Trump is deflating. Delay his impeachment trial to help Biden and raise conviction odds.

When Donald Trump got himself impeached the first time, there was a whiff of political theater about the process. While the charges were immensely serious, the political environment made it unlikely that the Senate would treat them seriously. And so it proved, with the Senate refusing to even hear witnesses.

But this time, it’s different. What Trump did to unleash the attack on the Capitol was so fundamentally wrong that there’s a real prospect of making this one stick. The House has already voted to impeach the president and now the question is, when should Speaker Nancy Pelosi transmit the single article of impeachment to the Senate so that the trial can begin?

The last time Trump was impeached, the House sat on the articles of impeachment for almost a month before transmitting them to the Senate. This time, some people want to deliver the new article this week as soon as the Senate is back. Others, including Rep. Jim Clyburn, the third-ranking House Democrat, have proposed not transmitting the new article of impeachment until early May. That would give the incoming Biden administration time to get its nominees confirmed by the Senate and to pass key legislation, especially COVID relief.

Capitol attack evidence is mounting

So who’s right? Is it better to hold a Senate trial immediately or wait? Unusually in politics, there is a solid answer to that question.

Trump’s political power has been hollowing out since the morning after Election Day. Losing made this inevitable. No politician is more powerful out of office than in. But the process dramatically accelerated after two Georgia senators lost their seats, and their party's majority, in runoff elections Jan. 5. The attack on the Capitol the next day turned Trump from failed politician to political pariah.

And — and here is the essential insight— it’s only going to get worse. In three months or even one, Trump will be a much less fearsome figure than he is now. Losing his social media megaphone has already damaged his control of his followers. Trump’s popularity depends on constant reinforcement. And yet, during the most politically critical week of his presidency, he’s been effectively invisible even though he still has all the normal communication channels of the presidency. If he can’t command the national stage now, a Twitterless Trump, out of office and disgraced, can’t either.

It’s also likely that once the events of Jan. 6 have been fully investigated, Trump will look even worse than he does today. It’s becoming increasingly clear that the president was initially very pleased about the attack and refused to take aggressive action to stop it.

There’s also an unprecedented amount of evidence, generated by the rioters themselves, currently being collated by news organizations. This gives an astonishingly detailed picture of what happened that day and why. It’s hard to argue that President Trump didn’t incite the attack on the Capitol when several of the attackers themselves have said they were attacking the Capitol because Trump told them to. Processing and analyzing all this information takes time.

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On top of that, Trump will have his hands full dealing with personal business and legal issues. Forget federal charges. Even if he successfully pardons himself, Trump will be the subject of multiple state criminal investigations from New York to Georgia.

The civil suits are even worse because they are more embarrassing. Trump has used his status as president to hold off several active and potential civil suits, including an investigation into real estate fraud by the New York attorney general’s office, and two suits for defamation from Summer Zervos and E. Jean Carroll. On Wednesday at noon ET, all those defenses collapse. Trump will be forced to comply with subpoenas, sit for depositions, and provide DNA samples. Even if none of this produced embarrassing revelations, it would still soak up most of Trump’s time and attention.

And I’m going to go out on a limb here and say there is zero probability that these suits will not result in embarrassing revelations.

Trump stock will keep sinking

By all accounts, Trump is already careening out of control. Stripped of the buffer of White House staff and government lawyers devoted to mitigating his worst impulses, how much worse will it get? A President Trump owning the libs on Twitter is one thing. An ex-President Trump who’s only in the headlines when he’s battling allegations about real estate fraud and DNA stains on dresses is something else. Trump’s “great patriots” attend his rallies and turn out for him because they want to feel like they are part of something important. Being reduced to fodder for stories on "Access Hollywood" isn’t going to be quite as motivating.

So for the next few months, at least, Trump’s stock will be sinking. Is that enough to get Senate Republicans to turn on him? Maybe. Senate Republicans might want to co-opt Trumpism, but Trump himself is a political millstone.

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This time, the forces arrayed against him are very different. Even Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell has let it be known that he’s considering voting for impeachment, and he doesn’t do quixotic. McConnell knows his caucus and he knows his politics. If he decides that the balance of political opportunity favors convicting Trump, then the 17 Republican votes necessary will be there to do it — and probably quite a few more — because much of his caucus will have reached the same conclusion.

So if you want to convict Trump, which paves the way for voting to ban him from holding public office, the best way to get to the necessary 67 votes is let the dust settle. Once Trump is no longer protected by the presidency, he’s going to look a lot less formidable than he does today and the Republican political calculus will be different. Take the time to get the Biden administration off to a good start. Confirm nominees. Begin considering legislation. Get on with the business of actually governing. For the first time in four years, the problem of Donald Trump can wait.

Chris Truax, an appellate lawyer in San Diego, is a legal adviser for The Guardrails of Democracy Project, CEO of CertifiedVoter.com and a member of USA TODAY's Board of Contributors.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Delay Trump's impeachment trial to help Biden and raise conviction odds