.’

Dersh's point is correct but it doesn't actually say that in the Constitution.

23 posted on 01/10/2021 10:42:00 PM PST by TigersEye (2020 - The year of massive frauds. Impeachment - masks - lockdowns - Biden - elections...)
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To: SeekAndFind

As if the Democrats what Constitution and law says.

The Democrats are now the law and you are either with them or a “domestic terrorist.”


24 posted on 01/10/2021 10:46:09 PM PST by thegagline
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To: SeekAndFind

This push to silence President Trump, to impeach him or remove him from office using the 25th Ammendment and all this other over the top nonsense with just ten days to go makes one wonder what they are so worried about. And if you look at that “consession speech”... it does not concede anything.
President Trump has something up his sleeve and they all know it... most of the rest of us seem to be in the dark.


25 posted on 01/10/2021 10:49:48 PM PST by fireman15
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To: fireman15

It really seems to be well beyond their usual nuttiness. This is instigating a big firestorm when they don’t need to do anything at all.


26 posted on 01/10/2021 10:55:11 PM PST by TigersEye (2020 - The year of massive frauds. Impeachment - masks - lockdowns - Biden - elections...)
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To: madison10; Right_in_Virginia

Change the name of the rally to “Joe Biden is our savior” and let them call THAT terrorism.


27 posted on 01/10/2021 10:59:42 PM PST by Enterprise
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To: SeekAndFind
Dershowitz, who defended Trump during the Senate impeachment trial about a year ago, suggested that the Constitution does not allow for impeaching a former president.

“And the Constitution specifically says, ‘The President shall be removed from office upon impeachment.’ It doesn’t say the former president. Congress has no power to impeach or try a private citizen, whether it be a private citizen named Donald Trump or named Barack Obama or anyone else,” he said.

Looks to me like Dershowitz did more than merely "suggest."

Journalists these days!!!

Regards,

28 posted on 01/10/2021 11:00:32 PM PST by alexander_busek (Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.)
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Comment #29 Removed by Moderator

Comment #30 Removed by Moderator

Comment #31 Removed by Moderator

To: SeekAndFind

You can’t change election law during an election but here we are.


32 posted on 01/10/2021 11:33:32 PM PST by Organic Panic (Flinging poo is not a valid argument)
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To: Scram1

Belknap resigned with the intent of evading the impeachment process. President Trump is not resigning. His term is ending. That’s the determining difference between the two.


33 posted on 01/11/2021 1:18:43 AM PST by familyop
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To: SeekAndFind

Look at all of the pearl clutching here. ;D

You know that the Democrats have no reason to impeach and will not be able to convict in the Senate. The whole mess is a Democrat drama to keep their stupid working class faction mesmerized for now. They don’t want poorer Democrat voters (who hate their ex-husbands, ex-boyfriends and fathers) to realize that they voted to enslave themselves and lose some of their most important freedoms to plutocrats.

A related problem for us is that some Democrat infiltrators have too many of the dimmer minds on our side mesmerized with even more stupid dramas.

Anyway, some of the more intelligent Democrats know that they’ll be facing the consequence of a great and terrible backlash for their current politics of hatred and criminality. They’re only trying to hang in there for today.

The impulsive majority of Democrats are simply behaving like spoiled rotten children, addicted to bothering others but insatiable and unhappy. Notice them acting like they’re going to collide with you while driving on some days. Many of them are addicted to drugs, prescribed or illicit and unhealthy. Others have unhealthy sex addictions but have become fatter and uglier. That’s why they’re acting like zombies of some sort.

Many of them blew some of their own rights away by being busted or repeatedly high/rollin’/hallucinating/jonesin’ and strung out. Camel Lips and her nanny/police state crew has a surprise for them (busted again, ha).

Good riddance. Sayonara, addicted harpies, and your illegitimate, crazed adult kids, too. Go ahead. Run with that rage and gluttony. Keep looking for that feel-good! Faster!


34 posted on 01/11/2021 1:46:43 AM PST by familyop
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To: fireman15

Even if Trump doesn’t have anything up his sleeve it’s fun to watch them squirm like a snake under a heavy rock on it’s head.


35 posted on 01/11/2021 3:22:25 AM PST by lilypad
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To: Truthoverpower

Yep - he still leans left but is honest...a true rarity.


36 posted on 01/11/2021 5:12:31 AM PST by trebb (Fight like your life and future depends on it - because they do.)
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To: SeekAndFind

What would stop new majority leader Schumer from calling back the senate and changing the rules to force an immediate impeachment trial?

In fact comrade Schumer could probably rule that the senate does not need to hold a trial and just vote Trump guilty as charged as the evidence provided by the House is overwhelming.

These are truly dark times!


37 posted on 01/11/2021 5:53:12 AM PST by Colo9250 (The GOP died 1/6/2021, Long live the American Patriot Party!)
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To: SoCal Pubbie
I posted the case of Grant’s secretary of war. He was impeached after resigning. Perhaps someone else did also.

If the dems want to do this, they will. There’s nothing to stop them. Getting two thirds to convict in the Senate is another matter but nothing is certain.

Yes. I don’t know of any others who were impeached after resigning or otherwise leaving office, but several have resigned or left office after impeachment but before the conclusion of the trial, which would be the situation with Trump.

I don’t know of any in which the trial automatically ended, and the Senate has repeatedly taken the position that it still has jurisdiction to try and convict a former officer. The first time this happened was Sen. William Blount who was impeached in 1797 and then expelled from the Senate before he could be tried. He moved to dismiss on two grounds: (1) Senators are not “officers” subject to impeachment, and (2) he is no longer an “officer” because he was expelled. The Senate dismissed on the first ground, not the second.

The most recent was Judge Kent in 2009. A couple weeks after he resigned, the House passed a resolution instructing the managers merely to inform the Senate that it “no longer desires to urge” the articles. The Senate accepted that and dismissed.

As far as I can tell, the Senate has never acknowledged that it lacked jurisdiction to try and convict an impeached former officer. But it has also never convicted a former officer, so no one has ever had a reason, or standing, to challenge this in court.

I can think of an argument or two against it, probably based on the bills of attainder clause, but you have to get pretty deep in the weeds to get there. Regardless, it is not at all clear that Dershowitz is right, and the Senate has historically disagreed with him.

38 posted on 01/11/2021 6:19:02 AM PST by The Pack Knight
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To: Cobra64

They’ve read it, but it’s like Kryptonite to them.


39 posted on 01/11/2021 6:26:17 AM PST by Disambiguator
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To: The Pack Knight

I’m glad I’m not the only one to realize that this horrible possibility might just come to pass.

What’s your view on getting seventeen republicans to convict? With Trump completely isolated now and unable to defend himself in the court of public opinion, and a hostile media universally aligned to purge him, I expect future “bombshells” alleging impeachable offenses. One hundred days is plenty to have US attorneys file criminal charges. I fear that the GOP will be happy to rid themselves of Orange Man Bad.


40 posted on 01/11/2021 6:47:50 AM PST by SoCal Pubbie
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