Impeachment

Impeachment is the formal process by which President Trump would have to be removed from office, originally created as an enumerated power of the legislature in the U.S. Constitution.

Beginning in the House of Representatives, impeachment proceedings can be initiated in any committee and be brought by any member. They are then voted on and eventually sent to the full floor for either an all-at-once vote or a series of votes on each individual article of impeachment. The House decides by a simple majority whether or not to move forward with the impeachment, after which the articles are tried in the Senate.

Historically, only two Presidents have ever been impeached by the House (a somewhat surprising record considering the procedure only requires a simple majority) — Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton. Both were later acquitted during their Senate trials. The only other President to have articles of impeachment brought before the full house was Richard Nixon, however he resigned before they could be voted on.

Following the impeachment of a President by the House of Representatives the Senate holds a trial in which ‘managers’ appointed by the House represent the prosecution, the President’s administration provides a defense, and the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court presides.

At the conclusion of the trial the Senate votes on whether to deliberate publicly or privately, and following those deliberations votes on the articles of impeachment. A two-thirds majority of at least sixty-seven votes in the Senate is required to convict an impeachment and remove a President from office, a threshold that was not reached in either of the two impeachment trials the U.S. Senate has held.

This means that impeaching President Trump would almost certainly have to be a bi-partisan affair. However, considering that most Congressional Republicans have already hitched their wagon to the Trump train (even if it’s come off the rails) the odds are slim (barring some dramatic, earth-shattering revelations, even by Trump standards) that any articles of impeachment will be heard by the House at least until the next mid-term election when Democrats have a chance of reclaiming a majority in the chamber.

If Democrats ride a national wave of anti-Trump sentiment to retake the house in 2018 and subpoena President Trump’s tax returns, a move currently being prevented by Republicans who control the chamber, it’s almost certain they’ll find significant grounds on which to base numerous articles of impeachment.

Then the decision would ultimately come down to Republicans in the Senate. A lot has been made of the phrase ‘putting country before party’ lately, and this would likely end up being the ultimate test for vulnerable Senators. Even if Democrats have recovered their majority in the Senate after the 2018 elections, they will be nowhere near the two-thirds majority needed to convict an impeachment on a party-line vote.

Therefore, impeachment must be bi-partisan. The House would have to present such a compelling case to the Senate (the trial would probably be the media spectacle of a lifetime, I can only imagine what Trump’s twitter feed would look like) that they convince around twenty Republican Senators to vote for impeachment.

While not impossible, it’s also quite possible that the House convicts Trump and the Senate then acquits him — as they did for Presidents Johnson and Clinton.

Regardless, two things are clear already — if President Trump were impeached it would be an unprecedented event in U.S. history, and it’s hard to imagine a scenario in which President Pence or the Republican party as a whole come out unscathed from whatever revelations an impeachment trial might bring to light.