By any normal criteria, Donald Trump’s behaviour between the United States presidential election in November 2020 and his successor’s inauguration the following January would have to be regarded as criminal misconduct verging on the treasonable. Indeed, some of those who took part in the actions he orchestrated have been charged with seditious conspiracy, and sedition is legally close to treason. But political reality is not that simple. It is a long way from certain that justice will ever catch up with him. It is possible that he will return to the presidency of the world’s most powerful nation after the next election in 2024.

All this is bad news for the US but also for the world. The American democratic system, often regarded as a model for everyone else, appears to have a fundamental flaw. A detailed study of what happened between those two dates is needed in order to repair the damage. Fortunately that is the task a House Congressional select committee has embarked upon, and it has laid bare a coordinated plot designed to undermine the United States Constitution – a coup d’état in effect.