Trump Impeachment Process, Explained: What are the odds of Trump being Impeached ?

So what is impeachment? : Impeachment is to official misconduct what an indictment is to crime: a statement of charges leading to a trial. The procedure for congressional impeachment of Executive branch officials (including but not limited to the president) was spelled out in some detail in the U.S. Constitution, as the official House of Representatives history observes: Impeachment comes from British constitutional history. The process evolved from the 14th century as a way for parliament to hold the king’s ministers accountable for their public actions. Impeachment, as Alexander Hamilton of New York explained in Federalist 65, varies from civil or criminal courts in that it strictly involves the “misconduct of public men, or in other words from the abuse or violation of some public trust.” Individual state constitutions had provided for impeachment for “maladministration” or “corruption” before the U.S. Constitution was written. And the founders, fearing the potential for abuse of executive power, considered impeachment so important that they made it part of the Constitution even before they defined the contours of the presidency. Impeachment is not, to be clear, the removal of corrupt presidents or other officials, but simply the adoption of charges by the House, triggering a trial in the Senate. So, because the House passed articles of impeachment against Johnson and Clinton, these two presidents were impeached — but were subsequently acquitted by the Senate. The Constitution requires a two-thirds vote in the Senate to consummate an impeachment with removal from office, but the document is otherwise silent about procedures. The Constitution permits Congress to remove presidents before their term is up if enough lawmakers vote to say that they committed “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” Only two presidents have been impeached — Andrew Johnson in 1868 and Bill Clinton in 1998 — and both were ultimately acquitted and completed their terms in office. Richard Nixon resigned in 1974 to avoid being impeached.The two most recent presidential impeachments began with a vote in the full House. Pelosi has broken with this format and has chosen to instruct the six House committees already investigating Trump to proceed "under that umbrella of impeachment inquiry." Impeachable offenses, according to the Constitution, include "Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors." What exactly constitutes those crimes, particularly High Crimes and Misdemeanors, has been the subject of vigorous debate throughout US history. During previous impeachment inquiries, a House committee, usually the Judiciary Committee or its subcommittee, conducts an investigation to see if a federal official's conduct warrants impeachment. What is a “high crime”? The term “high crimes and misdemeanors” came out of the British common law tradition: it was the sort of offense that Parliament cited in removing crown officials for centuries. Essentially, it means an abuse of power by a high-level public official. This does not necessarily have to be a violation of an ordinary criminal statute. In 1788, as supporters of the Constitution were urging states to ratify the document, Alexander Hamilton described impeachable crimes in one of the Federalist Papers as “those offenses which proceed from the misconduct of public men, or, in other words, from the abuse or violation of some public trust. They are of a nature which may with peculiar propriety be denominated POLITICAL, as they relate chiefly to injuries done immediately to the society itself.” What is the process of impeachment ? In both the Nixon and the Clinton cases, the House Judiciary Committee first held an investigation and recommended articles of impeachment to the full House. In theory, however, the House of Representatives could instead set up a special panel to handle the proceedings — or just hold a floor vote on such articles without any committee vetting them. Currently, Democrats hold a 235 to 198 majority over Republicans. Michigan Rep. Justin Amash, who left the Republican Party in July after announcing his support for impeachment proceedings, is the chamber's one independent and there is one vacancy. Assuming Amash votes with Democrats, they could afford to lose 18 Democrats and still achieve a majority. At this point, Trump would face a choice shared by only three other presidents: be impeached and fight for your office in the Senate or resign. Both Clinton in 1999 and President Andrew Johnson in 1868 fought in the House and ultimately survived a Senate trial. Nixon, after learning that Republicans would not support him during impeachment, resigned before the House could vote to impeach him. There were four articles of impeachment against Clinton, but only two were approved, on mostly party-line votes with a few defections. When the full House votes on articles of impeachment, if at least one gets a majority vote, the president is impeached — which is essentially the equivalent of being indicted . Next, the proceedings move to the Senate, which is to hold a trial overseen by the chief justice of the United States. After the House votes to impeach a President, the Constitution calls for a trial in the US Senate. There is some question as to whether Republicans in the Senate would even bother since they likely have the votes to easily dismiss the charges. