Here's a fuller analysis:
"The Constitution speaks sparingly to the contours of an impeachment trial but specifies unambiguously that the chief justice must 'preside.' The Senate rules, which incorporate this command, make no distinction between the chief justice’s role as presiding officer in this context and the vice president’s in all others. There is no apparent reason the presiding officer’s responsibility would include breaking 50-50 ties in one context but not the others.
"A presiding officer presides; that means keeping order and moving proceedings along, at least somewhat analogous to the role of a district court judge. The reason the chief justice and not the vice president plays this role in an impeachment of the president alone is that the vice president would have an automatic conflict of interest. If the presiding officer had no substantive role to play, there would be no conflict. It’s precisely because the presiding officer might make substantive decisions that the chief justice must step in.
Finally, the chief justice played a substantive role in both previous impeachment trials of the president. Most notably, Chief Justice Salmon Chase twice broke ties in the Andrew Johnson trial."
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