You’re inserting words and ideas that aren’t there. I know you wish they were, but they aren’t.
So - where does it require the House to have delivered the articles prior to his leaving office? It isn’t the removal clauses. The House has sole authority over impeachments and the Senate has sole authority over trials. The SCOTUS cannot tell them they are wrong unless they are violating another clause, such as trying to convict without a 2/3 majority.
Article 1, section 3 allows two penalties but does not require both of them. The Senate has removed people from office without disqualifying them, so it is logical they can do the reverse - disqualify without removing from office.
Maybe my copy of the constitution is defective. - it was printed about 25 years ago. I don’t read the word INCUMBENT in my copy. I didn’t miss an Amendment adding that, did I?
You are also misreading article 2, Section 4. The words say that the President/vp/officer MUST be removed for treason/bribery/high crimes. Stated another way, when the crime is X, the officers are required to be removed from office. That is just minimum sentencing.
You are claiming that because the Senate cannot remove him from office, they lose their authority of a trial. Yet nothing in the Constitution ties the clauses together, therefore they are independent. Neither affect the other.
On top of that - it is established that a former officer of the state can be impeached after they leave office for things they did while in office, so they certainly can be tried after leaving office too.
If Trump is convicted and disqualified, he can say whatever he likes in 2024, but Democrats will sue and the SCOTUS will keep him from running. I don’t expect that to happen, but the Senate has that authority.
Rather than making this stuff up, I’d suggest that you step back from the partisan position and just read the words without adding meaning that isn’t there. You will stop misleading yourself.
This could have been a good discussion, again going nowhere, until your last paragraph where you demonstrated, once again, that you’re just a little asshole who can’t possibly be wrong. Don’t be a cunt. Put on your big boy pants and maybe do some reading.
I inserted nothing that a textualist would disagree with. You on the other hand are holding that since the text doesn’t specifically prohibit trying a private citizen, it must be allowed.
You would be wrong. That was the English impeachment model, but the Founders thought better of it.
Here’s liberal Jonathan Turley’s take in it. Turkey supported the impeachment of Trump right up until his last day in office, but says the Senate trial for a former president is not within the bounds of the Constitution.
“For my part, I am admittedly fixated on the fact that impeachment refers to the removal of “the President” and other officials in office. I understand that many do not adhere to a strong textualist approach to the Constitution. However, there is a glaring anomaly in the text. Indeed, the primary stated purpose of the trial is to determine whether “the President . . . shall be removed.” At the second Trump impeachment trial, the president will be Joe Biden, not Donald Trump. So the Senate will hold a rather curious vote to decide whether to remove a president who has already gone. Moreover, Chief Justice John Roberts is not expected to be present to answer these questions because there is no president to try. Article I states “When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside.” So the Senate will get someone else. The question is who is being tried. Is he a president? Obviously not. Is he a civil officer? No, he is a private citizen. A private citizen is being called to the Senate to be tried for removal from an office that he does not hold.
“Every other part of the Constitution using the term “the President” or such specific officeholders is a reference to the current officeholder, not anyone who has ever held that office. Otherwise, Donald Trump could still be issuing pardons.”
https://jonathanturley.org/2021/01/22/the-case-against-retroactive-impeachment-trials-a-response-to-the-open-letter-of-scholars/And, smartass, the term incumbent was a contextualist term. Former circuit court judge Michael Luttig also agrees with me.
“The reason for this is found in the Constitution itself. Trump would no longer be incumbent in the Office of the President at the time of the delayed Senate proceeding and would no longer be subject to “impeachment conviction” by the Senate, under the Constitution’s Impeachment Clauses. Which is to say that the Senate’s only power under the Constitution is to convict — or not — an incumbent president.
“The purpose, text and structure of the Constitution’s Impeachment Clauses confirm this intuitive and common-sense understanding.
The very concept of constitutional impeachment presupposes the impeachment, conviction and removal of a president who is, at the time of his impeachment, an incumbent in the office from which he is removed. Indeed, that was the purpose of the impeachment power, to remove from office a president or other “civil official” before he could further harm the nation from the office he then occupies.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/01/12/once-trump-leaves-office-senate-cant-hold-an-impeachment-trial/
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