Trump Impeachment Trial: Former President Should Receive a Fair Chance

As the Senate launches its second impeachment trial of Donald Trump next week, its members must confront the deep unfairness of the proceedings.

The Senate rashly claimed jurisdiction over a former president, fumbled on the selection of a presiding judge, and ignored the constitutional — not political — standards that should prevail. Further, it has given Trump’s depleted legal team little time or means to present a full defense — the only guarantee that the American people will accept the verdict as fair. Trump’s lawyers will have to accept these unfair conditions, though might conceivably be able to appeal directly to the federal courts to stop a show trial (more on that later).

About the Author

John Yoo

John Yoo is the Thomas W. Smith Senior Fellow at the Civitas Institute, University of Texas at Austin; Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law at the University of California at Berkeley; and a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. He is a co-author of the just-released two-volume American Constitutional Law (Routledge, 2026).

As the Senate launches its second impeachment trial of Donald Trump next week, its members must confront the deep unfairness of the proceedings.

The Senate rashly claimed jurisdiction over a former president, fumbled on the selection of a presiding judge, and ignored the constitutional — not political — standards that should prevail. Further, it has given Trump’s depleted legal team little time or means to present a full defense — the only guarantee that the American people will accept the verdict as fair. Trump’s lawyers will have to accept these unfair conditions, though might conceivably be able to appeal directly to the federal courts to stop a show trial (more on that later).

About the Author

John Yoo

John Yoo is the Thomas W. Smith Senior Fellow at the Civitas Institute, University of Texas at Austin; Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law at the University of California at Berkeley; and a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. He is a co-author of the just-released two-volume American Constitutional Law (Routledge, 2026).

RD

About the Author

Robert J. Delahunty

Robert J. Delahunty is a fellow at the Claremont Institute’s Center for the American Way of Life.