#u-s-constitution — Public Fediverse posts

Chuck Baldwin: “Impeach Hegseth and Trump!”

Article republished by Jerry Alatalo | September 24, 2026

[Editor’s note: So there is no doubt regarding the stance embraced by this writer, – my perspective aligns perfectly with that expressed in this article, fearlessly written by Pastor Chuck Baldwin. Please share this information far and wide. Please feel free to share your thoughts in the comments. Thank you very much. Peace.]

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Impeach Hegseth!

By Chuck Baldwin
Chuck Baldwin Live

September 24, 2026

“No point is of more importance than that the right of impeachment should be continued. Shall any man be above Justice?”

George Mason

No, no man is above justice, not even Pete Hegseth.

Hegseth equals Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara (under President Lyndon Johnson) as one of the very worst defense secretaries America has ever seen. He is guilty of International War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity. He is a mass murderer, liar, drunk, misogynist, racist and totally unfit for the office he holds. From the reports I read from military veterans, morale among our U.S. service personnel has never been lower than it is right now.

It is time to impeach Pete Hegseth.

And that is exactly what Congressman Thomas Massie is proposing to do.

From Politico:

Kentucky Republican Rep. Thomas Massie on Tuesday introduced articles of impeachment against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, an extraordinary attempt by members of the president’s own party to oust a Pentagon chief.

The articles are for high crimes and misdemeanors, including the war in Iran, the Trump administration’s boat strikes in the Caribbean and Hegseth’s alleged suppression of free speech in his fight with Democrats over their calls for troops to refuse illegal orders.

The nature of the resolution means the House will be forced to vote on it this week, setting up a politically complicated vote for Republicans right before the midterm elections.

A group of nine Democrats, led by Rep. Yassamin Ansari (D-Ariz.), introduced an impeachment resolution in April against Hegseth. They accused him of prosecuting an unauthorized war in Iran, targeting civilians and mishandling classified information, among other charges. But Massie’s move is a first-of-its kind effort to go after a Cabinet member in the same party.

Thomas Massie is exactly the kind of congressman we need representing us in Washington. He is honest, courageous and loyal to the U.S. Constitution—even if it means bucking his own party. While the vast majority of congressmen and senators on Capitol Hill are preoccupied with taking bribes from Israel and the military-industrial complex and bowing to party bigwigs like the idolaters they are, Massie stands as a giant among pygmies.

With the GOP in the majority in the House of Representatives, it is unlikely that Massie’s articles of impeachment will survive a House vote; but it forces House members to put their vote on record. And Hegseth (along with Donald Trump) is on the wrong side of history, and each House member that votes against Hegseth’s impeachment will carry a tarnished congressional reputation for the rest of their life.

Breaking news yesterday: Politico reports:

Speaker Mike Johnson said Wednesday he is canceling planned Thursday votes and sending members home for a seven-week recess a day earlier than expected.

The decision lops another day off a pre-election legislative schedule that Johnson had already truncated by two weeks. It also allows members to avoid having to take a vote on an impeachment resolution introduced by Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) targeting Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, which would have hit the floor no later than Thursday under House rules.

The corruption of Mike Johnson and the GOP leadership is off the charts. They will lie, cheat, steal—and even kill—to ignore the will of the electorate and ram their pro-Zionist agenda down the throats of the American people.

As for Donald Trump, I was delighted to see a young man put these salient words on the record. His name is Jason Chukwuma:

Quoting Donald Trump: I’m an extremely stable genius. In less than two years, my administration has accomplished more than almost any administration in the history of our country. I got more votes than any president in the history of our country. In the history of our country, right? Not even close. 75 million. Far more than Obama. Far more than anybody.

Jason Chukwuma: Of all the vices Donald Trump seems committed to practicing on a daily basis, it can be hard to single out any one of them as his worst. The bigotry, the cruelty, the lack of empathy, the greed, the vindictiveness, it can all blur together into one giant moral indictment.

But as a Christian, there’s one sin that stands above all the others. Not necessarily in terms of its consequences for the world, but in terms of its spiritual significance for the inner Christian life. Something I’m sure Donald Trump knows nothing about, but that many of his supporters, especially his most fervent ones, profess to be experts on.

The sin I’m talking about is pride.

Pride isn’t incidental to Donald Trump’s public identity. It is his identity. The man’s capacity for self-praise is endless, and so is his constant insistence that everyone around him participate in his self-worship service. He doesn’t merely demand loyalty from those around him. He wants grown men and women, senators, governors, members of Congress, billionaires and cabinet officials to crawl before his ego. To beg, to grovel, to flatter, to praise him and humiliate themselves just to prove that they understand how special he is.

This was the principal character trait of the demonic Roman Caesars such as Caligula, Nero and Commodus. Trump’s heart is just as evil as theirs was.

You would think that a man with such a debased moral character would be soundly rejected by Christians who claim to follow a God so humble that, despite literally being God, He willingly chose to come to Earth as a human being. And not just any human being. He didn’t come as a king, or an emperor, or a billionaire or a president. He chose to be born into a poor family from the middle of nowhere as a member of an oppressed ethnic minority, living under the domination of a ruthless empire. And that same empire would eventually torture and murder Him after He spent His earthly life tending to the sick, the poor and the vulnerable, while rebuking the rich, the proud and the powerful.

And yet somehow, many of the people who claim to follow this crucified Messiah seem to have no serious problem with Donald Trump’s many sins, least of all his pride, which is a very big problem for them as people who claim to follow Jesus.

That’s because Donald Trump as a person embodies the spiritual posture the Bible most consistently says God hates. Time and time again, Scripture singles out this specific sin as uniquely evil, uniquely dangerous and uniquely detestable to God. That’s because humility, the opposite of pride, isn’t just one Christian virtue among many. It’s the foundation that makes all the other virtues, and the Christian life itself, possible. Without humility, you can’t repent. Without humility, you can’t confess sin. Without humility, you can’t forgive; you can’t receive correction; you can’t serve; and you can’t follow Jesus. Because following Jesus begins with the admission that you are not God. Pride makes repentance impossible because repentance begins with the one thing that a proud person refuses to say, “I was wrong.”

To repent is to take responsibility for your actions, to admit that you’re not perfect, that you make mistakes, that, in other words, you’re not God.

But instead, we have a president who openly admitted that he’s never asked God for forgiveness for anything. And the Christians supporting him don’t seem to find any serious problem with that.

Fortunately, God does.

After so many years of being exposed to Donald Trump’s behavior, many of us have been conditioned to just accept it as normal. They say, “This is just Trump,” or “This is just politics now and the way things are.” But it’s not normal. It has never been normal. And it will never be normal.

The longer we’re told to adjust ourselves to the increasingly pathological, dysfunctional and openly wicked character of our political system, the more important it becomes to call this derangement what it is. Because Trump’s narcissism isn’t subtle or hidden; it’s blatant, extreme, public and constant.

Think about the most obnoxious, self-centered person you have ever met in your life. The person whose need for validation was so exhausting, whose self-aggrandizement was so absurd and whose arrogance was so offensive that everyone around them felt uncomfortable merely by being in their presence. I’m willing to bet that for most of you, compared to Donald Trump, that person would come across as modest. That’s what makes the indifference of his Christian supporters so jarring.

We’re not talking about a faint trace of pride or a little bragging here and there. We’re talking about the most exaggerated display of boasting, self-praise, grievance, vanity and the hunger for validation ever performed on the American public stage. And yet millions of Christians have looked at all of that and somehow decided it’s not a serious spiritual problem.

Which becomes even more astonishing once you read what the Bible actually has to say about arrogance and pride and how intensely God despises it.

The reward for humility is honor, but the price of arrogance is shame and failure. Jesus Himself says so: “For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

The desire to exalt oneself in one’s own sight and the sight of others does not come from God. It runs completely counter to the very essence of who He is, making it totally unbecoming and inappropriate for anyone who claims to follow Him to indulge, practice or endorse.

The need to boast and praise oneself is not a trait of Jesus. However, it is a hallmark of His exact opposite, the Antichrist. Throughout Scripture, the Bible warns that grotesque and obscene levels of pride will be one of the core identifying features of this figure.

The sheer degree of his [Trump’s] pride and boastfulness, which is clearly pathological and well beyond any commonly acceptable bounds of human behavior, is eerily consistent with the extreme narcissism the Bible tells us the man of lawlessness will display when he comes.

I encourage readers to watch my message from Revelation 13 that describes and identifies the “Antichrist.”

Instead of resisting this rising tide of evil, too many Christians are joining it. They’re falling away from the truth to embrace the lies of a man of lawlessness, a man with no room in his heart to love God or anyone else, for that matter, because he is utterly consumed by vain and diseased self-obsession.

Jesus warned his followers that a man cannot serve two masters. Eventually, he will love one and hate the other. In the same way, Christians cannot continue to call Christ their Lord while invoking His name to sanctify a man and political movement that stand completely opposed to everything Jesus lived, preached and died for.

Amen, Jason!

Donald Trump’s pathological pride and slavish obeisance to Benjamin Netanyahu and the Zionist State of Israel have probably done more to drive people away from Christianity than any other single individual in U.S. history. Not primarily because of Trump the man, but because of the enthusiastic and cult-like manner in which evangelical Christians support and idolize this man.

And men such as Pete Hegseth and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent—and most of the men in charge of Trump’s administration—are carbon copies of Trump. They share his pride, his deceit and his bloodlust.

History will judge them accordingly.

Thank God for Thomas Massie. Shame on the white evangelicals in Kentucky’s Fourth District (mostly the “Boomers”) that defeated Massie’s re-election bid. And shame on evangelical pastors and “Christians” who continue to support and defend maniacal madmen such as Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth.

Both men need to be impeached, convicted in the Senate, removed from office, prosecuted for International War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity and imprisoned. That’s the only way that America can salvage its reputation as a “City on a Hill” (John Winthrop, 1630) in the eyes of the peoples of the world and, perhaps, in the eyes of Almighty God.

Reprinted with permission from Chuck Baldwin Live.

