Trump acquitted himself

The Senate finally confirms what the public had long ago decided

President Trump.
(Image credit: Illustrated | LEAH MILLIS/POOL/AFP via Getty Images, Fourleaflover/iStock)

President Trump was formally acquitted in the Senate on Wednesday afternoon to the surprise of nobody in particular. Mitt Romney was the lone Republican to support his removal from office. (His nomination at the next convention of the Shadow Republican Party is now assured, if it had ever been in doubt, despite the fact that he voted in favor of only one of the two articles of impeachment.) Despite what some previous reports had suggested might occur, no Democrats broke with their party. Otherwise the outcome was more or less what everyone had expected. There were never going to be enough votes to remove Trump from office, regardless of which pretext his opponents seized upon for his impeachment. He was acquitted long ago.

I mean this in more than one sense. Trump acquitted himself long ago in the eyes of the American people. Despite years of frivolous investigations, his approval rating is roughly equal to Barack Obama's at this point in his term. Public polling suggests that the impeachment process is unpopular even among some voters who otherwise oppose Trump, especially in those states that will be most consequential in this year's presidential election. (The fact that it is supported by another portion who flail omnidirectionally at Trump's every utterance is of little consequence.) He now enjoys all the ordinary advantages of an incumbent president in peacetime. It remains to be seen what additional ones he will enjoy thanks to the monumental folly of impeachment.

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Matthew Walther

Matthew Walther is a national correspondent at The Week. His work has also appeared in First Things, The Spectator of London, The Catholic Herald, National Review, and other publications. He is currently writing a biography of the Rev. Montague Summers. He is also a Robert Novak Journalism Fellow.