CNN’s Anderson Cooper on Wednesday laid bare how Donald Trump will be remembered in the history books after he was impeached for the second time in his one-term presidency.
“Seven days after choosing to be the first president ever to incite insurrection against the country and the Constitution he took an oath to defend, the president now has another first to his name,” Cooper said. “The first and only president to ever be impeached twice.”
“There have been just four presidential impeachments in the entire history of this nation. Donald John Trump owns half of them, and [it] will follow him to his grave,” he added. “That is the face that future generations of schoolkids will see when they go online and search the word ‘impeachment.’”
The House voted 232-197 in favor of a single article of impeachment, which charges Trump with “incitement of insurrection” for his role in fomenting the riot at the US Capitol on January 6. Trump’s supporters breached and vandalised the building, assaulted police and demanded that lawmakers overturn the results of the election that Democrat Joe Biden won.
Ten Republicans joined Democrats in the vote to impeach. It now moves to trial in the Senate, where Trump’s fate is unclear. It’s all but certain that Senate proceedings will not conclude until after Biden is inaugurated on January 20.