A conviction would have required a two-thirds majority in the Senate. But forty-three out of the fifty Republicans in the chamber voted to acquit the former president. Whether they did so out of fear of a backlash (all Republican senators and representatives who voted in favor of impeachment faced censure from their state party organizations), out of a commitment to party discipline (minority leader Mitch McConnell voted to acquit), or out of sincere belief, the tally showed yet again—and for the first time since Trump left office—that he had turned the Republican Party into an autocrat’s
...more
