IMPEACHMENT 101

Picture Courtesy: https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/hawaii-rep-tulsi-gabbard-defends-voting-present-impeachment/story?id=67820214

This article was written by Anjali Mehrotra a student of  Rajiv Gandhi National University of Law

On 18^th December 2019, Donald Trump became the third US President to be impeached. Previously, former President Andrew Johnson (1868) was impeached primarily for dismissing his secretary of war against the will of Congress. The only other president to be impeached was Bill Clinton (1998) on grounds of perjury and obstruction of justice after he lied about the nature of his affair with Monica Lewinsky and then allegedly asked her to lie about it as well. In 1974, Richard Nixon resigned from office before impeachment proceedings could start against him over the Watergate scandal.

However, no US president has been removed from office as a result of impeachment.

What is impeachment and what is the process?

Impeachment is the process by which a legislature (usually in the form of the lower house) brings charges against a civil officer of government for crimes alleged to have been committed. The impeached official remains in office until a trial is held. It is not a criminal process but a political one.

The US constitution categorically states that a president “shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes or misdemeanours“.

According to the Constitution, the House of Representatives has “the sole power of impeachment”, the Senate (Upper House) has “the sole power to try all impeachments”.

The process of impeachment takes place in two phases. Only the first phase had been conducted against Trump as of now. Two articles of impeachment/charges were brought forward in the House of Representatives and passed in a vote. It is imperative to understand that the House of Representatives has a majority of the Democratic Party while Trump being a Republican denies any wrongdoing and blames it on vendetta by the opposition. The House of Representatives consists of 435 members, among which 235 are Democrats and 199 are Republicans.

The second phase will take place in the Senate where the trial will take place in January. The Senate, which has a composition of 53 Republicans and 45 Democrats and two Independents, will vote following a trial, which will be overseen by the chief justice of the US Supreme Court, John Roberts. The trial will consider all the evidence against Trump, after which there will be a vote to either acquit or convict him.

Here, if less than two-thirds of the Senate convicts him, them he will remain in power till the next election whereas it two-thirds/ 67% of the Senate or more convicts him then he shall be removed from office.

It has been established by the Presidential Succession Act of 1947 that the Vice President would take over the office in case the President is removed from power; which means that Mike Pence would step in if the Senate convicts Trump.

Accusations against Trump

The basic contention against him circles around the fact whether or not he inappropriately took help from Ukraine to aid his re-election campaign for the upcoming 2020 elections. This means that the House did not consider the Robert Mueller report on Russia’s alleged interference in the 2016 election nor did they consider Trump handling of the issue.

According to the New York Times, he sought foreign interference using “hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars” to help him in the 2020 presidential elections and subsequently stopped the US Congress from performing its duty to check the executive branch.

He is being blamed for improperly pressurizing the Ukrainian government for marring information against one of his main opponents from the Democratic Party- Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden. While Joe Biden was Vice-President, Hunter had worked for a Ukrainian company.

He, apparently, held two major bargaining chips against Ukraine. First, withholding of the $400 million aid that had been allocated by the Congress to Ukraine and a White House meeting for the Ukrainian President. The Democrats attribute this action of his to abuse of power that is use the office for personal advancement and that too at the cost of national security as Ukraine was using that US aid in its conflict with Russia. In addition to this, he is accused of obstruction Congress by not cooperating with the inquiry.

The initial evidence was provided by an anonymous whistle-blower, an intelligence officer as a formal complaint who expressed concerns about the US President’s July 25th call with President Volodymyr Zelensky. The basic written version of the call shows the Trump persuading the Ukrainian President to investigate the discrediting allegations against Joe Biden. The call had come soon after he had blocked the release of the US military aid to Ukraine. It was testified in court that the President very clearly made the release of aid contingent on the condition of the Biden investigation but the White House denies this. The underlying aim here was to get Ukraine to open an investigation into the Bidens and declare as much publicly.

President Trump attributes the inquiry against him as a ‘witch hunt’ by the Democrats and the media while the Republican defence states that Ukraine’s president felt no pressure, Ukrainians were not aware that the aid was withheld and that the aid was eventually released.

What the future holds?

The trial will take place in January next place. It is unlikely for Trump to be impeached as the Senate if Republican dominated who in all probability will vote along party lines. Thus far, the Republicans have rejected the charges against Trump.

An editorial published in the New York Times said, “It’s a lot to ask of Republicans to insist on holding their own leader accountable, just as that was a lot to expect of Democrats during the Clinton impeachment inquiry. But while many Democrats then criticized President Bill Clinton and some voted to impeach him, Republican lawmakers would not breathe a word against Trump on Wednesday.”

Hence, it is unlikely that he would be removed from power and it likely to be acquitted by the Senate as were Johnson and Clinton.

It is uncertain how the impeachment would impact the upcoming 2020 Presidential election. A Wall Street Journal/ NBC News survey, suggests that Americans are split 48-48% on whether to remove Mr. Trump from office. Some 90% of Republicans oppose the impeachment, while 83% of Democrats support it.