The Senate jury pool is tainted

Should the House impeach the president, the Senate is then charged with conducting a trial presided over by the chief justice of the Supreme Court and heard and judged by all 100 United States senators.

The first thing Democrats are eager to remind the American people is that if there is a trial for removal of the president, he is not entitled to the same rights, privileges and protocols as a criminal defendant. They claim It would be a political trial with no jeopardy of life or liberty for the president. That doesn’t seem right or just.

The removal of a president should not be about stripping him (or her) of due process or procedural or substantive due process, it should be on par with the rights afforded every American — especially considering that removing a president is akin to depriving Americans of their right to select a president and the term they elected him to serve.

Jurors are supposed to be free from prejudice and predisposition towards the accused and the evidence.

Of the 100 United States senators who will sit in judgment, six have a vested interest in conviction — since they hope to be running against the president they’d be sitting in judgment of. Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Michael Bennet (D-Colo.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) are all running to remove President Donald Trump on Election Day in 2020. Yet they may get the opportunity to do it sooner by voting for his removal in a Senate impeachment trial.

Democrats should be careful what they wish for. Should the House vote for impeachment by the close of 2019, that leaves the Senate to take up a trial for removal after the first of the year in 2020. The process could last months in lead-up and actual trial. All 100 senators must be present and must remain silent until their vote is cast for either acquittal or conviction. All six Democratic senators running for president will likely be prevented from campaigning in early primary states like Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. You can’t be in two places at the same time.

These senators should recuse themselves from sitting as a juror in a trial to remove the very person they are running to replace as president. The only problem with that is they can’t — for two reasons: Democrats would never be able to convict the president without them, and they can’t recuse themselves so long as they are a sitting senator. Democrats have put themselves in a no-win situation — literally.

House Democrats running for president are not without taint in the process of removing their political adversary since there is no trial for removal in the Senate unless and until there is an impeachment in the House.

It is unconscionable that the likely Democratic nominee for president would be in the position of participating in the removal of the person they are seeking to unseat.

Democrats are engaged in subversion of a national election for president in 2020. They think they can get two chances to defeat Trump: Impeach and remove him, or use impeachment and removal to so weaken him that he will be unelectable.

The crimes alleged by Democrats against the president pale in comparison to the trampling of the Constitution as Democrats seek the removal of a president they can’t beat at the polls.

Democrats are using the Constitution as a sword to kill off a political adversary rather than a shield to protect the nation from abuse of power.

The House is engaged in an inquisition, not an impeachment. And should the House indict, the Senate jury pool is tainted — and it is impossible for President Trump to get a fair trial.

Democrats know they will never be able to remove this president because they don’t have the votes. This is a charade that will not be condoned by the American people. 

It is not enough to hate a president out of office; you have to beat him at the ballot box.

Bradley A. Blakeman was a deputy assistant to President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2004. A principal of the 1600 Group, a strategic communications firm, he is an adjunct professor of public policy and international affairs at Georgetown University and a contributor to Fox News and Fox Business.