(Source/credit: LewRockwell.com)

#MAGA #FourthPillar #FourthEstate #FreePress #USConstitution #FuckTrump #Censorship #ThisIsFascism #Resist #Vote #BlueWave #TrumpWars #TrumpEconomy #TrumpEpsteinFiles #TrumpDistraction #SaddamInsane

#MAGA #FourthPillar #FourthEstate #FreePress #USConstitution #FuckTrump #Censorship #ThisIsFascism #Resist #Vote #BlueWave #TrumpWars #TrumpEconomy #TrumpEpsteinFiles #TrumpDistraction #SaddamInsane

#MAGA #FourthPillar #FourthEstate #FreePress #USConstitution #FuckTrump #Censorship #ThisIsFascism #Resist #Vote #BlueWave #TrumpWars #TrumpEconomy #TrumpEpsteinFiles #TrumpDistraction #SaddamInsane

#MAGA #FourthPillar #FourthEstate #FreePress #USConstitution #FuckTrump #Censorship #ThisIsFascism #Resist #Vote #BlueWave #TrumpWars #TrumpEconomy #TrumpEpsteinFiles #TrumpDistraction #SaddamInsane

#MAGA #FourthPillar #FourthEstate #FreePress #USConstitution #FuckTrump #Censorship #ThisIsFascism #Resist #Vote #BlueWave #TrumpWars #TrumpEconomy #TrumpEpsteinFiles #TrumpDistraction #SaddamInsane

(Oct 2017) The 25th Amendment Proves Why Trump's #MentalHealth Matters
https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/25th-amendment-proves-why-trump-s-mental-health-matters-ncna801666

(Dec2025) Comment and analysis: President Trump and the 25th Amendment https://www.ibanet.org/President-Trump-and-the-25th-Amendment

(June2026) Concerns Grow Over Trump's Mental Fitness for Presidency - https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/5914003-trump-decline-25th-amendment/

(Aug2026) #Trump Faces #25thAmendment Call Over Bizarre Dead President Boast
https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/articles/trump-faces-25th-amendment-call-203627458.html

(Oct2019) What the 25th Amendment Is Really For https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/what-25th-amendment-really

#USpol #USConstitution

/🧵

(Oct 2017) The 25th Amendment Proves Why Trump's #MentalHealth Matters
https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/25th-amendment-proves-why-trump-s-mental-health-matters-ncna801666

(Dec2025) Comment and analysis: President Trump and the 25th Amendment https://www.ibanet.org/President-Trump-and-the-25th-Amendment

(June2026) Concerns Grow Over Trump's Mental Fitness for Presidency - https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/5914003-trump-decline-25th-amendment/

(Aug2026) #Trump Faces #25thAmendment Call Over Bizarre Dead President Boast
https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/articles/trump-faces-25th-amendment-call-203627458.html

(Oct2019) What the 25th Amendment Is Really For https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/what-25th-amendment-really

#USpol #USConstitution

/🧵

(Oct 2017) The 25th Amendment Proves Why Trump's #MentalHealth Matters
https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/25th-amendment-proves-why-trump-s-mental-health-matters-ncna801666

(Dec2025) Comment and analysis: President Trump and the 25th Amendment https://www.ibanet.org/President-Trump-and-the-25th-Amendment

(June2026) Concerns Grow Over Trump's Mental Fitness for Presidency - https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/5914003-trump-decline-25th-amendment/

(Aug2026) #Trump Faces #25thAmendment Call Over Bizarre Dead President Boast
https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/articles/trump-faces-25th-amendment-call-203627458.html

(Oct2019) What the 25th Amendment Is Really For https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/what-25th-amendment-really

#USpol #USConstitution

/🧵

(Oct 2017) The 25th Amendment Proves Why Trump's #MentalHealth Matters
https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/25th-amendment-proves-why-trump-s-mental-health-matters-ncna801666

(Dec2025) Comment and analysis: President Trump and the 25th Amendment https://www.ibanet.org/President-Trump-and-the-25th-Amendment

(June2026) Concerns Grow Over Trump's Mental Fitness for Presidency - https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/5914003-trump-decline-25th-amendment/

(Aug2026) #Trump Faces #25thAmendment Call Over Bizarre Dead President Boast
https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/articles/trump-faces-25th-amendment-call-203627458.html

(Oct2019) What the 25th Amendment Is Really For https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/what-25th-amendment-really

#USpol #USConstitution

/🧵

(Oct 2017) The 25th Amendment Proves Why Trump's #MentalHealth Matters
https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/25th-amendment-proves-why-trump-s-mental-health-matters-ncna801666

(Dec2025) Comment and analysis: President Trump and the 25th Amendment https://www.ibanet.org/President-Trump-and-the-25th-Amendment

(June2026) Concerns Grow Over Trump's Mental Fitness for Presidency - https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/5914003-trump-decline-25th-amendment/

(Aug2026) #Trump Faces #25thAmendment Call Over Bizarre Dead President Boast
https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/articles/trump-faces-25th-amendment-call-203627458.html

(Oct2019) What the 25th Amendment Is Really For https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/what-25th-amendment-really

#USpol #USConstitution

/🧵

Does the Constitution still work as intended? Joy-Ann Reid asked that on Constitution Day with retired federal judge John Daniel Tinder, weighing original design against modern reality. Read the full post: https://www.joyannreid.com/p/constitution-day-live-with-joy-and #ConstitutionDay #Democracy #USConstitution

Does the Constitution still work as intended? Joy-Ann Reid asked that on Constitution Day with retired federal judge John Daniel Tinder, weighing original design against modern reality. Read the full post: https://www.joyannreid.com/p/constitution-day-live-with-joy-and #ConstitutionDay #Democracy #USConstitution

#USConstitution #Birthday #USPol

Happy Birthday US Constitution!

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America…”

FYI @ai6yr

https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/constitution-transcript

#USConstitution #Birthday #USPol

Happy Birthday US Constitution!

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America…”

FYI @ai6yr

https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/constitution-transcript

#USConstitution #Birthday #USPol

Happy Birthday US Constitution!

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America…”

FYI @ai6yr

https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/constitution-transcript

#USConstitution #Birthday #USPol

Happy Birthday US Constitution!

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America…”

FYI @ai6yr

https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/constitution-transcript

#USConstitution #Birthday #USPol

Happy Birthday US Constitution!

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America…”

FYI @ai6yr

https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/constitution-transcript

CW: Occasional Foul Language. Always Political.

Today, September 17th, is both Constitution Day & Citizenship Day, which celebrates the passage of the U.S. Constitution & the journey of every single person who has or will become a U.S. Citizen through naturalization!

Link: https://bsky.app/profile/50501movement.bsky.social/post/3mvpv3ucrfk2w

----------------------------

Reposted from 50501: The People's Movement

Join the Movement at https://fiftyfifty.one

This robot is unaffiliated w/ 50501

Replies here are only seen in the Fediverse, not on Bluesky. 50501 volunteers do not monitor this account.

----------------------------

#Coup #Activism #FederalGovernment #USpol #Trump #NoKings #elections #50501Movement #WeAreTheResistance #WeHaveFriendsEverywhere #FDT #PeoplesMovement #FiftyFiftyOne #StopICE #protest #organize

#ConstitutionDay #CitizenshipDay #USConstitution #Naturalization #Constitution #CitizenPride #AmericanCitizenship #ConstitutionCelebration #Patriotism #KnowYourRights

CW: Occasional Foul Language. Always Political.

Today, September 17th, is both Constitution Day & Citizenship Day, which celebrates the passage of the U.S. Constitution & the journey of every single person who has or will become a U.S. Citizen through naturalization!

Link: https://bsky.app/profile/50501movement.bsky.social/post/3mvpv3ucrfk2w

----------------------------

Reposted from 50501: The People's Movement

Join the Movement at https://fiftyfifty.one

This robot is unaffiliated w/ 50501

Replies here are only seen in the Fediverse, not on Bluesky. 50501 volunteers do not monitor this account.

----------------------------

#Coup #Activism #FederalGovernment #USpol #Trump #NoKings #elections #50501Movement #WeAreTheResistance #WeHaveFriendsEverywhere #FDT #PeoplesMovement #FiftyFiftyOne #StopICE #protest #organize

#ConstitutionDay #CitizenshipDay #USConstitution #Naturalization #Constitution #CitizenPride #AmericanCitizenship #ConstitutionCelebration #Patriotism #KnowYourRights

CW: Occasional Foul Language. Always Political.

Today, September 17th, is both Constitution Day & Citizenship Day, which celebrates the passage of the U.S. Constitution & the journey of every single person who has or will become a U.S. Citizen through naturalization!

Link: https://bsky.app/profile/50501movement.bsky.social/post/3mvpv3ucrfk2w

----------------------------

Reposted from 50501: The People's Movement

Join the Movement at https://fiftyfifty.one

This robot is unaffiliated w/ 50501

Replies here are only seen in the Fediverse, not on Bluesky. 50501 volunteers do not monitor this account.

----------------------------

#Coup #Activism #FederalGovernment #USpol #Trump #NoKings #elections #50501Movement #WeAreTheResistance #WeHaveFriendsEverywhere #FDT #PeoplesMovement #FiftyFiftyOne #StopICE #protest #organize

#ConstitutionDay #CitizenshipDay #USConstitution #Naturalization #Constitution #CitizenPride #AmericanCitizenship #ConstitutionCelebration #Patriotism #KnowYourRights

CW: Occasional Foul Language. Always Political.

Today, September 17th, is both Constitution Day & Citizenship Day, which celebrates the passage of the U.S. Constitution & the journey of every single person who has or will become a U.S. Citizen through naturalization!

Link: https://bsky.app/profile/50501movement.bsky.social/post/3mvpv3ucrfk2w

----------------------------

Reposted from 50501: The People's Movement

Join the Movement at https://fiftyfifty.one

This robot is unaffiliated w/ 50501

Replies here are only seen in the Fediverse, not on Bluesky. 50501 volunteers do not monitor this account.

----------------------------

#Coup #Activism #FederalGovernment #USpol #Trump #NoKings #elections #50501Movement #WeAreTheResistance #WeHaveFriendsEverywhere #FDT #PeoplesMovement #FiftyFiftyOne #StopICE #protest #organize

#ConstitutionDay #CitizenshipDay #USConstitution #Naturalization #Constitution #CitizenPride #AmericanCitizenship #ConstitutionCelebration #Patriotism #KnowYourRights

Happy (US) Constitution Day to those who celebrate.

https://natrona.wyodems.net/2026/constitution-day-gathering-reading-the-constitution/

#usconstitution #wyoming

Happy (US) Constitution Day to those who celebrate.

https://natrona.wyodems.net/2026/constitution-day-gathering-reading-the-constitution/

#usconstitution #wyoming

Happy (US) Constitution Day to those who celebrate.

https://natrona.wyodems.net/2026/constitution-day-gathering-reading-the-constitution/

#usconstitution #wyoming

#USConstitution #Bribery #Definition

#USConstitution #Bribery #Definition

#USConstitution #Bribery #Definition

#USConstitution #Bribery #Definition

#USConstitution #Bribery #Definition

What a depraved corrupt fuck stain

#USPol #Gaslighting #USConstitution #Corruption

What a depraved corrupt fuck stain

#USPol #Gaslighting #USConstitution #Corruption

What a depraved corrupt fuck stain

#USPol #Gaslighting #USConstitution #Corruption

What a depraved corrupt fuck stain

#USPol #Gaslighting #USConstitution #Corruption

What a depraved corrupt fuck stain

#USPol #Gaslighting #USConstitution #Corruption

5 family dynasties signed half the treaties acquiring indigenous lands in Turtle Island, for the United State of America.
The counter revolution of 1776 was not about high ideals but a means for the few white landowners to continue making profit off of African bodies and stolen indigenous lands, according to these scholars of black and indigenous history.

https://penandmachete.substack.com/p/250-years-of-counterrevolution-new?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=e75j0
#settlercolonialism
#antislavery
#usconstitution
#indigenousrights
#landback
#reparations

5 family dynasties signed half the treaties acquiring indigenous lands in Turtle Island, for the United State of America.
The counter revolution of 1776 was not about high ideals but a means for the few white landowners to continue making profit off of African bodies and stolen indigenous lands, according to these scholars of black and indigenous history.

https://penandmachete.substack.com/p/250-years-of-counterrevolution-new?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=e75j0
#settlercolonialism
#antislavery
#usconstitution
#indigenousrights
#landback
#reparations

@popcornreel
Remember when every #Republican #politician would pull out their "pocket #USConstitution " and wave it like it was scared?
Now they wipe their ass with the document. And if you wonder why I declare that as the #truth?? Read the documents including the #Amendments.

