[The Hill] Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) shocked his fellow Republican senators and surprised much of the nation on Wednesday with a dramatic floor speech announcing he would vote to convict President Trump on the impeachment charge of abuse of power.Romney announced his decision in a nearly empty Senate chamber just hours before the Senate voted to acquit Trump and after fellow GOP colleagues such as Sens. Susan Collins (Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) had already announced they would not vote to convict Trump.
Just as surprising as his vote was the intensity of the 2012 Republican presidential nominee’s language.
While other Senate Republicans chided Trump for "inappropriate" conduct, Romney said "the president is guilty of an appalling abuse of public trust" and "a flagrant assault on our electoral rights."
"The grave question the Constitution tasks senators to answer is whether the president committed an act so extreme and egregious that it rises to the level of a ’high crime and misdemeanor.’ Yes, he did," he said.