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell simply decided not hold a vote on Merrick Garland's nomination by President Barack Obama to sit on the Supreme Court. There's been plenty of speculation about whether McConnell would simply decide not to hold an impeachment trial. If there were a trial, senators become jurors and the chief justice of the US Supreme Court presides -- that's John Roberts. The House votes on managers who bring the trial in the Senate. Although they might be helped by outside counsel, the House managers actually bring the trial and present evidence. The impeached official can offer a defense or have counsel do it. While Democrats hold a majority in the House, Republicans control the Senate with a 53-45 majority. Two independents usually side with Democrats. But it takes a supermajority to remove a President from office. That means 67 senators would have to agree that Trump should be removed from office. With the current party split, 20 Republicans would have to turn on him. At the moment, exactly zero Republicans senators have said anything close to supporting the idea of impeachment. A team of lawmakers from the House, known as managers, play the role of prosecutors. The president has defense lawyers, and the Senate serves as the jury. If at least two-thirds of the senators find the president guilty, he is removed, and the vice president takes over as president. There is no appeal. Pelosi has not given a timeframe for this process but she told her colleagues it would be done "expeditiously," and Nadler has hoped to conclude it by the end of the year. This process can take months. For Johnson, the entire process lasted 94 days, from first congressional action to Senate acquittal, lasted from February 22, 1868 to May 26, 1868. For Richard Nixon, it lasted 184 days. The House approved the impeachment inquiry on February 6, 1974 and Nixon resigned. For Clinton, it lasted 127 days. The House approved the impeachment inquiry on October 8, 1998, and the Senate acquitted him on February 12, 1999. the odds of Trump being removed via impeachment range from “slim” to “none.” It would take only 34 of 54 Senate Republicans to acquit Trump, and the idea that 20 senators from a party dominated by this president like a Bronze Age warlord would defy the MAGA base and try to defenestrate him on the brink of an epochal presidential election is, in a word, laughable. And that’s true no matter what Nadler’s committee uncovers, or what journalists dig up, or what the president himself admits in one of his moments when his belief in his own invincibility overcomes all good judgment (“I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and wouldn’t lose any voters,” he famously boasted). Perhaps there is a theoretical set of events that could rapidly erode Trump’s partisan invincibility the way Watergate gradually eroded Nixon’s, but it’s hard to imagine and impossible to expect. So How Is This All Likely to End? Assuming Trump is impeached and then acquitted, this saga will conclude with the 2020 presidential election, and with Trump’s ejection from office or his triumphal reelection. It’s possible, of course, that whether or not the current impeachment drive goes anywhere, a second-term Trump could get himself impeached (indeed, some Democratic opponents of impeaching Trump now think this option should be saved for later, when his conduct would undoubtedly become far worse). But most likely his impeachment, or even impeachment hearings, will reinforce the sense that the 2020 election is a high-stakes referendum on the sprawling corruption and norm-breaking attitudes of Trump. It’s the possible impact of impeachment on Trump’s reelection that has caused so many arguments among Democrats (mostly in Washington, since rank-and-file Democrats have been trending pro-impeachment for some time). Best we can tell from polls, the public is not making any sort of fine distinctions between “initiating impeachment proceedings” or impeaching Trump or removing him from office. Once Democrats head decisively down that road they may as well follow it until its logical end. Some sincerely believe impeachment will hurt Trump in 2020 by focusing public attention on his misconduct and conveying a clear sense of Democratic purpose in holding him and his corrupt hirelings accountable (or conversely, that failing to impeach Trump will depress Democratic “base” enthusiasm). Others (most clearly presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren) argue that it’s a constitutional or moral duty even if it helps produce the horror of a second Trump term. Any way you look at it, the implications of what House Democrats now decide to do could be momentous yet hard to adjudge until the ultimate deal goes down. Trump's latest Tweet , quote : "I am currently at the United Nations representing our Country, but have authorized the release tomorrow of the complete, fully declassified and unredacted transcript of my phone conversation with President Zelensky of Ukraine. You will see it was a very friendly and totally appropriate call. No pressure and, unlike Joe Biden and his son, NO quid pro quo! This is nothing more than a continuation of the Greatest and most Destructive Witch Hunt of all time!" , end of quote . Trump is going to release Call Transcript folks . My popcorn is ready !











The Financial Armageddon Economic Collapse Blog tracks trends and forecasts , futurists , visionaries , free investigative journalists , researchers , Whistelblowers , truthers and many more