@popcornreel
Remember when every #Republican #politician would pull out their "pocket #USConstitution " and wave it like it was scared?
Now they wipe their ass with the document. And if you wonder why I declare that as the #truth?? Read the documents including the #Amendments.

@popcornreel
Remember when every #Republican #politician would pull out their "pocket #USConstitution " and wave it like it was scared?
Now they wipe their ass with the document. And if you wonder why I declare that as the #truth?? Read the documents including the #Amendments.

@popcornreel
Remember when every #Republican #politician would pull out their "pocket #USConstitution " and wave it like it was scared?
Now they wipe their ass with the document. And if you wonder why I declare that as the #truth?? Read the documents including the #Amendments.

@popcornreel
Remember when every #Republican #politician would pull out their "pocket #USConstitution " and wave it like it was scared?
Now they wipe their ass with the document. And if you wonder why I declare that as the #truth?? Read the documents including the #Amendments.

Federal Appeals Court Rules #USConstitution Doesn't Guarantee A Right to #CleanWater

https://www.democracynow.org/2026/9/9/headlines/federal_appeals_court_rules_us_constitution_does_not_guarantee_right_to_clean_drinking_water

#water #drinkingwater

Federal Appeals Court Rules #USConstitution Doesn't Guarantee A Right to #CleanWater

https://www.democracynow.org/2026/9/9/headlines/federal_appeals_court_rules_us_constitution_does_not_guarantee_right_to_clean_drinking_water

#water #drinkingwater

Federal Appeals Court Rules #USConstitution Doesn't Guarantee A Right to #CleanWater

https://www.democracynow.org/2026/9/9/headlines/federal_appeals_court_rules_us_constitution_does_not_guarantee_right_to_clean_drinking_water

#water #drinkingwater

Federal Appeals Court Rules #USConstitution Doesn't Guarantee A Right to #CleanWater

https://www.democracynow.org/2026/9/9/headlines/federal_appeals_court_rules_us_constitution_does_not_guarantee_right_to_clean_drinking_water

#water #drinkingwater

Federal Appeals Court Rules #USConstitution Doesn't Guarantee A Right to #CleanWater

https://www.democracynow.org/2026/9/9/headlines/federal_appeals_court_rules_us_constitution_does_not_guarantee_right_to_clean_drinking_water

#water #drinkingwater

Historically, legislation and court decisions have always lagged behind technological change. But the gap between the two is even starker in the world of generative AI. The large language model (LLM) that kicked things off, ChatGPT, was only released in November 2022; the pace of development since then has been dizzying. Meanwhile, nearly 200 lawsuits have been brought against AI companies, […]

Historically, legislation and court decisions have always lagged behind technological change. But the gap between the two is even starker in the world of generative AI. The large language model (LLM) that kicked things off, ChatGPT, was only released in November 2022; the pace of development since then has been dizzying. Meanwhile, nearly 200 lawsuits have been brought against AI companies, […]

Historically, legislation and court decisions have always lagged behind technological change. But the gap between the two is even starker in the world of generative AI. The large language model (LLM) that kicked things off, ChatGPT, was only released in November 2022; the pace of development since then has been dizzying. Meanwhile, nearly 200 lawsuits have been brought against AI companies, […]

Historically, legislation and court decisions have always lagged behind technological change. But the gap between the two is even starker in the world of generative AI. The large language model (LLM) that kicked things off, ChatGPT, was only released in November 2022; the pace of development since then has been dizzying. Meanwhile, nearly 200 lawsuits have been brought against AI companies, […]

Historically, legislation and court decisions have always lagged behind technological change. But the gap between the two is even starker in the world of generative AI. The large language model (LLM) that kicked things off, ChatGPT, was only released in November 2022; the pace of development since then has been dizzying. Meanwhile, nearly 200 lawsuits have been brought against AI companies, […]

The Unfinished Business of January 6: When Accountability Failed

By Cliff Potts, CSO, and Editor-in-Chief of WPS News

Baybay City, Leyte, Philippines — September 1, 2026

On January 6, 2021, the constitutional machinery of the United States was performing one of its most routine and most important functions: Congress was counting electoral votes and formally completing the transfer of presidential power.

Then the Capitol was breached.

The attack itself has been examined through congressional hearings, criminal prosecutions, court proceedings, an impeachment trial, and the final report of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. Arguments continue over responsibility for security failures, the motivations of individual participants, Donald Trump’s intentions, and the political character of subsequent investigations. Those disagreements belong in the historical record.

But one fact cannot reasonably be disputed: Congress was forced to suspend the constitutionally prescribed certification proceeding while a violent mob occupied portions of the United States Capitol (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Trump was subsequently impeached by the House for “incitement of insurrection.” The Senate acquitted him when 57 senators voted guilty and 43 voted not guilty—ten votes short of the constitutionally required two-thirds majority (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021; U.S. Senate, 2021a).

Four years later, Trump returned to the White House.

January 6 therefore presents an extraordinary constitutional problem.

This is no longer merely a question about what happened in 2021.

It is a question about what the United States decided—or failed to decide—about presidential accountability.

January 6 Did Not Begin on January 6

Reducing January 6 to several hours of rioting misses much of the constitutional issue.

The House Select Committee concluded after its investigation that Trump had engaged in a broader effort to overturn the lawful result of the 2020 presidential election. Its final report drew upon documents and testimony from numerous Republicans and members of Trump’s own administration and campaign, including former Justice Department officials, White House personnel, campaign officials, state officials, and others (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The committee concluded that Trump continued promoting false allegations of widespread election fraud after courts rejected numerous challenges and after advisers told him that evidence did not support claims sufficient to reverse the election result (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The committee also concluded that Trump pressured state officials concerning election results, participated in efforts involving alternative electoral certificates, sought assistance from Justice Department officials, and pressured Vice President Mike Pence not to count certain electoral votes during the January 6 joint session of Congress (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Those were findings of a congressional committee, not criminal convictions.

That distinction matters.

Trump and his supporters have consistently rejected the committee’s interpretation, characterized the investigation as partisan, maintained that he genuinely believed the election had been compromised, and argued that his political speech and challenges to election results were constitutionally protected.

But disagreement with the committee does not erase the evidence it collected. The historical record includes testimony from Trump’s own officials describing repeated warnings that allegations being advanced about the election were unsupported (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The constitutional issue therefore reaches beyond the riot itself.

It concerns an incumbent president’s response to losing an election.

The Vice President Was Asked to Do Something He Could Not Lawfully Do

Vice President Mike Pence became central to Trump’s effort.

Trump and allies argued that Pence possessed authority during the congressional electoral count to reject or delay electoral votes from contested states.

Pence rejected that argument.

The January 6 Committee concluded that Trump pressured Pence to refuse to count electoral votes despite being informed that the proposed action lacked lawful constitutional authority (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

That episode is significant because the peaceful transfer of presidential power depends upon losing candidates eventually accepting an institutional answer they do not like.

Candidates can demand recounts.

They can file lawsuits.

They can challenge election procedures.

They can seek investigations.

They can argue that election laws were violated.

But eventually the courts rule, states certify their results, electors vote, Congress counts those votes, and power changes hands.

The American constitutional system cannot function if an incumbent president possesses an effective unilateral veto over that process.

Then Came the Capitol

Trump addressed supporters near the White House on January 6 before Congress convened to count the electoral votes. He urged supporters to march to the Capitol while also telling them to make their voices heard “peacefully and patriotically.”

That language is an important part of Trump’s defense and should not be omitted from any serious assessment of his responsibility.

His defenders argue that this explicit reference to peaceful protest contradicts the allegation that Trump intended to provoke violence.

The House impeachment managers argued differently. They maintained that the speech had to be understood within the context of Trump’s months-long campaign challenging the election result, his rhetoric surrounding January 6, and pressure directed toward Pence and other officials (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021).

The Select Committee later examined Trump’s December 19, 2020 announcement promoting the January 6 protest and concluded that his public messaging helped mobilize supporters who ultimately came to Washington (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The Capitol was subsequently breached.

Members of Congress evacuated or sheltered.

Police officers fought rioters.

The electoral count stopped.

Whatever political terminology one prefers for January 6—riot, attack, insurrection, protest that became violent—the constitutional proceeding was physically disrupted.

That alone made January 6 unlike an ordinary political demonstration.

The 187 Minutes

One of the Select Committee’s most consequential findings concerned what Trump did after the Capitol had been breached.

The committee devoted an entire chapter of its final report to what it called “187 Minutes of Dereliction,” examining the period between the end of Trump’s Ellipse speech and his eventual video message telling supporters to leave the Capitol (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

According to the committee’s reconstruction, people around Trump urged him to intervene publicly while the violence continued. The committee concluded that Trump did not immediately issue an unequivocal public demand that rioters leave the Capitol and that he continued focusing on the electoral count while the attack unfolded (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Trump and his defenders dispute the committee’s characterization of his actions and intentions.

But the underlying constitutional question is difficult to avoid.

The president of the United States is not merely another political commentator watching a riot on television.

The president heads the executive branch.

When violence physically interrupts Congress while it performs a constitutional function, presidential responsibility is qualitatively different from that of an ordinary citizen.

That is why those 187 minutes matter.

Congress Impeached Him

The House acted one week later.

On January 13, 2021, the House approved H.Res. 24, impeaching Trump for incitement of insurrection. Ten Republicans joined Democrats in voting for impeachment (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021).

Trump’s term ended January 20.

His Senate trial therefore occurred after he had left office, creating a constitutional dispute over whether the Senate retained jurisdiction to try a former president.

The Senate voted 56–44 that Trump remained subject to an impeachment trial for acts committed while president (U.S. Senate, 2021b).

The final vote was considerably more striking.

Fifty-seven senators voted guilty.

Forty-three voted not guilty.

Seven Republican senators joined every Democratic and independent senator voting to convict (U.S. Senate, 2021a).

Under almost any ordinary voting rule, 57–43 would be an overwhelming victory.

Impeachment is deliberately different.

The Constitution requires two-thirds of senators present to convict. Trump therefore was acquitted (U.S. Const. art. I, § 3; U.S. Senate, 2021a).

That acquittal must be respected as the formal constitutional result.

But understanding why some senators voted to acquit is equally important.

Even McConnell Said Trump Was Responsible

Then-Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell voted to acquit Trump.

Immediately afterward, however, McConnell delivered a remarkable speech.

He argued that Trump was “practically and morally responsible” for provoking the events of January 6 while maintaining that the Senate lacked jurisdiction to convict someone who was no longer president (McConnell, 2021).

In other words, McConnell’s acquittal vote was not an endorsement of Trump’s conduct.

Other Republican senators similarly relied upon jurisdictional arguments in explaining their votes.

That distinction changes the historical meaning of the 43 acquittal votes.

The Senate did not produce 43 senators unanimously declaring that Trump’s conduct was acceptable.

It produced a coalition containing senators who rejected the House’s case on the merits and others who believed the Constitution prevented them from convicting a former president.

Whether that jurisdictional interpretation was correct remains disputed. The Senate itself had already voted 56–44 that it possessed jurisdiction (U.S. Senate, 2021b).

The consequence, however, was unmistakable.

