To the Journal editor:

Making America Great Again?

The suppression of evidence from eye witnesses at the recent impeachment trial is not fair to the president and his political base.

Testimony from eye witnesses, which can establish one’s guilt or innocence beyond a reasonable doubt, was suppressed so the president cannot be exonerated. The suppression of key evidence would constitute a mistrial in any other trial.

Given that each senator took an oath of non-partisanship, then their final decision about removal should not have been reached until first hand witnesses testified under oath. Any determination before that would violate their oath of objectivity, since evidence crucial to the case had not been heard.

Like any other court, guilt needs to go beyond a reasonable doubt. This is not the case since eye witnesses were excluded who could answer the question regarding guilt.

The argument that including witnesses would take too long, was not supported by the facts. The Clinton impeachment lasted one week longer even when witnesses were included. Concluding the president’s conduct did not rise to the level of removal was not possible when eye witnesses were not permitted to testify.

Besides suppression of evidence, jury tampering appears to have occurred. Since the Republican senators knew by the president’s past actions toward others that he viewed as disloyal would be used against any senator who voted to remove him affected how they voted.

This belief has been supported given how Sen. Mitt Romney who voted to remove has been smear for his actions. In addition, the president not only threatened subpoena witnesses but fired them for testifying under oath.

In any other legal proceedings, jury tampering, threatening and retribution against subpoena witnesses would be a felony.

RONALD MARSHALL

Petoskey