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The Republican leader’s calculus was simple: Don’t stoke a full-on revolt by Trump supporters by voting to convict the former president, but demonstrate to anti-Trump Republicans that he recognized Mr. Trump’s failings. It didn’t work.

The former president, breaking an unusually long silence, called the Senate minority leader a “dour, sullen, and unsmiling political hack” and called on Republicans in the chamber to find a new leader.

Leaders of both political parties suggest that impeachments, Electoral College standoffs and Supreme Court nomination blockades may become frequent fights in American politics.

The verdict was unlikely to be the final word for former President Donald J. Trump, his badly divided party or the festering wounds the Jan. 6 riot that prompted the impeachment left behind.

The House Democrats branded former President Donald J. Trump a clear and present danger to American democracy who could sow new violence if he was not barred from holding office again.

The Democratic House impeachment managers opened their case against the former president with a narrative of his monthslong effort to overturn the election and raw footage of the Jan. 6 Capitol attack.

The footage showed the riot in searing detail: a police officer screaming in pain; lawmakers taking cover in the House chamber. It also showed Mr. Trump telling his supporters: “Go home. We love you. You’re very special.”

All but five Republican senators voted to challenge the constitutionality of the trial, suggesting that Democrats were unlikely to find the 17 they would need to join them in convicting the former president.

The plan would put off the historic proceeding until Feb. 9, giving former President Donald J. Trump time to prepare his defense and allowing President Biden to fill his cabinet and begin work on his agenda.

Drafts of the book outline the potential testimony of the former national security adviser if he were called as a witness in the president’s impeachment trial.

In declining to say when she might send the articles of impeachment to the Senate, Speaker Nancy Pelosi suggested she might keep them as leverage for negotiations on the rules for a trial.

The president’s brazen attempt at cheating has taken “decide it at the ballot box” off the menu. Impeachment is imperative.

Separately, two intelligence officials referred Mr. Trump’s activity to the Justice Department for a possible investigation. Law enforcement officials declined to open an inquiry.