Trump was not convicted.

He was not disqualified from future federal office.

And eventually he returned.

The Criminal Case Never Produced a Verdict

January 6 also entered the criminal justice system.

Special Counsel Jack Smith obtained a federal indictment alleging that Trump conspired to overturn the 2020 election. Trump pleaded not guilty and denied wrongdoing.

The case never reached a jury verdict.

After Trump won the 2024 presidential election, prosecutors moved to dismiss the federal case because longstanding Justice Department policy holds that a sitting president cannot be federally prosecuted.

That distinction is critical to the historical record.

The dismissal did not constitute an acquittal after trial.

Nor did the indictment constitute proof of guilt.

The central federal criminal allegations concerning Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election therefore ended without a jury determining guilt or innocence.

Once again, the institutional machinery of accountability reached Trump but did not produce a final adjudication of the underlying allegations.

Then Trump Pardoned the January 6 Defendants

Trump’s return to office transformed January 6 from historical controversy into a matter involving his second presidency.

On January 20, 2025—his first day back in office—Trump issued clemency covering nearly all defendants convicted of offenses related to January 6. He commuted the sentences of specified defendants, granted full pardons to others, and directed the attorney general to seek dismissal of remaining January 6 indictments (The White House, 2025).

The White House has defended those actions aggressively, describing January 6 defendants as victims of politically motivated prosecution and presenting Trump’s clemency as an effort to correct injustice and promote reconciliation (The White House, 2025).

The president unquestionably possesses broad constitutional pardon authority over federal offenses.

The question for this series is therefore not simply whether Trump could issue the pardons.

He could.

The larger question is what their issuance means for presidential accountability.

A president impeached over an attack connected to an effort to prevent the transfer of power returned four years later and used presidential authority to erase or reduce federal criminal consequences for many of the people prosecuted in connection with that attack.

That is constitutionally legal clemency.

It is also historically extraordinary.

Both things can be true simultaneously.

January 6 Cannot Simply Become Article III

There is a temptation for Trump’s opponents to say: January 6 was impeachable in 2021, therefore impeach him for January 6 again in 2026.

That would be a weak way to construct a third impeachment.

Trump has already been impeached and tried for his January 6-related conduct.

A credible new impeachment case should principally concern conduct undertaken during his current presidency.

January 6 instead performs another function.

It provides context.

It tells Congress what happened the last time institutions confronted Trump over alleged abuse of presidential power and an attempt to remain in office after losing an election.

It tells Congress what happened when the House impeached him.

It tells Congress what happened when 57 senators voted to convict him but the constitutional supermajority was not reached.

And Trump’s return to office tells Congress what an acquittal can ultimately mean.

The Cost of No Accountability

This is where January 6 becomes larger than Donald Trump.

The Constitution contains rules governing elections and transfers of power, but those rules ultimately depend upon human beings respecting and enforcing them.

Suppose a future president loses an election.

Suppose that president pressures state officials.

Suppose the president encourages alternative interpretations of electoral law designed to preserve his own power.

Suppose the president pressures the vice president.

Suppose supporters then disrupt the congressional proceeding that formalizes the president’s defeat.

What lesson does January 6 provide that future president?

The answer cannot simply be that everything worked out.

Yes, Congress reconvened.

Yes, the electoral votes were counted.

Yes, Joe Biden became president on January 20, 2021.

The immediate constitutional process survived.

But accountability is a different question.

Trump was impeached.

He was acquitted.

The federal criminal case against him never reached a verdict.

He regained the presidency.

And after returning to office, he exercised presidential clemency for nearly all federal defendants prosecuted for January 6-related offenses (The White House, 2025).

None of those individual events proves that the Constitution has failed.

Taken together, however, they establish a precedent that deserves serious consideration.

Constitutional restraints are partly constructed from expectations. Presidents know that certain actions will bring consequences because previous presidents saw those consequences imposed.

When consequences repeatedly fail to materialize, expectations change.

The danger is not necessarily that another president will reproduce January 6 exactly.

History rarely repeats itself that neatly.

The danger is that a future president will study what happened and conclude that the boundaries can be pushed farther.

Maybe Congress can be pressured more aggressively.

Maybe state officials can be threatened more directly.

Maybe federal law enforcement can be manipulated more effectively.

Maybe an election defeat can be resisted more systematically.

Maybe the next effort will be conducted by people who learned from the mistakes of the previous one.

That is the unfinished business of January 6.

America successfully transferred power on January 20, 2021.

What America never conclusively established was the price a president must pay for attempting to interfere with that transfer.

Donald Trump returned to office before the country settled that question.

Now the answer matters not only for him.

It matters for every president who comes afterward.

References

McConnell, M. (2021, February 13). Remarks following the Senate impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump. United States Senate.

The White House. (2025, January 20). Granting pardons and commutation of sentences for certain offenses relating to the events at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021.

U.S. Constitution, art. I, § 3.

U.S. House of Representatives. (2021). Impeaching Donald John Trump, President of the United States, for high crimes and misdemeanors (H. Res. 24, 117th Cong.).

U.S. House of Representatives, Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. (2022). Final report of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (H. Rept. 117-663). U.S. Government Publishing Office.

U.S. Senate. (2021a, February 13). Roll call vote 59: Article of impeachment against former President Donald John Trump.

U.S. Senate. (2021b, February 9). Roll call vote 57: Whether former President Donald John Trump is subject to a court of impeachment for acts committed while president.

The Unfinished Business of January 6: When Accountability Failed

By Cliff Potts, CSO, and Editor-in-Chief of WPS News

Baybay City, Leyte, Philippines — September 1, 2026

On January 6, 2021, the constitutional machinery of the United States was performing one of its most routine and most important functions: Congress was counting electoral votes and formally completing the transfer of presidential power.

Then the Capitol was breached.

The attack itself has been examined through congressional hearings, criminal prosecutions, court proceedings, an impeachment trial, and the final report of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. Arguments continue over responsibility for security failures, the motivations of individual participants, Donald Trump’s intentions, and the political character of subsequent investigations. Those disagreements belong in the historical record.

But one fact cannot reasonably be disputed: Congress was forced to suspend the constitutionally prescribed certification proceeding while a violent mob occupied portions of the United States Capitol (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Trump was subsequently impeached by the House for “incitement of insurrection.” The Senate acquitted him when 57 senators voted guilty and 43 voted not guilty—ten votes short of the constitutionally required two-thirds majority (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021; U.S. Senate, 2021a).

Four years later, Trump returned to the White House.

January 6 therefore presents an extraordinary constitutional problem.

This is no longer merely a question about what happened in 2021.

It is a question about what the United States decided—or failed to decide—about presidential accountability.

January 6 Did Not Begin on January 6

Reducing January 6 to several hours of rioting misses much of the constitutional issue.

The House Select Committee concluded after its investigation that Trump had engaged in a broader effort to overturn the lawful result of the 2020 presidential election. Its final report drew upon documents and testimony from numerous Republicans and members of Trump’s own administration and campaign, including former Justice Department officials, White House personnel, campaign officials, state officials, and others (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The committee concluded that Trump continued promoting false allegations of widespread election fraud after courts rejected numerous challenges and after advisers told him that evidence did not support claims sufficient to reverse the election result (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The committee also concluded that Trump pressured state officials concerning election results, participated in efforts involving alternative electoral certificates, sought assistance from Justice Department officials, and pressured Vice President Mike Pence not to count certain electoral votes during the January 6 joint session of Congress (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Those were findings of a congressional committee, not criminal convictions.

That distinction matters.

Trump and his supporters have consistently rejected the committee’s interpretation, characterized the investigation as partisan, maintained that he genuinely believed the election had been compromised, and argued that his political speech and challenges to election results were constitutionally protected.

But disagreement with the committee does not erase the evidence it collected. The historical record includes testimony from Trump’s own officials describing repeated warnings that allegations being advanced about the election were unsupported (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The constitutional issue therefore reaches beyond the riot itself.

It concerns an incumbent president’s response to losing an election.

The Vice President Was Asked to Do Something He Could Not Lawfully Do

Vice President Mike Pence became central to Trump’s effort.

Trump and allies argued that Pence possessed authority during the congressional electoral count to reject or delay electoral votes from contested states.

Pence rejected that argument.

The January 6 Committee concluded that Trump pressured Pence to refuse to count electoral votes despite being informed that the proposed action lacked lawful constitutional authority (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

That episode is significant because the peaceful transfer of presidential power depends upon losing candidates eventually accepting an institutional answer they do not like.

Candidates can demand recounts.

They can file lawsuits.

They can challenge election procedures.

They can seek investigations.

They can argue that election laws were violated.

But eventually the courts rule, states certify their results, electors vote, Congress counts those votes, and power changes hands.

The American constitutional system cannot function if an incumbent president possesses an effective unilateral veto over that process.

Then Came the Capitol

Trump addressed supporters near the White House on January 6 before Congress convened to count the electoral votes. He urged supporters to march to the Capitol while also telling them to make their voices heard “peacefully and patriotically.”

That language is an important part of Trump’s defense and should not be omitted from any serious assessment of his responsibility.

His defenders argue that this explicit reference to peaceful protest contradicts the allegation that Trump intended to provoke violence.

The House impeachment managers argued differently. They maintained that the speech had to be understood within the context of Trump’s months-long campaign challenging the election result, his rhetoric surrounding January 6, and pressure directed toward Pence and other officials (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021).

The Select Committee later examined Trump’s December 19, 2020 announcement promoting the January 6 protest and concluded that his public messaging helped mobilize supporters who ultimately came to Washington (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The Capitol was subsequently breached.

Members of Congress evacuated or sheltered.

Police officers fought rioters.

The electoral count stopped.

Whatever political terminology one prefers for January 6—riot, attack, insurrection, protest that became violent—the constitutional proceeding was physically disrupted.

That alone made January 6 unlike an ordinary political demonstration.

The 187 Minutes

One of the Select Committee’s most consequential findings concerned what Trump did after the Capitol had been breached.

The committee devoted an entire chapter of its final report to what it called “187 Minutes of Dereliction,” examining the period between the end of Trump’s Ellipse speech and his eventual video message telling supporters to leave the Capitol (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

According to the committee’s reconstruction, people around Trump urged him to intervene publicly while the violence continued. The committee concluded that Trump did not immediately issue an unequivocal public demand that rioters leave the Capitol and that he continued focusing on the electoral count while the attack unfolded (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Trump and his defenders dispute the committee’s characterization of his actions and intentions.

But the underlying constitutional question is difficult to avoid.

The president of the United States is not merely another political commentator watching a riot on television.

The president heads the executive branch.

When violence physically interrupts Congress while it performs a constitutional function, presidential responsibility is qualitatively different from that of an ordinary citizen.

That is why those 187 minutes matter.

Congress Impeached Him

The House acted one week later.

On January 13, 2021, the House approved H.Res. 24, impeaching Trump for incitement of insurrection. Ten Republicans joined Democrats in voting for impeachment (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021).

Trump’s term ended January 20.

His Senate trial therefore occurred after he had left office, creating a constitutional dispute over whether the Senate retained jurisdiction to try a former president.

The Senate voted 56–44 that Trump remained subject to an impeachment trial for acts committed while president (U.S. Senate, 2021b).

The final vote was considerably more striking.

