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WILKES-BARRE — Pennsylvania’s two U.S. senators voted to convict former President Donald Trump, but the former president was acquitted Saturday of inciting the horrific attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.

Sen. Bob Casey, D-Scranton, and Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Lehigh Valley, were two of the 57 senators who voted to convict Trump, but 43 senators, all Republicans, voted to acquit him — far from the two-third threshold required.

“This past week, the House Managers put forward a compelling case based upon irrefutable facts against the former President of the United States,” Casey said. “For months after the election, we all witnessed the former President’s ‘Big Lie’when he repeatedly claimed — without any evidence — that the 2020 general election was stolen from him. This lie was roundly dismissed by more than 60 judges across the nation — including in Pennsylvania.”

Casey said after losing in federal and state courts, Trump then tried to pressure state and local elections officials to overturn the election, and even attempted to pressure his vice president to violate the vice president’s constitutional duty.

“After repeatedly failing to overturn the election, the former president summoned his mob of insurrectionists to Washington, D.C. on Jan. 6, 2021, for one more attack on American democracy,” Casey said. “He invited them. He incited them. And he directed them to the Capitol to prevent Congress from conducting its constitutional obligation to count the presidential electoral votes.”

Casey said this case was not merely about the former president’s speech on Jan. 6.

“This was about a pattern of conduct,” Casey said. “It was about the former president’s autocratic leadership and calls for political violence throughout his presidency. It was about a president who regularly condoned or encouraged violence at political rallies against protesters and members of the press.”

Casey said there is no way that a reasonable person could dispute that the former president knew exactly what he was doing by perpetuating the “Big Lie,” summoning his crowd of insurrectionists on Jan. 6 and telling them: “If you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”

Casey went on to say, “The former president led his supporters to a breaking point and as he had predicted in the past — it was ‘very bad, very bad.’ He did not merely endanger another branch of government and the presidential line of succession. His actions led to at least five deaths, injuries to nearly 140 members of law enforcement and untold collateral damage resulting from the carnage of that day. He endangered the lives of countless Congressional staffers and employees, members of the press and members of Congress. He put a target on the back of his own Vice President and his Vice President’s family. And he has shown no remorse for any of it.”

Casey also said the former president attacked the foundational principles of our democracy and the peaceful transfer of power.

“He violated his oath of office and he committed a high crime against our Constitution.” Casey said. “I voted to convict the former president in the most bipartisan presidential impeachment proceedings in our nation’s history.”

<strong>Toomey explains</strong>

Toomey began by observing that President Trump’s defense team made several accurate observations over the course of this trial.

“It’s true that many elected Democrats did want to impeach President Trump actually before he even became president,” Toomey said. “Many in the mainstream media were unrelentingly biased and hostile to Donald Trump, and both Democrats and many in the media often overlooked violent riots when they were perpetrated in favor of causes that they found sympathetic over the course of last summer.”

Having said that, Toomey said these facts do not make Donald Trump’s conduct in response to his loss of the 2020 election acceptable.

“It began with the dishonest, systematic attempt to convince supporters that he had won,” Toomey said. “His lawful, but unsuccessful, legal challenges failed due to a complete lack of evidence. Then he applied intense pressure on state and local officials to reverse the election outcomes in their states.”

Toomey said when all these efforts failed, President Trump summoned thousands of people to Washington, D.C., inflamed their passions by repeating disproven allegations about widespread fraud.

“He urged that mob to march on the Capitol for the explicit purpose of preventing Congress and the Vice President from formally certifying the results of the presidential election,” Toomey said. “All this to hold onto power despite having legitimately lost.”

Toomey added, “As a result of President Trump’s actions, for the first time in American history, the transfer of presidential power was not peaceful. A lawless attempt to retain power by a president was one of the founders’ greatest fears motivating the inclusion of the impeachment authorities in the U.S. Constitution.

“I was one of the 47 million Americans who voted for President Trump, in part because of the many accomplishments of his administration. Unfortunately, his behavior after the election betrayed the confidence that millions of us had placed in him.

“His betrayal of the Constitution and his oath of office required conviction.”

Casey and Toomey voted to convict Trump