New York, Feb 6 Mitt Romney, a former presidential candidate and senior party leader, broke ranks with the Republicans to vote to convict President Trump on one of the charges against him in the Senate trial, winning praise from Democrats and condemnation from his party.
Invoking God and religion, Romney declared on Wednesday: "The president is guilty of an appalling abuse of the public trust," and voted him guilty of the charge of abuse of power, but voted against convicting him on the second charge of obstruction of Congress.
Romney, who had unsuccessfully challenged former President Barack Obama in the 2012 election and had served as governor of Massachusetts, was the only senator from the party to vote against Trump.
He also became the only senator to vote against one's own party candidate in the three presidential impeachments in the nation's history.
In a family drama, Romney's niece Ronna McDaniel, who is the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, tweeted: "This is not the first time I have disagreed with Mitt, and I imagine it will not be the last."
"The bottomline is President Trump did nothing wrong," she said.
Romney compounded his vote against Trump by rising to the defence of former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter, whose actions in Ukraine sparked the impeachment when Trump asked that nation's President Volodymyr Zelensky to probe them.
He said that Biden, ignoring his conflict of interest and his son taking "excessive advantage" of his father's name, were not crimes that Trump should want investigated.
He said that he was "sure to hear abuse from the president and his supporters," and Trump didn't disappoint him.
Trump circulated a video denouncing him as a "Democrat asset" and tweeted: "Had failed presidential candidate @MittRomney devoted the same energy and anger to defeating a faltering Barack Obama as he sanctimoniously does to me, he could have won the election."
Trump's son, Donald Jr., tweeted a call for expelling Romney from the party.
Although Trump had backed Romney and contributed to his campaign, there was simmering animosity between them with Romney showing contempt for him.
Romney, who had tried to get the 2016 nomination but backed off, called Trump s "phony, a fraud" and announced that he would not vote for him and may instead write his wife's name on the ballot.
However, after Trump won, he had talks with him to explore the possibility of becoming secretary of state, but didn't get the job.
Brushing off the expected condemnations from Trump, Romney said: "Does anyone seriously believe I would consent to these consequences other than from an inescapable conviction that my oath before God demanded it of me?"
Like many US politic of both parties, liberal and conservative, he took cover in religion, saying: "As a Senator-juror, I swore an oath, before God, to exercise 'impartial justice'. I am a profoundly religious person. I take an oath before God as enormously consequential."
And then he went on to criticise the defence built by Trump's lawyers against the charges.
Romney has an independent base of supporters in Utah, the state from which he was elected to the Senate after having been the governor of Massachusetts and unsuccessfully running against Obama.
He can, therefore, defy Trump without the threat of reprisals from his supporters.
(Arul Louis can be contacted at arul.l@.in and followed on Twitter @arulouis)
( With inputs from IANS )