United States President Donald Trump’s historic impeachment trial kicked off  in earnest yesterday in the Senate, with Democrats calling for his removal from office and Republicans determined to acquit him and quickly, if possible.

Four months after the Ukraine scandal exploded, and 10 months before Americans go to the polls to decide whether to re-elect Trump, the 100 members of the Senate will gather at 1:00 pm (1800 GMT) with Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts presiding over the trial.

The lawmakers, sworn in last week as jurors, will decide if Trump abused his office and obstructed Congress as charged in the two articles of impeachment approved last month by the lower chamber House of Representatives.

The articles state that Trump tried to pressure Ukraine into interfering in the 2020 election to help him win, and then he tried to thwart a congressional probe of his behavior.

It will be only the third time a president has endured an impeachment trial, after Andrew Johnson in 1868 and Bill Clinton in 1999.

Related News

Part of the scandal centers on a July 25 telephone call in which Trump pushed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to announce an investigation of former Vice President Joe Biden, Trump’s potential opponent in the November vote.

Democrats, who control the House of Representatives, accuse Trump of manipulating Ukraine by withholding $400 million in military aid for its war against Russian-backed separatists — and a White House meeting — on condition a probe was opened into Biden. Trump, 73, was absent from Washington yesterday, attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where he again branded impeachment proceedings against him as a “hoax.”

“It’s the witch hunt that’s been going on for years and frankly it’s disgraceful,” he said.

Trump’s 12-man legal team is contesting the very idea of his impeachment.

They called the two articles of impeachment approved largely along party lines in the Democratic-controlled House, the product of “a rigged process” and “constitutionally deficient” because they involved no violation of established law.