prepared by the staff of the House Committee on the Judiciary

“ Simply put, President Trump has no free speech defense. President Trump is not a private citizen, free to say whatever he wants without accepting the consequences or recognizing the effects it might have on our system of government. As the head of the Executive Branch, his words can shake the nation—and so he is held to a higher standard than private citizens. Moreover, when it comes to the impeachment power, the question is not whether the President was free to say what he said. ”

“ Impeachment is about preserving the Nation from a threat to the constitutional order, not imposing punishment. Nowhere did the Framers suggest that a President must be allowed to remain in office if his abuses involved speech that would otherwise be shielded from criminal regulation by the First Amendment. This would be a strange and irrational limitation: Presidents would be free to openly advocate the overthrow of the United States government, or the adoption of fascism, and Congress would be powerless to remove them on that basis. ”

“ A President who incites violence against the Congress and three of the highest-level federal officials—and does so while Congress counts the electoral votes in an election that he lost—imperils the constitutional system. This offense is precisely the sort of conduct warranting impeachment and removal from office. ”

“ President Trump’s incitement of mob violence against the Capitol is clearly part of a broader pattern of encouraging lawless behavior and official action where it serves to aggrandize his own power. Especially in light of the accelerating pace of these events as the end of President Trump’s term comes to a close, the risk that that pattern will continue and repeat itself even in the final days of his administration is great. ”

“ Given all that, there can be no serious doubt that President Trump intended these reasonably foreseeable results encouraged by his own conduct. He may not have anticipated every detail, but any reasonable person would understand that inflaming a mob containing armed, angry supporters, and then directing them towards the Capitol with the goal of “fighting like Hell” and thwarting a supposed massive electoral conspiracy would result in violence and destruction. ”

“ This ignores the precedent this country would set if we refuse to impeach and the remedy of disqualification that the Senate may impose. Even wrongly assuming that President Trump poses no ongoing threat, impeachment sends the strongest possible message that, as John Adams said, we are a “government of laws, and not of men.” [255] Impeachment is a necessary measure to make sure that no President ever again attempts to incite his supporters to take unlawful action and overturn the will of the people. ”

“ There is no merit to the startling and dangerous idea that a president may engage in high Crimes and Misdemeanors in their final weeks in office and escape the operation of the Impeachment Clause. President Trump incited an insurrection to try to break the Constitutional order, overturn an election, and prevent the ratification of a new President elected by the people in a free and fair election. In these circumstances, he has left the House of Representatives no choice. ”

“ The reasons for yesterday’s criminal assault on our Congress and election process are many. But foremost among them is the sad reality that President Trump and other officials have repeatedly compromised our principles in pursuit of partisan advantage and personal gain. Those who engaged in disinformation and demagoguery in pursuit of self-interest abdicated their responsibility to the American people. ”

“ President Trump has falsely asserted he won the 2020 presidential election and repeatedly sought to overturn the results of the election. As his efforts failed again and again, President Trump continued a parallel course of conduct that foreseeably resulted in the imminent lawless actions of his supporters, who attacked the Capitol and the Congress. This course of conduct, viewed within the context of his past actions and other attempts to subvert the presidential election, demonstrate that President Trump remains a clear and present danger to the Constitution and our democracy. ”

“ The generation that came of age in the eighteenth century was familiar with leaders who incited angry mobs and threatened constitutional stability. They would have immediately recognized President Trump’s conduct on January 6, 2021. And they would not hesitate to declare that a President who incites a mob to charge, breach, and desecrate the Capitol had committed an impeachable offense. ”

“ Harm to Our Nation’s National Security President Trump’s conduct directly harmed the national security of the United States. In the most immediate sense, the President’s incitement of the mob assault on the Capitol may have exposed sensitive materials and locations to the public creating immediate national security risks. In the long term, the insurrection caused lasting damage to the nation’s international reputation as a bastion of democratic order, undermining American “soft power” and emboldening our adversaries abroad. ”

“ At the heart of our Constitution is a commitment to popular sovereignty. At the core of that framework is the election of representatives to the United States Congress and the establishment of the Electoral College as the method of selection for the President and Vice President of the United States. The democratically elected Members of the Congress are charged with legislating and carrying important constitutional duties on behalf of the American people. ”

