Donald Trump is the first US president to be impeached twice. An impeachment proceeding is the formal process by which a sitting president is accused of wrongdoing. A president can be impeached for treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanours.
Trump’s first impeachment happened in 2019. He was acquitted. Now, the Democrats claim Trump “incited an insurrection” on Capitol Hill on the 6th of January.
The process begins in the House of Representatives (the lower house) where any member can suggest launching an impeachment proceeding. Once the impeachment is launched, there is a vote where a simple majority (50% plus one or 218 votes) is required to pass the articles to a Senate (upper house) trial. The vote passed on the 13th of January with 232 votes. Ten of these votes came from Republicans.
Prior to the senate trial, the Democrats appointed a team of nine impeachment managers who are acting as prosecutors and building a case against Trump. They are focussing on Trump’s rally prior to the attack on the Capitol on the 6th of January.
They are also arguing that Trump was building towards the Capitol Hill riots for a long time. They are pointing to Trump’s comments about the anti-Semitic Proud Boys, to Trump’s response when his supporters attempted to drive a Biden campaign bus off a road; and to his comments after the deadly attack by white supremacists in Charlottesville in 2017. They claim Trump groomed his supporters for this moment.
Trump’s defence team argue that it is unconstitutional to impeach a former president. They claim is it is “constitutional cancel culture”. But their argument has not been clear, see the video below.
While a former president has never been impeached in practice, it is clear from the constitution that impeachment for former presidents is within the rules. By leaning on the constitutionality of the case, however, it means Republicans do not have to ask themselves hard questions about whether Trump really did incite an insurrection.
To remove a president from office two-thirds of Senators must vote in favour (67 of 100). There are currently fifty Republicans in the senate, and because Trump still holds power over Republican voters, it is unlikely that seventeen will vote against him.
So why go along with the process at all?
The first reason is to tarnish Trump’s reputation, he is now the only president in history to be impeached twice. The second is to set a precedent, to ensure impeachments of former presidents are possible in the future. The third is to show that words and actions have consequences, even for the President of the USA.
— Jonathan Lewis (@lonnyjewis)