In Federalist No. 65, Hamilton defines an impeachable offense as one that inflicts “political” injury on a democratic society; it is not hard to imagine a chief executive who, by his or her speech, achieves this level of harm. An openly racist president would fall into this category. So would one who lied about the reasons for taking the country to war.

We need not rely on hypotheticals. The Nixon case is precedent on this question. The House Judiciary Committee approved an article of impeachment citing Nixon’s publicly stated falsehoods about the Watergate break-in and his actions to investigate it, as violations of his constitutional oath to take care to faithfully execute the laws and his office. There is, then, no basis for the claim that words alone cannot justify the institution of impeachment proceedings.