“ Uniquely among prominent public officials, President Trump’s statements condemned the hatred and violence “on many sides, on many sides” while also praising “very fine people on both sides.” [238] In a context in which the values of human equality are enshrined in our Constitution and are universally agreed to be fundamental American values, all those who hold a position of trust under the Constitutional are expected to, and most regularly and loudly do, denounce white supremacy in clear and unambiguous terms. ”

“ All of us here today do not want to see our election victory stolen by [sic] bold and radical left Democrats which is what they are doing and stolen by the fake news media. That is what they have done and what they are doing. We will never give up. We will never concede. It doesn’t happen. You don’t concede when there’s theft involved. ... Our country has had enough. We will not take it anymore, and that is what this is all about. ... And to use a favorite term that all of you people really came up with, we will stop the steal. ”

“ In sum, the President’s conduct in inciting an insurrection against our government, designed to subvert and obstruct the results of our free and fair elections, caused serious harm to our nation’s fundamental interest in orderly democratic self-governance. ”

“ Anyone you want, but I think right here, we’re going to walk down to the Capitol—And we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women and we’re probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them. Because you'll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength and you have to be strong. ”

“ On December 18th, for example, President Trump urged his supporters and Republican Senators to “get tougher,” tweeting “ [w] e won the Presidential Election, by a lot. FIGHT FOR IT! Don’t let them take it away,” and adding on December 22nd “ [t] he truth is we won the election by a landslide. We won it big.” [20] The next week, President Trump falsely tweeted that the “United States had more votes than it had people voting, by a lot. This travesty cannot be allowed to stand. It was a Rigged Election, one not even fit for third world countries!” ”

“ The Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei of Iran said in a live televised speech that “ [y] ou are now seeing the situation in the U.S. ... This is their democracy and human rights, this is their election scandal, these are their values. These values are being mocked by the whole world. Even their friends are laughing at them.” [177] The foreign ministry of the People’s Republic of China made public statements justifying that government’s violent crackdown on Hong Kong pro-democracy protestors through comparisons to the rioters that attacked the U.S. Capitol. ”

“ Moreover, President Trump had every reason to know that, incited by his statements, the thousands of people pouring into D.C. would engage in actual violence. As early as December 1st, elected officials warned President Trump of the consequences of his rhetoric. For example, Gabriel Sterling, an elected official in Georgia, cautioned President Trump regarding his public statements spreading false claims about the election: “Mr. President ... Stop inspiring people to commit potential acts of violence. Someone’s going to get hurt, someone’s going to get shot, someone’s going to get killed.” ”

“ That President Trump has used the weight of his office to engage in such conduct in the past, and the recent escalation of that conduct which resulted in the January 6, 2021 insurrection, gives rise to a significant concern that, if not removed from office, President Trump will continue to engage in similar efforts to incite mass, violent lawless action during the remainder of his term. ”

“ If they ran such a clean election, they’d have you come in and look at the paper ballots. Who hides evidence? Criminals hide evidence. Not honest people. Over the next 10 days, we get to see the machines that are crooked, the ballots that are fraudulent, and if we’re wrong, we will be made fools of. ”

“ Additionally, Capitol Police have been reported to have briefed lawmakers of three more potential protests at the Capitol in coming days, including one which would involve “insurrectionists forming a perimeter around the Capitol, the White House and the Supreme Court, and then blocking Democrats from entering the Capitol―perhaps even killing them―so that Republicans could take control of the government.” [211]
President Trump has demonstrated that he is unfit to lead and is a danger to the Nation. ”

“ President Trump has previously expressed both tacit and explicit support for mob violence perpetrated by his sympathizers. On August 12, 2017 multiple violent clashes broke out during the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, including an incident in which one protester, a self-identified white supremacist, intentionally drove his car into a crowd of counter-protesters, killing one and injuring 19 others. ”

“ The rioters attacked law enforcement officers, unleashed chaos and terror among Members and staffers and their families, occupied the Senate Chamber and Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office, ransacked other offices, vandalized government property, and succeeded in interfering with Congress’s performance of its constitutional duty to count the electoral votes. Five people were killed, including a U.S. Capitol police officer, and more than fifty police officers were seriously injured. ”

“ The President’s former Secretary of Defense James Mattis declared that “ [t] oday’s violent assault on our Capitol, an effort to subjugate American democracy by mob rule, was fomented by Mr. Trump.” [233] Former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly stated that “ [w] hat happened on Capitol Hill ... is a direct result of [President Trump’s] poisoning the minds of people with the lies and the fraud.” ”