“If I can’t say what I believe that our president should stand for, then why should I ask Alaskans to stand with me?” said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) in a lengthy interview after she joined six other Republicans to convict Trump. “This was consequential on many levels, but I cannot allow the significance of my vote, to be devalued by whether or not I feel that this is helpful for my political ambitions.”…

As she entered her Capitol hideaway to finish her official statement on her vote to convict Trump, she gestured at where there had been trash and broken glass from rioters that desecrated the building and recalled the sound of a police officer “retching” because he’d been sprayed with pepper spray. She said what made her “soul happy” on Saturday was the memory that Congress finished certifying the election later that day.

“We did it because we had some extraordinary men and women that were willing to stand up and defend and protect. And that was good,” she said. “I just wish that Donald Trump had been one of them.”