ODDS OF CONVICTION ARE SLIM.
Assuming none of the 50 Democrats and Independents jumps ship, it will take 17 Republican votes to convict Trump. As it looks now, fewer than 10 GOP senators will support conviction.

The principal reason for any impeachment is to remove an offender from office, but Trump is already out. The other reason—often cited in Trump's case—is to bar the offender from holding future office. However, that step comes in a separate Senate vote, which won't occur without a conviction.

Even if Trump were to somehow lose in the Senate he would presumably ask the Supreme Court—where his appointees are part of a conservative majority—to rule on the constitutionality of impeaching a former president. A frequent Trump defender, Prof. Alan Dershowitz, says the Senate faces "a lack of jurisdiction" in Trump's case.

A FAILED PROSECUTION WILL HELP TRUMP.
The "witch hunt" that Trump and his media allies have railed about for years will be reinforced by a Senate acquittal. It will help Trump raise more money—on top of the hundreds of millions he collected after Election Day by falsely claiming "fraud."

Trump will not only be free to run again in 2024, he will boast that he was "twice found innocent" in Senate trials.

THERE ARE BETTER WAYS TO PUNISH TRUMP.
Without an impeachment conviction, the crime Trump committed by inciting the Capitol violence can still be prosecuted, now that Trump no longer has the protections afforded sitting presidents. Charges could also be brought for Trump's phone call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in which Trump pressured him to "find" enough votes to change the outcome.

Meanwhile, Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance is pursuing what court papers describe as "possibly extensive and protracted criminal conduct at the Trump Organization." New York Attorney General Letitia James is investigating four different Trump real estate projects. On top of that, cases of sexual misconduct brought by several women remain active.

Felons are not necessarily prohibited from holding office, unless they are found guilty of inciting "any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof"—a ban that will apply to Trump if he's prosecuted and convicted for his role in the Jan. 6 insurrection. The law, Section 2383 of Title 18of the United States Code, stipulates that the offender shall be rendered "incapable of holding any office under the United States."

TRUMP IS ALREADY FADING.
Social media companies have acted to curb Trump's dangerous rhetoric. The PGA stripped Trump's New Jersey golf course of its contract to host next year's PGA Championship. Even the worst of the nation's hate groups have abandoned Trump, including the far-right Proud Boys, who messaged: "Trump will go down as a total failure."

By the time Trump's plane landed in Florida on Biden's Inauguration Day, the nation had already moved on. Even without a Senate trial, he was uncloaked: A small man, withering before our eyes, losing the things he cares about most—power, ego and money.

THE COUNTRY MUST HEAL.
If President Biden is to have any chance of uniting the nation, he needs conciliatory imagery. A Senate trial, regardless of the outcome, will be viewed by many as a purely political exercise. Moreover, should Chief Justice John Roberts decline to preside over the trial the task would go to Vice President Kamala Harris and the resulting scene would smack of the very partisan politics Biden hopes to avoid.

In pardoning Nixon for his Watergate crimes, President Ford stated, "It is not the ultimate fate of Richard Nixon that most concerns me, though surely it deeply troubles every decent and every compassionate person. My concern is the immediate future of this great country." Forcing Nixon to face trial, Ford said, would mean that "ugly passions would again be aroused and our people would again be polarized in their opinions."

Unlike Nixon, Trump should not be pardoned—he should be required to spend years defending himself in civil and criminal proceedings.

Trump's legacy need not be that he was tried twice by the Senate; rather, that he was canceled by a nation with more important things to worry about.

(c) Peter Funt. This column originally appeared in USA Today.