Fifty-seven senators voted guilty.

Forty-three voted not guilty.

Seven Republican senators joined every Democratic and independent senator voting to convict (U.S. Senate, 2021a).

Under almost any ordinary voting rule, 57–43 would be an overwhelming victory.

Impeachment is deliberately different.

The Constitution requires two-thirds of senators present to convict. Trump therefore was acquitted (U.S. Const. art. I, § 3; U.S. Senate, 2021a).

That acquittal must be respected as the formal constitutional result.

But understanding why some senators voted to acquit is equally important.

Even McConnell Said Trump Was Responsible

Then-Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell voted to acquit Trump.

Immediately afterward, however, McConnell delivered a remarkable speech.

He argued that Trump was “practically and morally responsible” for provoking the events of January 6 while maintaining that the Senate lacked jurisdiction to convict someone who was no longer president (McConnell, 2021).

In other words, McConnell’s acquittal vote was not an endorsement of Trump’s conduct.

Other Republican senators similarly relied upon jurisdictional arguments in explaining their votes.

That distinction changes the historical meaning of the 43 acquittal votes.

The Senate did not produce 43 senators unanimously declaring that Trump’s conduct was acceptable.

It produced a coalition containing senators who rejected the House’s case on the merits and others who believed the Constitution prevented them from convicting a former president.

Whether that jurisdictional interpretation was correct remains disputed. The Senate itself had already voted 56–44 that it possessed jurisdiction (U.S. Senate, 2021b).

The consequence, however, was unmistakable.

Trump was not convicted.

He was not disqualified from future federal office.

And eventually he returned.

The Criminal Case Never Produced a Verdict

January 6 also entered the criminal justice system.

Special Counsel Jack Smith obtained a federal indictment alleging that Trump conspired to overturn the 2020 election. Trump pleaded not guilty and denied wrongdoing.

The case never reached a jury verdict.

After Trump won the 2024 presidential election, prosecutors moved to dismiss the federal case because longstanding Justice Department policy holds that a sitting president cannot be federally prosecuted.

That distinction is critical to the historical record.

The dismissal did not constitute an acquittal after trial.

Nor did the indictment constitute proof of guilt.

The central federal criminal allegations concerning Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election therefore ended without a jury determining guilt or innocence.

Once again, the institutional machinery of accountability reached Trump but did not produce a final adjudication of the underlying allegations.

Then Trump Pardoned the January 6 Defendants

Trump’s return to office transformed January 6 from historical controversy into a matter involving his second presidency.

On January 20, 2025—his first day back in office—Trump issued clemency covering nearly all defendants convicted of offenses related to January 6. He commuted the sentences of specified defendants, granted full pardons to others, and directed the attorney general to seek dismissal of remaining January 6 indictments (The White House, 2025).

The White House has defended those actions aggressively, describing January 6 defendants as victims of politically motivated prosecution and presenting Trump’s clemency as an effort to correct injustice and promote reconciliation (The White House, 2025).

The president unquestionably possesses broad constitutional pardon authority over federal offenses.

The question for this series is therefore not simply whether Trump could issue the pardons.

He could.

The larger question is what their issuance means for presidential accountability.

A president impeached over an attack connected to an effort to prevent the transfer of power returned four years later and used presidential authority to erase or reduce federal criminal consequences for many of the people prosecuted in connection with that attack.

That is constitutionally legal clemency.

It is also historically extraordinary.

Both things can be true simultaneously.

January 6 Cannot Simply Become Article III

There is a temptation for Trump’s opponents to say: January 6 was impeachable in 2021, therefore impeach him for January 6 again in 2026.

That would be a weak way to construct a third impeachment.

Trump has already been impeached and tried for his January 6-related conduct.

A credible new impeachment case should principally concern conduct undertaken during his current presidency.

January 6 instead performs another function.

It provides context.

It tells Congress what happened the last time institutions confronted Trump over alleged abuse of presidential power and an attempt to remain in office after losing an election.

It tells Congress what happened when the House impeached him.

It tells Congress what happened when 57 senators voted to convict him but the constitutional supermajority was not reached.

And Trump’s return to office tells Congress what an acquittal can ultimately mean.

The Cost of No Accountability

This is where January 6 becomes larger than Donald Trump.

The Constitution contains rules governing elections and transfers of power, but those rules ultimately depend upon human beings respecting and enforcing them.

Suppose a future president loses an election.

Suppose that president pressures state officials.

Suppose the president encourages alternative interpretations of electoral law designed to preserve his own power.

Suppose the president pressures the vice president.

Suppose supporters then disrupt the congressional proceeding that formalizes the president’s defeat.

What lesson does January 6 provide that future president?

The answer cannot simply be that everything worked out.

Yes, Congress reconvened.

Yes, the electoral votes were counted.

Yes, Joe Biden became president on January 20, 2021.

The immediate constitutional process survived.

But accountability is a different question.

Trump was impeached.

He was acquitted.

The federal criminal case against him never reached a verdict.

He regained the presidency.

And after returning to office, he exercised presidential clemency for nearly all federal defendants prosecuted for January 6-related offenses (The White House, 2025).

None of those individual events proves that the Constitution has failed.

Taken together, however, they establish a precedent that deserves serious consideration.

Constitutional restraints are partly constructed from expectations. Presidents know that certain actions will bring consequences because previous presidents saw those consequences imposed.

When consequences repeatedly fail to materialize, expectations change.

The danger is not necessarily that another president will reproduce January 6 exactly.

History rarely repeats itself that neatly.

The danger is that a future president will study what happened and conclude that the boundaries can be pushed farther.

Maybe Congress can be pressured more aggressively.

Maybe state officials can be threatened more directly.

Maybe federal law enforcement can be manipulated more effectively.

Maybe an election defeat can be resisted more systematically.

Maybe the next effort will be conducted by people who learned from the mistakes of the previous one.

That is the unfinished business of January 6.

America successfully transferred power on January 20, 2021.

What America never conclusively established was the price a president must pay for attempting to interfere with that transfer.

Donald Trump returned to office before the country settled that question.

Now the answer matters not only for him.

It matters for every president who comes afterward.

References

McConnell, M. (2021, February 13). Remarks following the Senate impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump. United States Senate.

The White House. (2025, January 20). Granting pardons and commutation of sentences for certain offenses relating to the events at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021.

U.S. Constitution, art. I, § 3.

U.S. House of Representatives. (2021). Impeaching Donald John Trump, President of the United States, for high crimes and misdemeanors (H. Res. 24, 117th Cong.).

U.S. House of Representatives, Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. (2022). Final report of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (H. Rept. 117-663). U.S. Government Publishing Office.

U.S. Senate. (2021a, February 13). Roll call vote 59: Article of impeachment against former President Donald John Trump.

U.S. Senate. (2021b, February 9). Roll call vote 57: Whether former President Donald John Trump is subject to a court of impeachment for acts committed while president.

The Unfinished Business of January 6: When Accountability Failed

By Cliff Potts, CSO, and Editor-in-Chief of WPS News

Baybay City, Leyte, Philippines — September 1, 2026

On January 6, 2021, the constitutional machinery of the United States was performing one of its most routine and most important functions: Congress was counting electoral votes and formally completing the transfer of presidential power.

Then the Capitol was breached.

The attack itself has been examined through congressional hearings, criminal prosecutions, court proceedings, an impeachment trial, and the final report of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. Arguments continue over responsibility for security failures, the motivations of individual participants, Donald Trump’s intentions, and the political character of subsequent investigations. Those disagreements belong in the historical record.

But one fact cannot reasonably be disputed: Congress was forced to suspend the constitutionally prescribed certification proceeding while a violent mob occupied portions of the United States Capitol (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Trump was subsequently impeached by the House for “incitement of insurrection.” The Senate acquitted him when 57 senators voted guilty and 43 voted not guilty—ten votes short of the constitutionally required two-thirds majority (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021; U.S. Senate, 2021a).

Four years later, Trump returned to the White House.

January 6 therefore presents an extraordinary constitutional problem.

This is no longer merely a question about what happened in 2021.

It is a question about what the United States decided—or failed to decide—about presidential accountability.

January 6 Did Not Begin on January 6

Reducing January 6 to several hours of rioting misses much of the constitutional issue.

The House Select Committee concluded after its investigation that Trump had engaged in a broader effort to overturn the lawful result of the 2020 presidential election. Its final report drew upon documents and testimony from numerous Republicans and members of Trump’s own administration and campaign, including former Justice Department officials, White House personnel, campaign officials, state officials, and others (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The committee concluded that Trump continued promoting false allegations of widespread election fraud after courts rejected numerous challenges and after advisers told him that evidence did not support claims sufficient to reverse the election result (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The committee also concluded that Trump pressured state officials concerning election results, participated in efforts involving alternative electoral certificates, sought assistance from Justice Department officials, and pressured Vice President Mike Pence not to count certain electoral votes during the January 6 joint session of Congress (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Those were findings of a congressional committee, not criminal convictions.

That distinction matters.

Trump and his supporters have consistently rejected the committee’s interpretation, characterized the investigation as partisan, maintained that he genuinely believed the election had been compromised, and argued that his political speech and challenges to election results were constitutionally protected.

But disagreement with the committee does not erase the evidence it collected. The historical record includes testimony from Trump’s own officials describing repeated warnings that allegations being advanced about the election were unsupported (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The constitutional issue therefore reaches beyond the riot itself.

It concerns an incumbent president’s response to losing an election.

The Vice President Was Asked to Do Something He Could Not Lawfully Do

Vice President Mike Pence became central to Trump’s effort.

Trump and allies argued that Pence possessed authority during the congressional electoral count to reject or delay electoral votes from contested states.

Pence rejected that argument.

The January 6 Committee concluded that Trump pressured Pence to refuse to count electoral votes despite being informed that the proposed action lacked lawful constitutional authority (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

That episode is significant because the peaceful transfer of presidential power depends upon losing candidates eventually accepting an institutional answer they do not like.

Candidates can demand recounts.

They can file lawsuits.

They can challenge election procedures.

They can seek investigations.

They can argue that election laws were violated.

But eventually the courts rule, states certify their results, electors vote, Congress counts those votes, and power changes hands.

The American constitutional system cannot function if an incumbent president possesses an effective unilateral veto over that process.

Then Came the Capitol

Trump addressed supporters near the White House on January 6 before Congress convened to count the electoral votes. He urged supporters to march to the Capitol while also telling them to make their voices heard “peacefully and patriotically.”

That language is an important part of Trump’s defense and should not be omitted from any serious assessment of his responsibility.

His defenders argue that this explicit reference to peaceful protest contradicts the allegation that Trump intended to provoke violence.

The House impeachment managers argued differently. They maintained that the speech had to be understood within the context of Trump’s months-long campaign challenging the election result, his rhetoric surrounding January 6, and pressure directed toward Pence and other officials (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021).

The Select Committee later examined Trump’s December 19, 2020 announcement promoting the January 6 protest and concluded that his public messaging helped mobilize supporters who ultimately came to Washington (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The Capitol was subsequently breached.

Members of Congress evacuated or sheltered.

Police officers fought rioters.

The electoral count stopped.

Whatever political terminology one prefers for January 6—riot, attack, insurrection, protest that became violent—the constitutional proceeding was physically disrupted.

That alone made January 6 unlike an ordinary political demonstration.

