Biden urges Americans to defend 'fragile' democracy after Trump acquitted at impeachment trial

US President Joe Biden said that the Senate's acquittal of former President Donald Trump for inciting an insurrection was a reminder that democracy was fragile, and every American had a duty to defend the truth.

"This sad chapter in our history has reminded us that democracy is fragile," Mr Biden said in a statement issued hours after the Senate failed to muster the two-thirds majority needed to convict Trump.

Mr Biden noted that 57 senators – including a record seven Republicans – voted to find Mr Trump guilty, following a bipartisan vote by the House of Representatives to impeach the Republican former president.

"While the final vote did not lead to a conviction, the substance of the charge is not in dispute. Even those opposed to the conviction, like Senate Minority Leader (Mitch) McConnell, believe Donald Trump was guilty of a 'disgraceful dereliction of duty' and 'practically and morally responsible for provoking' the violence unleashed on the Capitol," Mr Biden said.

He said he was thinking about Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, who was killed during the siege of the Capitol on Jan. 6, others who bravely stood guard, and those who lost their lives.

He lauded the courage of those who made efforts to protect the integrity of US democracy, including Democrats and Republicans, election officials and judges, elected representatives and poll workers.

"This sad chapter in our history has reminded us that democracy is fragile. That it must always be defended. That we must be ever vigilant. That violence and extremism has no place in America. And that each of us has a duty and responsibility as Americans, and especially as leaders, to defend the truth and to defeat the lies," he said.

The Democratic president said the task at hand was to end what he called "an uncivil war and heal the very soul of our nation."

It came after Senator Mitch McConnell delivered a scalding denunciation of Donald Trump in a speech from the Senate floor, calling him "morally responsible" for the Jan. 6 attack on the US Capitol.

In his vote on Mr Trump's impeachment, Mr McConnell said "not guilty" because he said a former president could not face trial in the Senate.

Washington's most powerful Republican and the Senate's minority leader used his strongest language to date to excoriate Mr Trump minutes after the Senate acquitted the former president.

Clearly angry, the Senate's longest-serving GOP leader said Mr Trump's actions surrounding the attack on Congress were "a disgraceful, disgraceful dereliction of duty." He even noted that though Mr Trump is now out of office, he remains subject to the country's criminal and civil laws.

"He didn't get away with anything yet," said Mr McConnell, who turns 79 next Saturday and has led the Senate GOP since 2007.

It was a stunningly bitter castigation of Mr Trump by Mr McConnell, who could have used much of the same speech had he instead decided to convict Mr Trump.

By voting for acquittal, Mr McConnell and his fellow Republicans left the party locked in its struggle to define itself after Mr Trump's defeat in November. Fiercely loyal pro-Trump Republicans, and the base of the party they represent, are colliding with more traditional Republicans who believe the former president is damaging the party's national appeal.

A guilty vote by Mr McConnell, which likely would have brought some other Republicans along with him, would have marked a more direct effort to wrest the party away from Mr Trump.

That could have prompted 2022 primary challenges against GOP incumbents, complicating Republican efforts to win the Senate majority by nominating far-right, less-electable candidates. Mr McConnell has spent years fending off such candidates.

"Time is going to take care of that some way or another," said Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, asked about the party's course. "But remember, in order to be a leader you got to have followers. So we're gonna find out."

After Saturday's vote, furious Democrats launched their own attacks against Mr McConnell and the GOP.

Speaking to reporters, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., mocked the "cowardly group of Republicans" in the Senate she said were afraid to "respect the institution in which they served".

She also said Mr McConnell had created a self-fulfilling prophecy, forcing the Senate trial to begin after Mr Trump left the White House by keeping the chamber out of session. Republicans say Ms Pelosi could have triggered the proceedings earlier by delivering official impeachment documents sooner.

Mr McConnell had signalled last month that he was open to finding Mr Trump guilty, a jaw-dropping admission of alienation after spending four years largely helping him or ducking comments about his most outrageous assertions. Mr McConnell informed GOP senators how he would vote in a private email early on Saturday, saying, "While a close call, I am persuaded that impeachments are a tool primarily of removal and we therefore lack jurisdiction."

He expanded on his rationale on the Senate floor after Saturday's roll call, making clear his enmity toward Mt Trump's actions.

"There is no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the event of that day," he said.

Even before the November election, Mr Trump repeatedly claimed that if he lost it would be due to fraud by Democrats, a false accusation that he continued to assert until leaving office.

He summoned supporters to Washington for Jan. 6, the day Congress would formally certify his Electoral College loss to Joe Biden, then used a provocative speech near the White House to urge them to march on the Capitol as that count was underway. His backers violently fought past police and into the building, forcing lawmakers to flee, temporarily disrupting the vote count and producing five deaths. The visceral, bloody images from that day were at the core of Democrats impeachment case against Mr Trump.

Mr McConnell called that assault a "foreseeable consequence" of Mr Trump using the presidency, calling it "the largest megaphone on Planet Earth". Rather than calling off the rioters, Mr McConnell accused Mr Trump of "praising the criminals" and seeming determined to overturn the election "or else torch our institutions on the way out".

The 36-year Senate veteran manoeuvred through Mr Trump's four years in office like a captain steering a ship through a rocky strait on stormy seas. Battered at times by vindictive presidential tweets, Mr McConnell made a habit of saying nothing about many of Mr Trump's outrageous comments.

He ended up guiding the Senate to victories such as the 2017 tax cuts and the confirmations of three Supreme Court justices and more than 200 other federal judges.

Their relationship, built more on expedience than admiration, plummeted after Mr Trump's denial of his Nov. 3 defeat and relentless efforts to reverse the voters' verdict with his baseless claims that Democrats fraudulently stole the election.

It withered completely last month, after Republicans lost Senate control with two Georgia runoff defeats they blamed on Mr Trump, and the savage attack on the Capitol by Trump supporters. The day of the riot, Mr McConnell railed against "thugs, mobs, or threats" and described the attack as "this failed insurrection."