Trump should have been charged with dividing america. But is he guilty of that either?   | thearticle

The high crime and misdemeanour of which Donald Trump had been accused in his trial, and of which he was acquitted by the Senate this week, was the wrong one. Few Americans care about what

he did or didn’t conspire to do in Ukraine to thwart Joe Biden’s presidential bid — which after the Iowa primary looks dead in the water anyway. No, the gravamen of the charge against Trump

is that he has divided America as never before. Senators voted in the impeachment trial according to party lines, with one exception: Mitt Romney. Thanks to Senator Romney’s vote to impeach

the President on the first charge, that of abuse of power, Trump was the first holder of his office in history not only to be impeached but to have a bipartisan vote against him. (Hold that

thought.) The Romney exception proves the rule — and not just because he is the Senator for Utah and a practising Mormon. Nor is it the fact that Romney is a former Governor of

Massachusetts, hence relatively liberal by Republican standards (his public health plan was the model for Obamacare).  No, it is the fact that Romney was the presidential candidate who lost

to Obama in 2012 and so represents everything in the Republican party that Trump is against. Indeed, he denounced Trump at the height of the 2016 campaign and has repeatedly criticised him

since. This makes his decision to vote for the impeachment of the President entirely predictable, but also politically irrelevant. Trump is now backed by an overwhelming majority of

Republicans, both in Washington and at grassroots level. In their eyes, the traitor to the Constitution isn’t Trump — it’s Romney. It is certainly the case that the divisions of American

politics have hardened along partisan lines in the past year or two. But that is only to be expected as the presidential election draws nearer. Four years rarely suffices for a lasting

legacy and so the stakes are very high, both for Trump and his foes. No wonder the temperature has risen, seemingly to boiling point. This sense of crisis is exacerbated by the fact that the

White House refuses to play by the rules and its occupant makes a mockery of the tradition and decorum by which old-fashioned Americans set such store. Yet the narrative of polarisation

that has come to dominate coverage of the United States is itself highly partisan. It is the same denial of a fair trial that led to this week’s impeachment fiasco, which has been a disaster

for the Democrats. Unlike the professional Trump-haters in politics and the media, many of whom are scarcely disinterested, most Americans are disposed to give the President the benefit of

the doubt, even if they never voted for him. The case against Trump, that he abused his office and obstructed justice, was not only not proven — it should never have been brought. As for the

underlying accusation — that he has divided the Republic and done irreparable damage to America’s reputation — the verdict here too would have been “not guilty”. It’s true that some people

have never accepted the 2016 result. Hillary Clinton, for example, declared after yesterday’s acquittal that 52 Republican Senators had voted to betray their oath to defend the Constitution,

adding: “We’re entering dangerous territory for our democracy. It’ll take all of us working together to restore it.” What a hypocritical remark for a former Secretary of State to make,

casting doubt on the validity of the legal process, accusing her opponents of treason and once again refusing to abide by the election she lost. If the United States is disunited, it is at

least as much the fault of undemocratic Democrats as of the duly elected 45th President. The facts suggest that Americans may actually have become less rather than more polarised in the last

four years. Real disposable incomes have indeed risen to record levels and unemployment is lower than at any time since the 1960s. A tighter labour market has boosted wages for the lowest

paid and there is some evidence that Trump’s corporate tax cuts have benefited not only executives but also workers. Fewer illegal workers crossing the Mexican border may also have

contributed to a modest rise in blue collar living standards, after decades of stagnation. This matters more than a handful of billionaires flaunting their wealth, the most prominent of whom

are Democrats anyway. Michael Bloomberg has already spent more on his campaign than anyone in history, but nobody accuses him of an attempt to buy the presidency. Ordinary Americans have

never resented the rich — indeed, they usually admire them. That even includes Trump. Polarisation has taken place — but it is political rather than social, and it is mainly on the extremes

of Left and Right. A reliable barometer of extremism is anti-Semitism, and it is true that American Jews have been dismayed by an unprecedented spate of deadly attacks on synagogues and

other Jewish targets. Yet a survey by the Anti-Defamation League shows that among the general population the incidence of anti-Semitic attitudes have never been lower. It seems likely that

there has been no general increase in this or any other political prejudice under this presidency. Blaming Trump for a rise in extremism is a game played by liberals every time violence

erupts, but it is a chimera and most voters don’t buy it. Does that mean it’s business as usual in American politics? Not necessarily, but most presidents do win re-election. The events of

this momentous week have made it more likely that Donald Trump, too, will revert to the norm.