The 187 Minutes

One of the Select Committee’s most consequential findings concerned what Trump did after the Capitol had been breached.

The committee devoted an entire chapter of its final report to what it called “187 Minutes of Dereliction,” examining the period between the end of Trump’s Ellipse speech and his eventual video message telling supporters to leave the Capitol (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

According to the committee’s reconstruction, people around Trump urged him to intervene publicly while the violence continued. The committee concluded that Trump did not immediately issue an unequivocal public demand that rioters leave the Capitol and that he continued focusing on the electoral count while the attack unfolded (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Trump and his defenders dispute the committee’s characterization of his actions and intentions.

But the underlying constitutional question is difficult to avoid.

The president of the United States is not merely another political commentator watching a riot on television.

The president heads the executive branch.

When violence physically interrupts Congress while it performs a constitutional function, presidential responsibility is qualitatively different from that of an ordinary citizen.

That is why those 187 minutes matter.

Congress Impeached Him

The House acted one week later.

On January 13, 2021, the House approved H.Res. 24, impeaching Trump for incitement of insurrection. Ten Republicans joined Democrats in voting for impeachment (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021).

Trump’s term ended January 20.

His Senate trial therefore occurred after he had left office, creating a constitutional dispute over whether the Senate retained jurisdiction to try a former president.

The Senate voted 56–44 that Trump remained subject to an impeachment trial for acts committed while president (U.S. Senate, 2021b).

The final vote was considerably more striking.

Fifty-seven senators voted guilty.

Forty-three voted not guilty.

Seven Republican senators joined every Democratic and independent senator voting to convict (U.S. Senate, 2021a).

Under almost any ordinary voting rule, 57–43 would be an overwhelming victory.

Impeachment is deliberately different.

The Constitution requires two-thirds of senators present to convict. Trump therefore was acquitted (U.S. Const. art. I, § 3; U.S. Senate, 2021a).

That acquittal must be respected as the formal constitutional result.

But understanding why some senators voted to acquit is equally important.

Even McConnell Said Trump Was Responsible

Then-Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell voted to acquit Trump.

Immediately afterward, however, McConnell delivered a remarkable speech.

He argued that Trump was “practically and morally responsible” for provoking the events of January 6 while maintaining that the Senate lacked jurisdiction to convict someone who was no longer president (McConnell, 2021).

In other words, McConnell’s acquittal vote was not an endorsement of Trump’s conduct.

Other Republican senators similarly relied upon jurisdictional arguments in explaining their votes.

That distinction changes the historical meaning of the 43 acquittal votes.

The Senate did not produce 43 senators unanimously declaring that Trump’s conduct was acceptable.

It produced a coalition containing senators who rejected the House’s case on the merits and others who believed the Constitution prevented them from convicting a former president.

Whether that jurisdictional interpretation was correct remains disputed. The Senate itself had already voted 56–44 that it possessed jurisdiction (U.S. Senate, 2021b).

The consequence, however, was unmistakable.

Trump was not convicted.

He was not disqualified from future federal office.

And eventually he returned.

The Criminal Case Never Produced a Verdict

January 6 also entered the criminal justice system.

Special Counsel Jack Smith obtained a federal indictment alleging that Trump conspired to overturn the 2020 election. Trump pleaded not guilty and denied wrongdoing.

The case never reached a jury verdict.

After Trump won the 2024 presidential election, prosecutors moved to dismiss the federal case because longstanding Justice Department policy holds that a sitting president cannot be federally prosecuted.

That distinction is critical to the historical record.

The dismissal did not constitute an acquittal after trial.

Nor did the indictment constitute proof of guilt.

The central federal criminal allegations concerning Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election therefore ended without a jury determining guilt or innocence.

Once again, the institutional machinery of accountability reached Trump but did not produce a final adjudication of the underlying allegations.

Then Trump Pardoned the January 6 Defendants

Trump’s return to office transformed January 6 from historical controversy into a matter involving his second presidency.

On January 20, 2025—his first day back in office—Trump issued clemency covering nearly all defendants convicted of offenses related to January 6. He commuted the sentences of specified defendants, granted full pardons to others, and directed the attorney general to seek dismissal of remaining January 6 indictments (The White House, 2025).

The White House has defended those actions aggressively, describing January 6 defendants as victims of politically motivated prosecution and presenting Trump’s clemency as an effort to correct injustice and promote reconciliation (The White House, 2025).

The president unquestionably possesses broad constitutional pardon authority over federal offenses.

The question for this series is therefore not simply whether Trump could issue the pardons.

He could.

The larger question is what their issuance means for presidential accountability.

A president impeached over an attack connected to an effort to prevent the transfer of power returned four years later and used presidential authority to erase or reduce federal criminal consequences for many of the people prosecuted in connection with that attack.

That is constitutionally legal clemency.

It is also historically extraordinary.

Both things can be true simultaneously.

January 6 Cannot Simply Become Article III

There is a temptation for Trump’s opponents to say: January 6 was impeachable in 2021, therefore impeach him for January 6 again in 2026.

That would be a weak way to construct a third impeachment.

Trump has already been impeached and tried for his January 6-related conduct.

A credible new impeachment case should principally concern conduct undertaken during his current presidency.

January 6 instead performs another function.

It provides context.

It tells Congress what happened the last time institutions confronted Trump over alleged abuse of presidential power and an attempt to remain in office after losing an election.

It tells Congress what happened when the House impeached him.

It tells Congress what happened when 57 senators voted to convict him but the constitutional supermajority was not reached.

And Trump’s return to office tells Congress what an acquittal can ultimately mean.

The Cost of No Accountability

This is where January 6 becomes larger than Donald Trump.

The Constitution contains rules governing elections and transfers of power, but those rules ultimately depend upon human beings respecting and enforcing them.

Suppose a future president loses an election.

Suppose that president pressures state officials.

Suppose the president encourages alternative interpretations of electoral law designed to preserve his own power.

Suppose the president pressures the vice president.

Suppose supporters then disrupt the congressional proceeding that formalizes the president’s defeat.

What lesson does January 6 provide that future president?

The answer cannot simply be that everything worked out.

Yes, Congress reconvened.

Yes, the electoral votes were counted.

Yes, Joe Biden became president on January 20, 2021.

The immediate constitutional process survived.

But accountability is a different question.

Trump was impeached.

He was acquitted.

The federal criminal case against him never reached a verdict.

He regained the presidency.

And after returning to office, he exercised presidential clemency for nearly all federal defendants prosecuted for January 6-related offenses (The White House, 2025).

None of those individual events proves that the Constitution has failed.

Taken together, however, they establish a precedent that deserves serious consideration.

Constitutional restraints are partly constructed from expectations. Presidents know that certain actions will bring consequences because previous presidents saw those consequences imposed.

When consequences repeatedly fail to materialize, expectations change.

The danger is not necessarily that another president will reproduce January 6 exactly.

History rarely repeats itself that neatly.

The danger is that a future president will study what happened and conclude that the boundaries can be pushed farther.

Maybe Congress can be pressured more aggressively.

Maybe state officials can be threatened more directly.

Maybe federal law enforcement can be manipulated more effectively.

Maybe an election defeat can be resisted more systematically.

Maybe the next effort will be conducted by people who learned from the mistakes of the previous one.

That is the unfinished business of January 6.

America successfully transferred power on January 20, 2021.

What America never conclusively established was the price a president must pay for attempting to interfere with that transfer.

Donald Trump returned to office before the country settled that question.

Now the answer matters not only for him.

It matters for every president who comes afterward.

References

McConnell, M. (2021, February 13). Remarks following the Senate impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump. United States Senate.

The White House. (2025, January 20). Granting pardons and commutation of sentences for certain offenses relating to the events at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021.

U.S. Constitution, art. I, § 3.

U.S. House of Representatives. (2021). Impeaching Donald John Trump, President of the United States, for high crimes and misdemeanors (H. Res. 24, 117th Cong.).

U.S. House of Representatives, Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. (2022). Final report of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (H. Rept. 117-663). U.S. Government Publishing Office.

U.S. Senate. (2021a, February 13). Roll call vote 59: Article of impeachment against former President Donald John Trump.

U.S. Senate. (2021b, February 9). Roll call vote 57: Whether former President Donald John Trump is subject to a court of impeachment for acts committed while president.

The Unfinished Business of January 6: When Accountability Failed

By Cliff Potts, CSO, and Editor-in-Chief of WPS News

Baybay City, Leyte, Philippines — September 1, 2026

On January 6, 2021, the constitutional machinery of the United States was performing one of its most routine and most important functions: Congress was counting electoral votes and formally completing the transfer of presidential power.

Then the Capitol was breached.

The attack itself has been examined through congressional hearings, criminal prosecutions, court proceedings, an impeachment trial, and the final report of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. Arguments continue over responsibility for security failures, the motivations of individual participants, Donald Trump’s intentions, and the political character of subsequent investigations. Those disagreements belong in the historical record.

But one fact cannot reasonably be disputed: Congress was forced to suspend the constitutionally prescribed certification proceeding while a violent mob occupied portions of the United States Capitol (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Trump was subsequently impeached by the House for “incitement of insurrection.” The Senate acquitted him when 57 senators voted guilty and 43 voted not guilty—ten votes short of the constitutionally required two-thirds majority (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021; U.S. Senate, 2021a).

Four years later, Trump returned to the White House.

January 6 therefore presents an extraordinary constitutional problem.

This is no longer merely a question about what happened in 2021.

It is a question about what the United States decided—or failed to decide—about presidential accountability.

January 6 Did Not Begin on January 6

Reducing January 6 to several hours of rioting misses much of the constitutional issue.

The House Select Committee concluded after its investigation that Trump had engaged in a broader effort to overturn the lawful result of the 2020 presidential election. Its final report drew upon documents and testimony from numerous Republicans and members of Trump’s own administration and campaign, including former Justice Department officials, White House personnel, campaign officials, state officials, and others (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The committee concluded that Trump continued promoting false allegations of widespread election fraud after courts rejected numerous challenges and after advisers told him that evidence did not support claims sufficient to reverse the election result (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The committee also concluded that Trump pressured state officials concerning election results, participated in efforts involving alternative electoral certificates, sought assistance from Justice Department officials, and pressured Vice President Mike Pence not to count certain electoral votes during the January 6 joint session of Congress (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Those were findings of a congressional committee, not criminal convictions.

That distinction matters.

Trump and his supporters have consistently rejected the committee’s interpretation, characterized the investigation as partisan, maintained that he genuinely believed the election had been compromised, and argued that his political speech and challenges to election results were constitutionally protected.

But disagreement with the committee does not erase the evidence it collected. The historical record includes testimony from Trump’s own officials describing repeated warnings that allegations being advanced about the election were unsupported (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The constitutional issue therefore reaches beyond the riot itself.

It concerns an incumbent president’s response to losing an election.

The Vice President Was Asked to Do Something He Could Not Lawfully Do

Vice President Mike Pence became central to Trump’s effort.

Trump and allies argued that Pence possessed authority during the congressional electoral count to reject or delay electoral votes from contested states.

Pence rejected that argument.

The January 6 Committee concluded that Trump pressured Pence to refuse to count electoral votes despite being informed that the proposed action lacked lawful constitutional authority (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

That episode is significant because the peaceful transfer of presidential power depends upon losing candidates eventually accepting an institutional answer they do not like.

