Trump has the Republican Party in his iron grip
The US president has been acquitted by the Senate in the fastest impeachment ever – in a trial with no witnesses.
There was never any doubt that he would be let off, but Donald Trump can no longer say that this impeachment was entirely partisan.
Senator Mitt Romney became the lone Republican voice willing to say what surely many more were thinking: that Mr Trump abused his power to the extent that he should be removed from office.
Publicly, Romney’s fellow Republicans said this was a baseless political witch-hunt, with some daring to go as far as suggesting Mr Trump’s behaviour was “inappropriate” but ultimately did not rise to the level of impeachment.
There is no doubt that the Democrats presented a convincing case that Mr Trump used crucial military aid and a coveted White House meeting to bully Ukraine into publicly slinging mud at his political rival Joe Biden.
Democrats appealed to Republicans who they said must surely believe that their charges chimed with Mr Trump’s past and present conduct.
This is the man who said on national TV that China should also take a look at Biden and who requested that in a supposedly “perfect” phone call that Ukraine’s president should “do us a favour”.
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So what else has impeachment told us?
Perhaps most starkly it has laid bare the extent to which Mr Trump has the Republican Party in his iron grip – the same party who sniggered when he entered the 2016 race.
Members like Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz who once openly mocked and derided Mr Trump are now dancing to his tune as loyal servants and enablers of what the emboldened man could deliver next.
They have ultimately decided to bow to his loud and powerful popularity with the party’s base – while insisting that they are in fact voting with their conscience.
Throughout the trial there was much talk of the moderate Republicans who might break from party lines.
Senator Susan Collins of Maine called the president’s conduct “flawed,” adding that it did not warrant “the extreme step of immediate removal from office”.
She also said she believed the US president had learned from his mistakes.
The idea of a chastened Trump is not getting much buy-in; the idea of an emboldened one carries far more weight.
This was a key part of the Democratic impeachment managers’ argument – let him get away with this and who knows what he will try and pull off next.
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Mr Trump desperately wants to win the 2020 election.
But it’s not just about victory for him anymore.
It’s about revenge against the party that exposed his behaviour and tried to bring him down.
This impeachment has surely proved that Mr Trump is willing to go outside acceptable norms to secure victory.
The Ukraine revelations aren’t over – expect documents and books from the likes of former national security adviser John Bolton.
He has written that Mr Trump tied investigations into Biden to the suspension of military aid to Ukraine – exactly as House prosecutors alleged.
We could also hear more from those witnesses who testified in the House inquiry, perhaps roused by Mr Trump’s acquittal.
The 2020 election is now the focus.
In fact, it was perhaps the most effective weapon the Republicans had when they argued that removing a president from office in an election year would lead to chaos and instability – overturning the will of the people and the democratic process that got Mr Trump elected.
We now enter the 2020 race with the looming threat of perhaps even greater Russian meddling and no clear answer from those in charge about whether foreign interference in a US election is wrong.
The Democrats were unable to end Mr Trump’s presidency.
Now, their best hope is that voters have absorbed their repeated insistence that Mr Trump’s behaviour makes him unfit for re-election – and that they choose to remove him via the ballot box in November.
Over the next 10 months, so much will happen.
That argument that seemed to change so few minds will likely have faded to a whisper.
