Trump's Impeachment: Fresh Blow To Democrats As Republicans Oppose The Trial; Call It 'Unconstitutional'

Republicans oppose the trial, reports says that Trump is sitting on some $70 million in campaign funds wants Republican senators to consider their own futures before they dare cross him.

New Delhi: Donald Trump continues to have a hold over the Republican party, as on Tuesday the Democrats efforts to impeach him received a fresh blow.

The motion failed after all 50 Democrats and only five Republicans in the Senate did not support the push to throw out the case before the trial has begun. The result confirmed Democrats will struggle to persuade 17 Republican senators -- the number needed for the required two-thirds majority -- to vote to convict Trump.

On Monday, the House of Representatives presented a single article of impeachment to the upper chamber accusing Trump of inciting the storming of the Capitol earlier this month, setting in motion the first-ever impeachment trial of a former president. The trial of Trump, who was impeached by the Democratic-majority House for an unprecedented second time, is to begin the week of February 8.

According to an Agence France Presse report said that Trump is sitting on some $70 million in campaign funds wants Republican senators to consider their own futures before they dare cross him. Aside from which, Trump's main way of applying pressure while out of office is to threaten disloyal legislators with support for their challengers in party primary votes ahead of the 2022 midterms.

And significantly, Rand Paul, Republican senator from Kentucky, raised a point of order to hold a vote on the constitutionality of the impeachment trial as Trump has left office. Democrats then called for a vote to kill the point of order, winning 55-45. Paul said afterwards "that 45 Senators agreed that this sham of a 'trial' is unconstitutional... This 'trial' is dead on arrival in the Senate," according to the AFP report.