Candidates can demand recounts.

They can file lawsuits.

They can challenge election procedures.

They can seek investigations.

They can argue that election laws were violated.

But eventually the courts rule, states certify their results, electors vote, Congress counts those votes, and power changes hands.

The American constitutional system cannot function if an incumbent president possesses an effective unilateral veto over that process.

Then Came the Capitol

Trump addressed supporters near the White House on January 6 before Congress convened to count the electoral votes. He urged supporters to march to the Capitol while also telling them to make their voices heard “peacefully and patriotically.”

That language is an important part of Trump’s defense and should not be omitted from any serious assessment of his responsibility.

His defenders argue that this explicit reference to peaceful protest contradicts the allegation that Trump intended to provoke violence.

The House impeachment managers argued differently. They maintained that the speech had to be understood within the context of Trump’s months-long campaign challenging the election result, his rhetoric surrounding January 6, and pressure directed toward Pence and other officials (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021).

The Select Committee later examined Trump’s December 19, 2020 announcement promoting the January 6 protest and concluded that his public messaging helped mobilize supporters who ultimately came to Washington (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The Capitol was subsequently breached.

Members of Congress evacuated or sheltered.

Police officers fought rioters.

The electoral count stopped.

Whatever political terminology one prefers for January 6—riot, attack, insurrection, protest that became violent—the constitutional proceeding was physically disrupted.

That alone made January 6 unlike an ordinary political demonstration.

The 187 Minutes

One of the Select Committee’s most consequential findings concerned what Trump did after the Capitol had been breached.

The committee devoted an entire chapter of its final report to what it called “187 Minutes of Dereliction,” examining the period between the end of Trump’s Ellipse speech and his eventual video message telling supporters to leave the Capitol (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

According to the committee’s reconstruction, people around Trump urged him to intervene publicly while the violence continued. The committee concluded that Trump did not immediately issue an unequivocal public demand that rioters leave the Capitol and that he continued focusing on the electoral count while the attack unfolded (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Trump and his defenders dispute the committee’s characterization of his actions and intentions.

But the underlying constitutional question is difficult to avoid.

The president of the United States is not merely another political commentator watching a riot on television.

The president heads the executive branch.

When violence physically interrupts Congress while it performs a constitutional function, presidential responsibility is qualitatively different from that of an ordinary citizen.

That is why those 187 minutes matter.

Congress Impeached Him

The House acted one week later.

On January 13, 2021, the House approved H.Res. 24, impeaching Trump for incitement of insurrection. Ten Republicans joined Democrats in voting for impeachment (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021).

Trump’s term ended January 20.

His Senate trial therefore occurred after he had left office, creating a constitutional dispute over whether the Senate retained jurisdiction to try a former president.

The Senate voted 56–44 that Trump remained subject to an impeachment trial for acts committed while president (U.S. Senate, 2021b).

The final vote was considerably more striking.

Fifty-seven senators voted guilty.

Forty-three voted not guilty.

Seven Republican senators joined every Democratic and independent senator voting to convict (U.S. Senate, 2021a).

Under almost any ordinary voting rule, 57–43 would be an overwhelming victory.

Impeachment is deliberately different.

The Constitution requires two-thirds of senators present to convict. Trump therefore was acquitted (U.S. Const. art. I, § 3; U.S. Senate, 2021a).

That acquittal must be respected as the formal constitutional result.

But understanding why some senators voted to acquit is equally important.

Even McConnell Said Trump Was Responsible

Then-Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell voted to acquit Trump.

Immediately afterward, however, McConnell delivered a remarkable speech.

He argued that Trump was “practically and morally responsible” for provoking the events of January 6 while maintaining that the Senate lacked jurisdiction to convict someone who was no longer president (McConnell, 2021).

In other words, McConnell’s acquittal vote was not an endorsement of Trump’s conduct.

Other Republican senators similarly relied upon jurisdictional arguments in explaining their votes.

That distinction changes the historical meaning of the 43 acquittal votes.

The Senate did not produce 43 senators unanimously declaring that Trump’s conduct was acceptable.

It produced a coalition containing senators who rejected the House’s case on the merits and others who believed the Constitution prevented them from convicting a former president.

Whether that jurisdictional interpretation was correct remains disputed. The Senate itself had already voted 56–44 that it possessed jurisdiction (U.S. Senate, 2021b).

The consequence, however, was unmistakable.

Trump was not convicted.

He was not disqualified from future federal office.

And eventually he returned.

The Criminal Case Never Produced a Verdict

January 6 also entered the criminal justice system.

Special Counsel Jack Smith obtained a federal indictment alleging that Trump conspired to overturn the 2020 election. Trump pleaded not guilty and denied wrongdoing.

The case never reached a jury verdict.

After Trump won the 2024 presidential election, prosecutors moved to dismiss the federal case because longstanding Justice Department policy holds that a sitting president cannot be federally prosecuted.

That distinction is critical to the historical record.

The dismissal did not constitute an acquittal after trial.

Nor did the indictment constitute proof of guilt.

The central federal criminal allegations concerning Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election therefore ended without a jury determining guilt or innocence.

Once again, the institutional machinery of accountability reached Trump but did not produce a final adjudication of the underlying allegations.

Then Trump Pardoned the January 6 Defendants

Trump’s return to office transformed January 6 from historical controversy into a matter involving his second presidency.

On January 20, 2025—his first day back in office—Trump issued clemency covering nearly all defendants convicted of offenses related to January 6. He commuted the sentences of specified defendants, granted full pardons to others, and directed the attorney general to seek dismissal of remaining January 6 indictments (The White House, 2025).

The White House has defended those actions aggressively, describing January 6 defendants as victims of politically motivated prosecution and presenting Trump’s clemency as an effort to correct injustice and promote reconciliation (The White House, 2025).

The president unquestionably possesses broad constitutional pardon authority over federal offenses.

The question for this series is therefore not simply whether Trump could issue the pardons.

He could.

The larger question is what their issuance means for presidential accountability.

A president impeached over an attack connected to an effort to prevent the transfer of power returned four years later and used presidential authority to erase or reduce federal criminal consequences for many of the people prosecuted in connection with that attack.

That is constitutionally legal clemency.

It is also historically extraordinary.

Both things can be true simultaneously.

January 6 Cannot Simply Become Article III

There is a temptation for Trump’s opponents to say: January 6 was impeachable in 2021, therefore impeach him for January 6 again in 2026.

That would be a weak way to construct a third impeachment.

Trump has already been impeached and tried for his January 6-related conduct.

A credible new impeachment case should principally concern conduct undertaken during his current presidency.

January 6 instead performs another function.

It provides context.

It tells Congress what happened the last time institutions confronted Trump over alleged abuse of presidential power and an attempt to remain in office after losing an election.

It tells Congress what happened when the House impeached him.

It tells Congress what happened when 57 senators voted to convict him but the constitutional supermajority was not reached.

And Trump’s return to office tells Congress what an acquittal can ultimately mean.

The Cost of No Accountability

This is where January 6 becomes larger than Donald Trump.

The Constitution contains rules governing elections and transfers of power, but those rules ultimately depend upon human beings respecting and enforcing them.

Suppose a future president loses an election.

Suppose that president pressures state officials.

Suppose the president encourages alternative interpretations of electoral law designed to preserve his own power.

Suppose the president pressures the vice president.

Suppose supporters then disrupt the congressional proceeding that formalizes the president’s defeat.

What lesson does January 6 provide that future president?

The answer cannot simply be that everything worked out.

Yes, Congress reconvened.

Yes, the electoral votes were counted.

Yes, Joe Biden became president on January 20, 2021.

The immediate constitutional process survived.

But accountability is a different question.

Trump was impeached.

He was acquitted.

The federal criminal case against him never reached a verdict.

He regained the presidency.

And after returning to office, he exercised presidential clemency for nearly all federal defendants prosecuted for January 6-related offenses (The White House, 2025).

None of those individual events proves that the Constitution has failed.

Taken together, however, they establish a precedent that deserves serious consideration.

Constitutional restraints are partly constructed from expectations. Presidents know that certain actions will bring consequences because previous presidents saw those consequences imposed.

When consequences repeatedly fail to materialize, expectations change.

The danger is not necessarily that another president will reproduce January 6 exactly.

History rarely repeats itself that neatly.

The danger is that a future president will study what happened and conclude that the boundaries can be pushed farther.

Maybe Congress can be pressured more aggressively.

Maybe state officials can be threatened more directly.

Maybe federal law enforcement can be manipulated more effectively.

Maybe an election defeat can be resisted more systematically.

Maybe the next effort will be conducted by people who learned from the mistakes of the previous one.

That is the unfinished business of January 6.

America successfully transferred power on January 20, 2021.

What America never conclusively established was the price a president must pay for attempting to interfere with that transfer.

Donald Trump returned to office before the country settled that question.

Now the answer matters not only for him.

It matters for every president who comes afterward.

References

McConnell, M. (2021, February 13). Remarks following the Senate impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump. United States Senate.

The White House. (2025, January 20). Granting pardons and commutation of sentences for certain offenses relating to the events at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021.

U.S. Constitution, art. I, § 3.

U.S. House of Representatives. (2021). Impeaching Donald John Trump, President of the United States, for high crimes and misdemeanors (H. Res. 24, 117th Cong.).

U.S. House of Representatives, Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. (2022). Final report of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (H. Rept. 117-663). U.S. Government Publishing Office.

U.S. Senate. (2021a, February 13). Roll call vote 59: Article of impeachment against former President Donald John Trump.

U.S. Senate. (2021b, February 9). Roll call vote 57: Whether former President Donald John Trump is subject to a court of impeachment for acts committed while president.

The Unfinished Business of January 6: When Accountability Failed

By Cliff Potts, CSO, and Editor-in-Chief of WPS News

Baybay City, Leyte, Philippines — September 1, 2026

On January 6, 2021, the constitutional machinery of the United States was performing one of its most routine and most important functions: Congress was counting electoral votes and formally completing the transfer of presidential power.

Then the Capitol was breached.

The attack itself has been examined through congressional hearings, criminal prosecutions, court proceedings, an impeachment trial, and the final report of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. Arguments continue over responsibility for security failures, the motivations of individual participants, Donald Trump’s intentions, and the political character of subsequent investigations. Those disagreements belong in the historical record.

But one fact cannot reasonably be disputed: Congress was forced to suspend the constitutionally prescribed certification proceeding while a violent mob occupied portions of the United States Capitol (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Trump was subsequently impeached by the House for “incitement of insurrection.” The Senate acquitted him when 57 senators voted guilty and 43 voted not guilty—ten votes short of the constitutionally required two-thirds majority (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021; U.S. Senate, 2021a).

Four years later, Trump returned to the White House.

January 6 therefore presents an extraordinary constitutional problem.

This is no longer merely a question about what happened in 2021.

It is a question about what the United States decided—or failed to decide—about presidential accountability.

January 6 Did Not Begin on January 6

Reducing January 6 to several hours of rioting misses much of the constitutional issue.

