It is patent bullshit that the impeachment trial was unconstitutional because Trump was no longer in office. The impeachment itself occurred while he was still in office. Nothing in the Constitution bars an impeachment trial after an officeholder has left that office. There is no law that bars such a trial, either. In fact, the Senate has conducted such trials in the past, though not of a president. (Incidentally, the only reason the Senate trial didn't start while Trump was still president is that Mitch McConnell flatly refused to reconvene the Senate until the day before Biden's inauguration.)
"Impeachment after leaving office is unconstitutional", though, sounds plausible as a defense, if your audience either (a) doesn't know much about what happened or (b) is deeply motivated to find Trump innocent no matter what.
Acquittal was dishonorable. Yet people — even senators — want to think of themselves as honorable. So why did those Republican senators vote to acquit?
The popular answer is, they fear Trump's sway over Republican voters. And if the subject at hand had been a simple legislative issue, like a particular bill, I could understand that fear.
But the subject at hand wasn't a bill. It was the role the former president played in fomenting violent insurrection.
Incessant angry lies by Trump and his allies hadn't altered the process of certifying the electoral results (though they came disturbingly close). Violence was the only logical recourse for the 6 January 2021 rallygoers, who took Trump seriously and literally.
The election was nearly undone by a violent mob acting under the influence of lying propaganda. That should make anyone who took the oath of office — which, no matter the office, calls above all for upholding the Constitution — mindful of what that oath means. Peaceful transfer of power is at the heart of the constitutional order. If the transfer of power between elected officials can be disrupted by a mob, the Constitution is an empty document.
The senators who voted to acquit not only did not hold to account a man who fought to overturn the constitutional order, they encouraged future sociopaths who will see a roadmap to autocracy if they can only emulate Trump's strengths (demagoguery most of all) while avoiding his conspicuous failings.
If you — I'm talking to the Senate Republicans who voted to acquit — can't uphold the primacy of the Constitution over a single man, how are you fit to hold office?
For that matter, why do you hold office?
What good do you think you do in office, when at the moment the country needed you most, you chickened out of doing the right thing?
Whatever you think you stand for, you don't stand for the constitutional order. You're an electoral tautology, wanting to hold office because you hold office.
You're an empty suit.
