After three years of Democrats seeking to impeach President Trump, the Senate has voted against the two articles of impeachment, therefore acquitting him. Now that the sole mission of the Democratic party to legally remove Trump from office has been demolished, where does this leave it?

The vote came as a shock to a majority of Americans, while others were expecting the Senate to dismiss the two articles of impeachment. The group that should not be surprised are the Democrats. Although they hold a slim majority over the House of Representatives, they are outnumbered in the Senate. Prior to the announcement of the acquittal, Chief Justice John Roberts announced that “47 senators have pronounced Donald John Trump, President of the United States, guilty as charged,” while “53 senators have found him not guilty as charged.”

This is not bewildering to Democrats as they knew it was clear they were not going to successfully impeach Trump, acknowledging it was only a method of slandering his presidency even more than has already been attempted.

It’s worth noting that there was an innate risk for the Democrats to impeach Trump. Prior to the impeachment, Speaker Nancy Pelosi had previously claimed she had no desire for an impeachment inquiry. “I’m not for impeachment … Impeachment is so divisive to the country that unless there’s something so compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan,” Pelosi said in an interview with the Washington Post.

Yet, Pelosi and others members of the House of Representatives concluded to impeach Trump on two different articles, but the effectiveness of the damage done to Trump’s Presidency appears questionable.

Following the State of the Union address and prior to the acquittal, the latest Gallup Poll has shown the highest approval rating Trump has received thus far in his term, coming in at 49%. How is this by any means a negative result of the impeachment?

The matter at hand is that Democrats exploited all means of removing Trump from office, but failed to do so. Had they gone in a manner where there was sufficient evidence to convince the Republican majority in the Senate, the vote may have otherwise turned around.

It is important to recognize that investigating Trump was not completely unjustified, but the grounds that he was impeached on were harder to prove as an impeachable offense. The biggest difficulty that both Democrats and Republicans can concede is how to interpret what the founders of the Constitution meant. In Article 11, Section 4 the United States Constitution establishes. “The President, Vice President, and civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”

The House of Representatives found the phone call between the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky and Trump to be “quid pro quo”. Whether or not that falls under what the founders meant has been difficult for members of Congress to interpret.

Regardless of both articles of impeachment and Adam Schiff’s (D-CA) presentation of the case with numerous witnesses, the Senate found that the evidence was not sufficient enough to prove that President Trump is guilty. Nonetheless, this not only changes the upcoming election for Trump, but also for Democrats across the spectrum.

Undecided voters or registered independents are an exceptionally crucial group to win over in both political parties. The recent acquittal is creating tensions on the campaign trail and should certainly be concerning to House of Representative members where all 435 of the seats and 35 of the Senate seats will be contested in November. Therefore, the result of the acquittal may bring them to favor Trump in this year’s upcoming election.

There may be a matter of time before another scandal befalls Trump, either on his own accord or due to Democrats. Despite this, the main focus should be on honing in the upcoming presidential election this fall. Especially Democrats who appearingly seek to remove Trump from office by impeachment, rather than nominating a candidate that may challenge Trump. The American public will await whether or not the impeachment affects Trump’s re-election bid.