Giuliani says he won’t be on Trump impeachment defense team
Trump was impeached by the House for a second time last week.
President Donald Trump is slated to hand over control of the White House to President-elect Joe Biden in three days.
The House of Representatives voted to impeach Trump last Wednesday on an article for "incitement of insurrection" for his role in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol -- making him the only president to be impeached twice.
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Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez to perform at Biden’s inauguration
Lady Gaga and Jennifer Lopez will lend their voices to Biden's inauguration next week, performing when he officially becomes the 46th president of the United States, Biden's Presidential Inaugural Committee announced Thursday morning.
The announcement detailing participants in the 59th inaugural swearing-in ceremony represents one of the more traditional aspects of Biden's inauguration, which has been largely altered amid the COVID-19 pandemic to accommodate an at-home audience, and facing new concerns over security in the wake of a riot at the Capitol last week that left five dead.
Gaga, who appeared on the campaign trail with Biden during the 2020 election and worked with the then-vice president on his "It's on Us" campaign to combat campus sexual assault, will perform the national anthem when Biden is sworn in, the committee announced.
Lopez, who endorsed Biden, and took part in a virtual chat with the president-elect during the campaign, is also slated to perform at the event.
-ABC News' Molly Nagle
Impeachment vote sets up challenge for Biden and new Senate: Analysis
Ten is either a huge number or a stunningly small one, depending on one's views of the state of partisanship and Trump's culpability for his words and actions.
But 10 Republicans won't be enough to bring true consequences to the soon-to-be-former president. That will fall to the Senate, where the focus will be in the early days of the Biden presidency, now that the House voted in the quickest and most bipartisan impeachment in American history.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is making clear that impeachment will be Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer's to handle, once they trade jobs late next week. McConnell's public statement not to have prejudged the outcome matters greatly at the outset of the coming trial.
All of the dynamics will be different by this time next week. Soon-to-be-President Biden will have appointees to confirm and a COVID-19 relief bill he wants passed; more will emerge about how last Wednesday's indignities came to pass; and the nation will know whether Biden will be allowed to take office peacefully in the end.
Plus, the Senate is just different than the House. There are different personalities and election cycles, different ambitions, more and different potential coalitions and partnerships, and an overall sense of more independence from presidents.
Trump's legacy has been sullied by the events of the past week and a second impeachment leaves its own permanent mark. But final and official judgments will fall to the body Biden knows so well -- and where he is likely to look to build his own presidential legacy starting quite soon.
-ABC News' Political Director Rick Klein
Republican lawmaker explains why he voted ‘no’ on the article of impeachment
Although South Dakota Rep. Dusty Johnson said that Trump deserves “more than his fair share of blame” for the U.S. Capitol riot last week, he voted not to impeach the president Wednesday.
Johnson told ABC News that his decision was based on due process of the law.
“I think due process matters,” said Johnson. “I just felt like a snap impeachment was not in the best interest of the country.”
He said Trump could have been held accountable through censure.
“Impeachment for someone who is out of office looks like some sort of formal reprimand. Really, you can’t kick them out when they’re already gone,” said Johnson. “I think (Nancy Pelosi) could have gotten 100 Republican votes for censure.”
Democrats defended the use of impeachment because an impeachment and a conviction vote by two-thirds of the Senate would open Trump up to a congressional ban on running for federal office. Trump has already indicated that he would run for office again in 2024.
Johnson said that he and “dozens” of his Republican colleagues felt frustrated on the House floor Wednesday. He said that his fellow Democrats missed an opportunity to work across the aisle.
“The rhetoric on the House floor today was the most toxic I have seen in my two years. It was the most rancorous,” he said. “And that’s one of the reasons why I was trying to get some of my Democratic colleagues more interested in a bipartisan censure, a more unifying approach than, I think, a largely single-party impeachment process.”
-ABC News Haley Yamada
Acting ICE director steps down
For the third time in less than a year, the acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) director has resigned, according to a source familiar with the matter.
Jonathan Fahey only lasted two weeks on the job.
Fahey is the third acting ICE director in less than a year. The previous director, Tony Pham only lasted a couple of months.
-ABC News' Luke Barr
Trump condemns violence at Capitol riot in new video
Shortly after he was impeached for the second time, Trump released a video condemning the violence at last week's riot at the Capitol, which he called a calamity.
"I want to be very clear -- I unequivocally condemn the violence that we saw last week, violence and vandalism have absolutely no place in our country, and no place in our movement," the president said.
"Making America great again has always been about defending the rule of law, supporting the men and women of law enforcement and upholding our nation's most sacred traditions and values," he added. "Mob violence goes against everything I believe in, and everything our movement stands for."
In the video, which was posted to YouTube and the White House Twitter account, Trump said that he directed federal agencies to use "all necessary resources" to maintain order in Washington ahead of Biden's inauguration.
Without mentioning the social media site by name, Trump also seemed to speak to his Twitter ban, saying "the efforts to censor, cancel and blacklist our fellow citizens are wrong and they are dangerous."
"What is needed now is for us to listen to one another. Not silence on another," he added.
The president did not mention impeachment.