[Slowbro]

¡°The president didn¡¯t commit incitement or any other crime. I should know. As a Washington prosecutor I earned the nickname ¡®protester prosecutor¡¯ from the antiwar group CodePink¡­ The president didn¡¯t mention violence on Wednesday, much less provoke or incite it. He said, ¡®I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.¡¯¡­

¡°When Mr. Trump spoke, there was no ¡®public disturbance,¡¯ only a rally. The ¡®disturbance¡¯ came later at the Capitol by a small minority who entered the perimeter and broke the law. They should be prosecuted. The president¡¯s critics want him charged for inflaming the emotions of angry Americans. That alone does not satisfy the elements of any criminal offense, and therefore his speech is protected by the Constitution that members of Congress are sworn to support and defend¡­ Inflaming emotions isn¡¯t a crime.¡±
Jeffrey Scott Shapiro, Wall Street Journal

¡°[There was] the 1918 prosecution of socialist Eugene Debs, who spoke against the draft in World War One and led figures like Woodrow Wilson to declare him a ¡®traitor to his country.¡¯ Debs was arrested and charged with sedition¡­

¡°In 1919, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote for a unanimous bench in one of the most infamous decisions to issue from the Supreme Court. It dismissed the free speech rights for Debs and held it was sufficient that his words had the ¡®natural tendency and reasonably probable effect¡¯ of deterring people from supporting the international conflict. That decision was a disgrace, but Democrats are now arguing something even more extreme as the basis for impeachment¡­

¡°Conservatives have pointed to Maxine Waters asking her supporters to confront Republicans in restaurants, while Ayanna Pressley insisted amidst the violent marches last year that ¡®there needs to be unrest in the streets,¡¯ and Kamala Harris said ¡®protesters should not let up¡¯ even as some of those marches turned violent. They can legitimately argue their rhetoric was not meant to be a call for violence, but this standard is filled with subjectivity. The damage caused by the rioters this week was enormous, however, it will pale in comparison to the damage from a new precedent of a snap impeachment for speech protected under the First Amendment.¡±
Jonathan Turley, The Hill

¡°A Trump impeachment and trial aren¡¯t in Mr. Biden¡¯s political interest. They would do nothing to calm partisan divisions and might turn off moderates who voted for Mr. Biden because they want the tumultuous Trump era to be over. It would make the first drama of his Presidency an act of retribution¡­

¡°Mr. Biden can better set the stage for his inaugural by telling the public that he¡¯d prefer if the impeachers stood down. He can say he thinks Mr. Trump¡¯s behavior is impeachable, and that had it taken place earlier he¡¯d support his ouster. But on the eve of the transfer of power and going into a new Presidency, it is needlessly divisive. He could say his goal as President is to move past the politics of polarization and annihilation, not to escalate it for another four years. Most Americans would welcome it.¡±
Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal

Some argue, ¡°The main prudential arguments against impeachment are that it would further inflame an already heated political scene and that Trump is leaving office in days no matter what¡­

¡°But the divisiveness of impeachment is overstated. House votes to impeach presidents didn¡¯t have dire consequences in either 1998 or 2019, and the fact that Trump is on his way out should lower such risks further. And even at this late date, impeachment and conviction would strengthen the country¡¯s political norms against future presidential misconduct¡­

¡°James Madison specifically mentioned impeachment as the remedy for a presidential abuse that wasn¡¯t a criminal violation¡­ A lot of Republican politicians want to leave Trump in their rearview mirror. Many voters who aren¡¯t die-hard Republicans will feel similarly. Biden doubtless wants to get on with his own legislative agenda. But there¡¯s nothing on that agenda more important than strengthening the country¡¯s safeguards against a future presidency like Trump¡¯s. Impeachment and conviction should be the first order of business for Congress.¡±
Ramesh Ponnuru, Bloomberg

Others still argue that ¡°If the president were months rather than days from the end of his term, his supporters¡¯ outrage would not be a good reason to refrain from impeaching him. But given that he would already be gone before he could conceivably be tried by the Senate, it would be gratuitous to invite further strife in our deeply divided country¡­

¡°There are ways other than impeachment for Congress to express righteous condemnation over the president¡¯s role in the atrocious events of last week. Clearly, a full-throated, bipartisan censure is warranted. Nevertheless, contrary to what he seems to believe, our country is bigger than Donald Trump. He is about to be yesterday¡¯s news. We should not hold up today¡¯s essential business on his account.¡±
Andrew McCarthy, Fox News