READING, Pa. - President Trump is going down in history as the first U.S. president to be impeached twice.
"I think Mr. Trump's reputation has been doused a blow from which it will never recover," said Tim Blessing, a political science professor and presidential historian at Alvernia University in Reading.
Blessing called Trump's second impeachment one of the low points in American history.
"Somebody with seven days left to go in his office, the House of Representatives felt so strongly about President Trump that they impeached him," Blessing said.
Protesters backing President Trump breached the U.S. Capitol in violent clashes with police that forced a delay in the constitutional process …
The vote came exactly one week after a deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, where some Trump supporters breached the building while lawmakers tried to certify the results of the November election, which Trump lost to President-elect Joe Biden.
"The big question here is what law precisely did President Trump break here?" Blessing said.
The article of impeachment charged Trump with incitement of insurrection.
Blessing said the swift move to impeach is also unprecedented.
"There has not even been a hint of due process here, and as a result, it makes the people who are charged by the Constitution with advocating for the House's position," he said, "it makes their job very difficult."
The 232-197 vote Wednesday afternoon is the most bipartisan impeachment as well. No Republicans voted for it the last time Trump was impeached. Five Democrats voted to impeach former President Bill Clinton, and none voted to impeach Andrew Johnson.
Blessing said this latest crossover is hardly historic.
"Out of almost 200 Republicans, only 10 crossed the aisle," he said. "That's another way of looking at it. I mean, it's bipartisan with an asterisk."
Blessing said he believes before the insurrection, historians 100 years from now could make the argument Trump was a substantial president — good or bad.
"I think that's all gone up in flames," Blessing added. "That attack on the Capitol and Trump's behavior, as I keep saying in the last two or three months, will pretty well obscure the positive things he accomplished."
