WASHINGTON – North Carolina Republican Richard Burr voted to convict President Donald Trump on his lone impeachment charge Saturday, a surprising vote for the retiring senator.
For the second time in little more than a year, fellow North Carolina Republican Thom Tillis voted to acquit Trump.
The Senate voted Saturday to acquit Trump on a single impeachment article of incitement of insurrection for his role in the deadly Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. The 57-43 vote fell short of the two-thirds (67-vote) threshold necessary for conviction.
“As I said on January 6th, the President bears responsibility for these tragic events. The evidence is compelling that President Trump is guilty of inciting an insurrection against a coequal branch of government and that the charge rises to the level of high Crimes and Misdemeanors. Therefore, I have voted to convict,” Burr said in a statement. “I do not make this decision lightly, but I believe it is necessary.
“By what he did and by what he did not do, President Trump violated his oath of office to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
Seven Republicans voted to convict on Saturday. Senators voted to allow witnesses earlier Saturday, but both sides agreed not to call any allowing for closing arguments and a vote.
Burr was perhaps the most surprising vote in the entire chamber. He was extremely critical of Trump on the night of Jan. 6, but had voted earlier in the week that the trial was unconstitutional.
“When this process started, I believed that it was unconstitutional to impeach a president who was no longer in office. I still believe that to be the case. However, the Senate is an institution based on precedent, and given that the majority in the Senate voted to proceed with this trial, the question of constitutionality is now established precedent,” Burr said in a statement.
“As an impartial juror, my role is now to determine whether House managers have sufficiently made the case for the article of impeachment against President Trump. I have listened to the arguments presented by both sides and considered the facts. The facts are clear.”
Burr and Tillis voted not to allow witnesses Saturday.
North Carolina’s senators had voted against even holding the trial twice in the days leading up to it, citing Trump’s status as a former president. President Joe Biden was inaugurated on Jan. 20 — two weeks after the riot in Washington, D.C., and one week after the U.S. House impeached Trump for the second time.
The Jan. 6 attack came on the day members of Congress certified results of the 2020 presidential election, a final and largely procedural process that occurs every four years.
“The President promoted unfounded conspiracy theories to cast doubt on the integrity of a free and fair election because he did not like the results. As Congress met to certify the election results, the President directed his supporters to go to the Capitol to disrupt the lawful proceedings required by the Constitution. When the crowd became violent, the President used his office to first inflame the situation instead of immediately calling for an end to the assault,” Burr said.
The Senate trial took less than a week. No witnesses were called, and Trump’s defense lawyers used less than three of their allotted 16 hours. Senators asked written questions to both sides throughout Friday afternoon, setting up Saturday’s final session.
THE TRIAL
On Tuesday, the two sides debated the constitutionality of the trial with 56 Senators, including six Republicans, voting that it was constitutional to move ahead. Burr and Tillis were among 44 Republicans to vote no.
The House impeachment managers delivered their case Wednesday and Thursday, outlining their contention that Trump was responsible for inciting a riot on Jan. 6. They pointed to Trump’s repeated false claims that the election had been stolen from him and his at times fiery speech to supporters before the Capitol was breached.
In their lengthy presentation, the House managers pointed to Trump’s public pressure campaign on Vice President Mike Pence to overturn the election results on Jan. 6 and his lack of action after protesters had stormed the Capitol.
“My problem with this is not the case that’s being presented but the process that led up to this. I feel very very strongly that the House needs to continue to do the work. There’s nothing that would prevent them from taking this evidence and more evidence and presenting a more fulsome case,” Tillis said Wednesday, when the House managers presented their most dramatic evidence.
The impeachment managers showed security footage from the Capitol riot, illustrating how close the mob came to Pence and members of Congress. They also showed footage of attacks on police officers in and around the Capitol.
“We’ve seen a lot of crimes committed that all need to be convicted. Every single person that stepped foot in this chamber when they were not supposed to be in this Capitol needs to be convicted,” Tillis said Wednesday. “We’ve seen a lot of that, and I hope that it continues to provide evidence to every single person who came here, whether they were violent or not. Every single one of them should go to prison.”
Trump’s defense attorneys gave their side on Friday, repeatedly showing video clips of Democrats saying the word “fight” to counter the contention that Trump’s language was responsible for the rioters’ actions. The defense also focused on free speech and due process claims in their brief presentation.
There was little drama surrounding the overall outcome. In a Senate evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans, conviction required at least 17 GOP senators to vote against Trump, an immensely popular figure with Republican voters. Trump received more than 74 million votes for president — the second-most in history though about seven million fewer than Biden.
Before the trial began, Burr and Tillis said they were opposed to holding it, citing Trump’s status as former president.
“This is a civilian now. A charge like this would go to the Justice Department and be referred for prosecution,” Burr said on Jan. 25.
But, at the time, Burr said he needed to hear the case.
Tillis said conviction was unwise and that he also opposed banning Trump from running for federal office again.
“On January 6, I said voting to reject the states’ electors was a dangerous precedent we should not set. Likewise, impeaching a former President who is now a private citizen would be equally unwise,” Tillis said in a Jan. 26 statement.
THE ATTACK
On the night of the attack, Burr said, “America’s core principles were threatened by those seeking to forcibly stop our electoral process and overturn the results of a presidential election with which they disagreed.” And he said Trump “bears responsibility for (Jan. 6) events by promoting the unfounded conspiracy theories that have led to this point.”
Burr and Tillis voted against the objections to the electoral results in Arizona and Pennsylvania, in essence voting to certify the results. All but one Republican in North Carolina’s U.S. House delegation voted to sustain the objections to one or both of the states.
Those votes occurred after members of Congress had been evacuated to secure locations for most of the afternoon to escape the riot.
Burr and Tillis voted to acquit Trump during his first impeachment trial in January 2020.
Trump is the first president to be impeached twice. There have been four impeachment trials for presidents in the U.S. Senate — Andrew Johnson in 1868, Bill Clinton in 1999, and Trump twice. None has been convicted.
Burr was a member of the U.S. House in 1998 when Clinton was impeached. Burr voted to impeach Clinton on two of the four articles.
