Despite hopes for better from the Republican Party, Donald Trump again escaped being held politically liable for his misconduct.  Of course, President Trump is the only U.S. president in which members of his own party voted for conviction, but seven Republican senators out of fifty.

There were some surprises in the final vote.  Of the four Republicans who will be retiring in 2022, two voted to convict.  The only Senator currently running for re-election in 2022 that voted to convict was Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.  Given that Alaska has done away with party primaries and will be using a top four primary with ranked choice voting in the general, Donald Trump’s threats against Senator Murkowski do not carry much weight.  Of the other four votes, two come from long-time Trump critics — Mitt Romney of Utah and Ben Sasse of Nebraska — whom Trump would go after regardless of their vote and one came from Susan Collins of Maine who has always faced the need to triangulate between being a loyal Republican and the Democratic majority in her state.  The only Senator to vote to convict who is probably running again and was not considered to be  a member of the moderate/conservative wing of the Republican Party was Bill Cassidy of Louisiana (who like Collins was just re-elected and can hope that six years is long enough for this madness to pass).  And like Murkowski, Senator Cassidy is from a state that does not have partisan primaries.  He just needs to keep enough Republican support to finish in the top two and then win the run-off.

But the bigger question is what this means for the 2024 election.  Not being convicted means that Donald Trump is technically eligible to run in 2024.  And he will continue to make noise about running.  While the odds are that he will not run, his omnipresence will alter the trajectory of the run-up to that race.  While some would-be candidates (like Nikki Haley) are apparently going ahead with making initial plans, others are going to have to wait for Trump to  yield the field.  Candidates will certainly not be able to raise money from Trump supporters until he announces that he is not running. Continue Reading...