Rep. Jim Jordan said former President Donald Trump must be acquitted after he indicated the impeachment trial starting on Tuesday is deleterious to “important constitutional rights.”
“After all the bluster and rhetoric from the House Democrat managers, the Senate must acquit President Trump because the facts and the Constitution are on his side,” the Ohio Republican wrote in a Fox News op-ed.
While Jordan argued that rioters who swarmed the Capitol last month must be held accountable, he claimed that Trump is not guilty of the charge of inciting an insurrection.
“Far from inciting violence, President Trump urged listeners to ‘peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard,'” he continued. “Those who failed to heed the President’s advice and who committed the acts of violence must be held accountable. But Democrats cannot seriously accuse President Trump of inciting violence when he specifically called for peaceful protests.”
Reasoning that Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts’s not presiding over the impeachment proceedings was evidence of the trial’s illegitimacy, Jordan said Democrats are violating a host of constitutional rights, including due process for Trump.
“Democrats … ignored the Constitution. Democrats afforded President Trump no due process in the House of Representatives. In fact, there was no process whatsoever — no witnesses, no depositions, no hearings, no cross-examinations,” he wrote, adding that the Democrats’ threat that Trump’s refusal to testify may be construed as proof of his guilt represents a further “trampling” of “important constitutional rights.”
Comments are closed.