How long will Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial last?

Senate Pro Tempore Patrick Leahy of Vermont is presiding over the trial instead of Chief Justice John Roberts, who oversaw Trump’s first trial while he was still in the Oval Office.

Under a draft agreement between Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, the proceedings will break Friday evening for the Jewish Sabbath at the request of Trump’s defense team and resume Sunday. There will likely be no witnesses, and the former president has declined a request to testify.

The proceedings are expected to diverge from the lengthy, complicated trial that resulted in Trump’s acquittal a year ago on charges that he privately pressured Ukraine to dig up dirt on a Democratic rival, Joe Biden, now the president.

If all of these scenarios hold firm, Trump’s likely acquittal will happen early to mid next week. Just like last year, two-thirds of the Senate is needed to convict, meaning Democrats — even if they vote along party lines as expected — will still need 17 Republicans to side with them to convict Trump.

Senators were sworn in as jurors late last month, shortly after Biden was inaugurated, but the trial proceedings were delayed as Democrats focused on confirming the new president’s initial Cabinet picks.

At the time, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky forced a vote to set aside the trial as unconstitutional because Trump is no longer in office, drawing 44 other Republicans to his argument.

Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, one of Trump’s ardent defenders, said on CBS’ “Face the Nation” he believes Trump’s actions were wrong and “he’s going to have a place in history for all of this,” but insisted it’s not the Senate’s job to judge.

The 45 votes in favor of Paul’s measure suggest the near impossibility of reaching a conviction in a Senate where Democrats hold 50 seats but a two-thirds vote — or 67 senators — would be needed to convict Trump. Only five Republicans joined with Democrats to reject Paul’s motion: Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

No president has faced impeachment proceedings after leaving office, but House managers say there’s ample precedent. They cite the case of former Secretary of War William Belknap, who resigned in 1876 just hours before he was impeached over a kickback scheme. The House impeached him anyway, and the Senate then tried him, though he was ultimately acquitted. Democrats also note that Trump was impeached by the House while he was still president.

The framers of the Constitution intended for the impeachment power to sanction current or former officials for acts committed while in office — with no “January exception,” Democrats wrote. Not only that, they say, the Constitution explicitly allows the Senate to disqualify from future office a former official it convicts.

That possibility, they suggest, makes the case against Trump — who could mount another White House run in 2024 — anything but moot. If Trump is acquitted, Democrats could pass a resolution to “censure” Trump or invoke a section of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution to try to have him disqualified from holding office in the future.

On Monday, Trump’s lawyers blasted the impeachment case against him as an act of “political theater” and accused House Democrats of exploiting the chaos and trauma of last month’s Capitol riot for their party’s gain.

Trump’s legal brief is a wide-ranging attack on the House case, foreshadowing the claims his lawyers intend to present on the same Senate floor that was invaded by rioters Jan. 6. The sharp-tongued tone, with accusations that Democrats are making “patently absurd” arguments and trying to “silence a political opponent,” makes clear Trump’s lawyers are preparing to challenge the constitutionality of the trial and any suggestion that he was to blame for the insurrection.

»Read the entire brief here

“While never willing to allow a ‘good crisis’ to go to waste, the Democratic leadership is incapable of understanding that not everything can always be blamed on their political adversaries, no matter how very badly they may wish to exploit any moment of uncertainty on the part of the American people,” the defense lawyers say.

In their brief, they suggest that Trump was exercising his First Amendment rights when he disputed the election results and argue that he explicitly encouraged his supporters to have a peaceful protest and therefore cannot be responsible for the actions of the rioters. They also say the Senate is not entitled to try Trump now that he has left office, an argument contested by even some conservative legal scholars, and they deny that the goal of the Democrats’ case is justice.

“Instead, this was only ever a selfish attempt by Democratic leadership in the House to prey upon the feelings of horror and confusion that fell upon all Americans across the entire political spectrum upon seeing the destruction at the Capitol on Jan. 6 by a few hundred people,” the lawyers wrote in a brief obtained by The Associated Press.

House managers prosecuting the case are expected to rely on videos from the siege, along with Trump’s rhetoric refusing to concede the election, to make their case. His new defense team has said it plans to counter with its own cache of videos of Democratic politicians making fiery speeches.

“We have the unusual circumstance where on the very first day of the trial, when those managers walk on the floor of the Senate, there will already be over 100 witnesses present,” Rep. Adam Schiff, D-California, who led Trump’s first impeachment, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “Whether you need additional witnesses will be a strategic call.”

Democrats argue it’s all about holding the former president accountable for his actions, even though he’s out of office. For Republicans, the trial will test their political loyalty to Trump and his enduring grip on the GOP.