President Trump Impeached
Donald J. Trump is the third president in US history to be impeached by the House of Representatives — but it’s not exactly what you think.
Trump will now face a trial in the Senate starting the week of Jan. 6, which will be presided over by Chief Justice Roberts. Two articles of impeachment were passed in the House with the most ‘yea’ votes in history, compromised only of Democrats and one Independent.
In American history, only two other presidents have successfully been impeached by the House, Bill Clinton in 1998 and Andrew Johnson in 1868. Richard Nixon resigned in 1974 before his imminent bipartisan impeachment in the House and removal from office by the Senate.
America divided. Illustration by Sydney Kysar, Chief of Graphic Design
As we wait for the details of the Senate trial to be set, the fight for our democracy and the rule of law will rage on in Washington. Do not expect things to be back to normal once the Spring semester begins. Either VP Pence will be sworn into office, which is highly unlikely due to the makeup of the Senate, or President Trump will be able to finish his term and ride the Senate acquittal to the 2020 campaign trail.
The first article garnered 230 yeas and 197 nays, with the second article picking up one extra Democratic defector to make it 229-198. Presidential candidate, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, was the only congressperson to vote ‘present’ on both articles.
The first article charges Trump with abuse of power. The article alleges the President tried to use his power to pressure the Ukrainian government into publicly announcing an investigation into his political rival, Joe Biden, in an attempt to influence the 2020 United States presidential election.
Trump has admitted to asking for investigations into Biden on the White House lawn and suggested that China do the same. The evidence is undisputed and keeps piling on. Most recently, Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, admitted on national television to personally orchestrating the ousting of US ambassador to Ukraine, Maria Yovanovitch, in order to carry out his self-serving shadow diplomacy. It has also been revealed that Giuliani’s indicted associate, Lev Parnas, who helped orchestrate the Ukrainian smear campaign, received $1 million from Kremlin-linked Ukrainian oligarch, Dmitry Firtash.
The second article charges Trump with obstruction of Congress, which was issued for his historically unprecedented lack of cooperation with Congressional oversight. The Constitution gives the House of Representatives the sole power to impeach an elected official. Still to this day, the White House has yet to allow first hand witnesses to testify and has blocked all House subpoena attempts to secure documents relevant to their investigation.
The impeachment votes came on Wednesday, Dec.18 after nearly ten hours of debate on the House floor where every member had a chance to voice their views on the articles of impeachment. Many Democrats spoke of impeachment as a ‘sad and solemn’ process. They suggest impeachment is being invoked because of their Constitutional duty to hold the President accountable for high crimes and misdemeanors that threaten democracy and national security.
At the same time, Republicans slammed the impeachment investigation for its lack of due process for the President and cited Democrats’ hate for Trump since before his election. They lamented that impeachment is taking away the votes of 63 million Americans for a duly elected president.
Republicans also claimed that Democratic leadership is caving to the radical socialist Left and even suggested Jesus had more rights during his crucifixion than is being afforded to Trump.
“He described the impeachment process as a ‘political suicide march’ for the Democrats, who have ‘branded themselves with an eternal mark of shame.’”
Both Democrats and Republicans cited the Founding Fathers to fit their arguments for and against impeachment. The Democrats explained that the actions of Donald Trump were exactly what our Founders feared could happen: Someone abusing his power like a king by seeking foreign interference in our elections to personally benefit his ambitions and not allowing a coequal branch of government to investigate his conduct.
Republicans pointed to the hyper partisan nature of this impeachment process to remove a political opponent, which Alexander Hamilton warned us of in his famous Federalist Papers.
As of right now, Nancy Pelosi has not sent the articles of impeachment to the Senate and has not named any impeachment managers from the House, who have the assignment to argue the case against Trump.
On the other side, the President’s lawyers will defend the allegations of Trump’s high crimes and misdemeanors, while the 100 Senators are required to be impartial jurors. They would have to vote with a ⅔ majority to remove Trump from office.
House Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader, Steny Hoyer, have threatened to delay the Senate impeachment trial in order to ensure a fair trial. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has already indicated that he prefers a short trial with no additional witness testimony. McConnell has also stated that he is coordinating with White House counsel and he is “not an impartial juror” because the impeachment investigation has been "the most rushed, least thorough, and most unfair" in modern history.
Lindsey Graham has also stated that he will “not pretend to be a fair juror,” calling into question the Senators’ ability to take the oath that requires them to do “impartial justice according to the Constitution and laws: So help me God.”
In order for the Senate to proceed with an impeachment trial that is aligned with the historical precedent set by previous trials, the rules would have to be voted on by a majority of the Senate. This means four Republicans would need to agree to the terms put forward by Senate Minority Leader, Chuck Schumer.
While the House was holding their vote on articles of impeachment, President Trump was in Battle Creek, Michigan delivering one of his longest campaign rallies to date. Trump told the massive crowd that it does not really feel like he is being impeached and celebrated Republican unity for the House votes against the articles. He described the impeachment process as a “political suicide march” for the Democrats, who have “branded themselves with an eternal mark of shame.”
While criticizing Democrats and the impeachment process, President Trump also attacked the FBI, former FBI lawyer Lisa Page, Rep. Debbie Dingell who voted for impeachment and her late husband, Rep. John Dingell, by suggesting his soul is looking up from the fiery depths of hell.
Many have warned that if President Trump is acquitted in the Senate, he will become more unhinged and unrelenting in his political attacks and lack of regard for the rule of law just as we saw after Congress’ weak response to ten counts of obstruction of justice laid out in the Mueller report.
Whether or not impeachment helps or hurts either party is yet to be seen. One thing is for sure though, 2020 will be an exciting start to a new decade.