By Spy Uganda
US President Donald Trump faces impeachment trial before the Senate over allegations of abuse of power.
This comes after House lawmakers delivered the articles of impeachment to the Senate.
However, in reaction to the move, Trump took to social media Thursday afternoon and issued his first public response about the pending impeachment;
“I JUST GOT IMPEACHED FOR MAKING A PERFECT PHONE CALL!” exclaimed the US president via Twitter, despite the fact that he was formally impeached on December 18 following the House’s approval of articles of impeachment.
Trump’s social media post came shortly after Senate President Pro Tempore Chuck Grassley (R-IA) swore in US Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts as presiding officer over the Senate’s impeachment trial.
The ceremony, which signaled the start of Trump’s trial on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, was followed by a ceremony in which each of the 100 US Senators were called to the Senate clerk’s desk to pledge their oath to “do impartial justice according to the Constitution and laws” during the forthcoming trial.
The trial is set to begin “in earnest” on January 21, according to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), and will focus on accusations that Trump abused the power of his office and withheld military funding from the Ukrainian government within a quid-pro-quo agreement contingent on the announcement of Kiev’s investigation into former US Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden.
Late last year, President Trump signed the 2020 National Defence Authorization Act into law, approving a whopping $738 billion in defence spending for the fiscal year beginning in October 2020, including an additional $71.5 billion for ‘overseas contingency funding’ (i.e. the nation’s war budget) but withheld funding for Ukraine, something that has since created him problems.
