Trump Impeachment Acquittal: Live Updates

Top Republicans sharply diverged on Sunday over former President Donald J. Trump’s future influence in the party, and especially his role in Senate and House campaigns in 2022, following his acquittal in the impeachment trial.

Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina made a full-throated case for Mr. Trump as an essential player in the party in the coming Senate and House elections, saying “Trump-plus is the way back in 2022.” Another Republican, Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, called the president a waning force and Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky indicated he might get involved in Republican races if Trump-backed candidates put seats at risks.

There is no easy path forward for Republicans, including for Mr. Trump. On one level, his acquittal makes it easier for him to brazenly claim political vindication for his role in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, remain a powerful force in the party, seek retribution against those who crossed him and run for the presidency again — an option he has not ruled out.

But on another level, he is profoundly damaged, perhaps the most disgraced American president in history, and with uncertain abilities to rally the party now that he lacks his Twitter bully pulpit and near-total fealty among Republican Senate and House members (though many of them still back him).

Mr. Graham, appearing on “Fox News Sunday,” said that Mr. Trump was “ready to move on and rebuild the Republican Party,” adding that he planned to talk with Mr. Trump about the 2022 midterms soon over a game of golf in Florida.

Describing a Saturday night phone call with Mr. Trump, Mr. Graham said: “I said Mr. President, this MAGA movement needs to continue. We need to unite the party. Trump-plus is the way back in 2022.” Mr. Graham claimed that the former president was “ready to hit the trail” to campaign for candidates, though Mr. Trump has told aides he would like to take a break for several months.

Mr. Cassidy, who voted to convict Mr. Trump on Saturday, painted a far different picture of Mr. Trump’s future. In appearance on ABC’s “This Week,” Mr. Cassidy said of the former president, “I think his force wanes,” and contended that more Republicans would come around in time to sharing his view of Mr. Trump’s guilt for the attack on the Capitol.

“The Republican Party is more than just one person,” he added. “The Republican Party is about ideas,” he said, arguing that the party’s candidates would rise or fall in the future on policy issues like the economy and Covid-19.

Mr. McConnell, the minority leader, crystallized some of the extreme straddling going on in the party by voting to acquit Mr. Trump on disputed technical grounds and then condemning him as responsible for inciting the attack. In an interview with Politico after the conviction vote, Mr. McConnell said Senate candidates in 2022 may have Mr. Trump’s backing or not, but “the only thing I care about is electability.”

“My goal is, in every way possible, to have nominees representing the Republican Party who can win in November,” Mr. McConnell said. He added: “I’m not predicting the president would support people who couldn’t win. But I do think electability — not who supports who — is the critical point.”

How Mr. McConnell and Senator Rick Scott, the Florida Republican who heads the party’s Senate campaign arm, navigate Mr. Trump is one of the big questions in 2022. Many Republican voters still see Mr. Trump as the leader of the party; some senators see Mr. McConnell as the de facto leader, given his standing in the Senate and his ties to party donors. But Mr. McConnell has nowhere near Mr. Trump’s sway with the base, activists and the leaders of many state…