The House Select Committee concluded after its investigation that Trump had engaged in a broader effort to overturn the lawful result of the 2020 presidential election. Its final report drew upon documents and testimony from numerous Republicans and members of Trump’s own administration and campaign, including former Justice Department officials, White House personnel, campaign officials, state officials, and others (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The committee concluded that Trump continued promoting false allegations of widespread election fraud after courts rejected numerous challenges and after advisers told him that evidence did not support claims sufficient to reverse the election result (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The committee also concluded that Trump pressured state officials concerning election results, participated in efforts involving alternative electoral certificates, sought assistance from Justice Department officials, and pressured Vice President Mike Pence not to count certain electoral votes during the January 6 joint session of Congress (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Those were findings of a congressional committee, not criminal convictions.

That distinction matters.

Trump and his supporters have consistently rejected the committee’s interpretation, characterized the investigation as partisan, maintained that he genuinely believed the election had been compromised, and argued that his political speech and challenges to election results were constitutionally protected.

But disagreement with the committee does not erase the evidence it collected. The historical record includes testimony from Trump’s own officials describing repeated warnings that allegations being advanced about the election were unsupported (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The constitutional issue therefore reaches beyond the riot itself.

It concerns an incumbent president’s response to losing an election.

The Vice President Was Asked to Do Something He Could Not Lawfully Do

Vice President Mike Pence became central to Trump’s effort.

Trump and allies argued that Pence possessed authority during the congressional electoral count to reject or delay electoral votes from contested states.

Pence rejected that argument.

The January 6 Committee concluded that Trump pressured Pence to refuse to count electoral votes despite being informed that the proposed action lacked lawful constitutional authority (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

That episode is significant because the peaceful transfer of presidential power depends upon losing candidates eventually accepting an institutional answer they do not like.

Candidates can demand recounts.

They can file lawsuits.

They can challenge election procedures.

They can seek investigations.

They can argue that election laws were violated.

But eventually the courts rule, states certify their results, electors vote, Congress counts those votes, and power changes hands.

The American constitutional system cannot function if an incumbent president possesses an effective unilateral veto over that process.

Then Came the Capitol

Trump addressed supporters near the White House on January 6 before Congress convened to count the electoral votes. He urged supporters to march to the Capitol while also telling them to make their voices heard “peacefully and patriotically.”

That language is an important part of Trump’s defense and should not be omitted from any serious assessment of his responsibility.

His defenders argue that this explicit reference to peaceful protest contradicts the allegation that Trump intended to provoke violence.

The House impeachment managers argued differently. They maintained that the speech had to be understood within the context of Trump’s months-long campaign challenging the election result, his rhetoric surrounding January 6, and pressure directed toward Pence and other officials (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021).

The Select Committee later examined Trump’s December 19, 2020 announcement promoting the January 6 protest and concluded that his public messaging helped mobilize supporters who ultimately came to Washington (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

The Capitol was subsequently breached.

Members of Congress evacuated or sheltered.

Police officers fought rioters.

The electoral count stopped.

Whatever political terminology one prefers for January 6—riot, attack, insurrection, protest that became violent—the constitutional proceeding was physically disrupted.

That alone made January 6 unlike an ordinary political demonstration.

The 187 Minutes

One of the Select Committee’s most consequential findings concerned what Trump did after the Capitol had been breached.

The committee devoted an entire chapter of its final report to what it called “187 Minutes of Dereliction,” examining the period between the end of Trump’s Ellipse speech and his eventual video message telling supporters to leave the Capitol (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

According to the committee’s reconstruction, people around Trump urged him to intervene publicly while the violence continued. The committee concluded that Trump did not immediately issue an unequivocal public demand that rioters leave the Capitol and that he continued focusing on the electoral count while the attack unfolded (U.S. House Select Committee, 2022).

Trump and his defenders dispute the committee’s characterization of his actions and intentions.

But the underlying constitutional question is difficult to avoid.

The president of the United States is not merely another political commentator watching a riot on television.

The president heads the executive branch.

When violence physically interrupts Congress while it performs a constitutional function, presidential responsibility is qualitatively different from that of an ordinary citizen.

That is why those 187 minutes matter.

Congress Impeached Him

The House acted one week later.

On January 13, 2021, the House approved H.Res. 24, impeaching Trump for incitement of insurrection. Ten Republicans joined Democrats in voting for impeachment (U.S. House of Representatives, 2021).

Trump’s term ended January 20.

His Senate trial therefore occurred after he had left office, creating a constitutional dispute over whether the Senate retained jurisdiction to try a former president.

The Senate voted 56–44 that Trump remained subject to an impeachment trial for acts committed while president (U.S. Senate, 2021b).

The final vote was considerably more striking.

Fifty-seven senators voted guilty.

Forty-three voted not guilty.

Seven Republican senators joined every Democratic and independent senator voting to convict (U.S. Senate, 2021a).

Under almost any ordinary voting rule, 57–43 would be an overwhelming victory.

Impeachment is deliberately different.

The Constitution requires two-thirds of senators present to convict. Trump therefore was acquitted (U.S. Const. art. I, § 3; U.S. Senate, 2021a).

That acquittal must be respected as the formal constitutional result.

But understanding why some senators voted to acquit is equally important.

Even McConnell Said Trump Was Responsible

Then-Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell voted to acquit Trump.

Immediately afterward, however, McConnell delivered a remarkable speech.

He argued that Trump was “practically and morally responsible” for provoking the events of January 6 while maintaining that the Senate lacked jurisdiction to convict someone who was no longer president (McConnell, 2021).

In other words, McConnell’s acquittal vote was not an endorsement of Trump’s conduct.

Other Republican senators similarly relied upon jurisdictional arguments in explaining their votes.

That distinction changes the historical meaning of the 43 acquittal votes.

The Senate did not produce 43 senators unanimously declaring that Trump’s conduct was acceptable.

It produced a coalition containing senators who rejected the House’s case on the merits and others who believed the Constitution prevented them from convicting a former president.

Whether that jurisdictional interpretation was correct remains disputed. The Senate itself had already voted 56–44 that it possessed jurisdiction (U.S. Senate, 2021b).

The consequence, however, was unmistakable.

Trump was not convicted.

He was not disqualified from future federal office.

And eventually he returned.

The Criminal Case Never Produced a Verdict

January 6 also entered the criminal justice system.

Special Counsel Jack Smith obtained a federal indictment alleging that Trump conspired to overturn the 2020 election. Trump pleaded not guilty and denied wrongdoing.

The case never reached a jury verdict.

After Trump won the 2024 presidential election, prosecutors moved to dismiss the federal case because longstanding Justice Department policy holds that a sitting president cannot be federally prosecuted.

That distinction is critical to the historical record.

The dismissal did not constitute an acquittal after trial.

Nor did the indictment constitute proof of guilt.

The central federal criminal allegations concerning Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election therefore ended without a jury determining guilt or innocence.

Once again, the institutional machinery of accountability reached Trump but did not produce a final adjudication of the underlying allegations.

Then Trump Pardoned the January 6 Defendants

Trump’s return to office transformed January 6 from historical controversy into a matter involving his second presidency.

On January 20, 2025—his first day back in office—Trump issued clemency covering nearly all defendants convicted of offenses related to January 6. He commuted the sentences of specified defendants, granted full pardons to others, and directed the attorney general to seek dismissal of remaining January 6 indictments (The White House, 2025).

The White House has defended those actions aggressively, describing January 6 defendants as victims of politically motivated prosecution and presenting Trump’s clemency as an effort to correct injustice and promote reconciliation (The White House, 2025).

The president unquestionably possesses broad constitutional pardon authority over federal offenses.

The question for this series is therefore not simply whether Trump could issue the pardons.

He could.

The larger question is what their issuance means for presidential accountability.

A president impeached over an attack connected to an effort to prevent the transfer of power returned four years later and used presidential authority to erase or reduce federal criminal consequences for many of the people prosecuted in connection with that attack.

That is constitutionally legal clemency.

It is also historically extraordinary.

Both things can be true simultaneously.

January 6 Cannot Simply Become Article III

There is a temptation for Trump’s opponents to say: January 6 was impeachable in 2021, therefore impeach him for January 6 again in 2026.

That would be a weak way to construct a third impeachment.

Trump has already been impeached and tried for his January 6-related conduct.

A credible new impeachment case should principally concern conduct undertaken during his current presidency.

January 6 instead performs another function.

It provides context.

It tells Congress what happened the last time institutions confronted Trump over alleged abuse of presidential power and an attempt to remain in office after losing an election.

It tells Congress what happened when the House impeached him.

It tells Congress what happened when 57 senators voted to convict him but the constitutional supermajority was not reached.

And Trump’s return to office tells Congress what an acquittal can ultimately mean.

The Cost of No Accountability

This is where January 6 becomes larger than Donald Trump.

The Constitution contains rules governing elections and transfers of power, but those rules ultimately depend upon human beings respecting and enforcing them.

Suppose a future president loses an election.

Suppose that president pressures state officials.

Suppose the president encourages alternative interpretations of electoral law designed to preserve his own power.

Suppose the president pressures the vice president.

Suppose supporters then disrupt the congressional proceeding that formalizes the president’s defeat.

What lesson does January 6 provide that future president?

The answer cannot simply be that everything worked out.

Yes, Congress reconvened.

Yes, the electoral votes were counted.

Yes, Joe Biden became president on January 20, 2021.

The immediate constitutional process survived.

But accountability is a different question.

Trump was impeached.

He was acquitted.

The federal criminal case against him never reached a verdict.

He regained the presidency.

And after returning to office, he exercised presidential clemency for nearly all federal defendants prosecuted for January 6-related offenses (The White House, 2025).

None of those individual events proves that the Constitution has failed.

Taken together, however, they establish a precedent that deserves serious consideration.

Constitutional restraints are partly constructed from expectations. Presidents know that certain actions will bring consequences because previous presidents saw those consequences imposed.

When consequences repeatedly fail to materialize, expectations change.

The danger is not necessarily that another president will reproduce January 6 exactly.

History rarely repeats itself that neatly.

The danger is that a future president will study what happened and conclude that the boundaries can be pushed farther.

Maybe Congress can be pressured more aggressively.

Maybe state officials can be threatened more directly.

Maybe federal law enforcement can be manipulated more effectively.

Maybe an election defeat can be resisted more systematically.

Maybe the next effort will be conducted by people who learned from the mistakes of the previous one.

That is the unfinished business of January 6.

America successfully transferred power on January 20, 2021.

What America never conclusively established was the price a president must pay for attempting to interfere with that transfer.

Donald Trump returned to office before the country settled that question.

Now the answer matters not only for him.

It matters for every president who comes afterward.

References

McConnell, M. (2021, February 13). Remarks following the Senate impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump. United States Senate.

The White House. (2025, January 20). Granting pardons and commutation of sentences for certain offenses relating to the events at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021.

U.S. Constitution, art. I, § 3.

U.S. House of Representatives. (2021). Impeaching Donald John Trump, President of the United States, for high crimes and misdemeanors (H. Res. 24, 117th Cong.).

U.S. House of Representatives, Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. (2022). Final report of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol (H. Rept. 117-663). U.S. Government Publishing Office.

U.S. Senate. (2021a, February 13). Roll call vote 59: Article of impeachment against former President Donald John Trump.

U.S. Senate. (2021b, February 9). Roll call vote 57: Whether former President Donald John Trump is subject to a court of impeachment for acts committed while president.

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The Republican regime is a terrorist organization.

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