ABC News <---- pretty good link to get a summary on the impeachment hearings
NY Times
The Economist
CNN
On Thursday, December 12, the House Judiciary Committee will meet to debate the two articles of Trump's impeachment. This means that the Democrats will likely be finalizing the articles regarding Trump's supposed quit-pro-quo arrangement with Ukraine and the Biden investigation while the Republicans will likely be offering amendments to the articles in efforts to oppose the impeachment. Both the committee and the full House are headed by the Democrats and thus, the case of the Democrats is more likely to be pushed forward, meaning Trump may be impeached.
However, According to The Economist article, today's political polarization will make it harder to impeach Trump. Because the Senate holds impeachment hearings and is led by the Republican party, it is unlikely that Trump will be removed from office. Removing Trump from office would require a 2/3 vote in the Senate, meaning a good number of Republicans would have to vote against their political party. Instead, it is likely that should Trump be impeached, a vote to acquit Trump will be held.
Do you think it is probable that Trump will be impeached given the situation? What is your opinion on the role of partisanship in an impeachment?
12 comments:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/house-democrats-brace-for-some-defections-among-moderates-on-impeachment-of-trump/2019/12/11/8698a398-1c29-11ea-8d58-5ac3600967a1_story.html
I believe it is extremely likely that Trump will be impeached due to the Democratic majority in the House. While a few representatives from swing districts may vote against impeachment in order to ensure reelection, the Washington Post reveals that "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) can afford to lose 17 Democrats and still prevail," meaning that even with these swing moderate democrats, the likelihood of the Articles of Impeachment in the house passing is highly plausible. However, the probability of Trump being removed from office is extremely unlikely because of the Republican majority in the senate. Impeachments have always been partisan. This can be illustrated in the all three of the Impeachment proceedings throughout American history (Johnson and the Radical Republicans, Nixon, and Clinton). Personally, I believe the only impeachment process that was a bit less partisan was Nixon's due to the obvious evidence of obstruction of justice; however, without sufficient evidence and strong reasoning that President Trump's actions are a danger to our democracy, the Democrats will not be able to change the minds of Republican Senators.
I definitely think impeachment in the house is going to happen, there's little doubt about that. Pelosi and the Democratic leadership in the House are preparing fast for impeachment and have gathered lots of data and testimony for Trump's wrongdoings in terms of quid pro quo in the Ukraine issue. This article suggests Pelosi wants to get the impeachment before Christmas:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/05/us/politics/pelosi-impeachment.html
Probably to retain the impeachment news cycle and make sure that not too much attention is dissipated over the holiday season, which is a good call since more Americans will be concerned about the impeachment before than during or after the winter holidays.
On the other hand, conviction in the Senate should be very unlikely. As you have already provided in the CNN article, McConnell and senior Republicans are not going to impeach such a strong and politically supported president from their own party. This Fox News article, from the right wing itself, says that Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham won't even call any impeachment hearings in the Senate.
https://www.foxnews.com/media/lindsey-graham-senate-impeachment-inquiry-timeline
This is pretty reminiscent of the Republican congress blocking Judge Merrick Garland for Obama's SCOTUS appointment. Either way, partisan politics will play a larger role and overshadow actual facts or what's right for the country.
It is very unlikely that President Trump will be removed from office because as Samantha said, it would require a great amount of Republics to go against their own party with a ⅔ vote in the senate. However, the CNN article states that Republicans still wish to support Trump and clear charges held against him. At the same time, the ABC News article pointed out that “while the Constitution references “high crimes and misdemeanors,” the founding fathers didn’t necessarily interpret that to mean a violation of U.S. law,” which means that the impeachment is Trump is highly likely even if the Senate chooses to prove how he doesn’t violate the Constitution. Moreover, rather than saying that the political polarization is making it harder to impeach Trump, I feel that the ongoing debate of Trump’s impeachment is really what’s causing this partisanship. The idea of whether or not to impeach Trump is further dividing Republicans and Democrats and even pushing independents to choose sides.
Judging by how Republican the Senate is, similar to what Savannah stated, I believe that it is unlikely that Trump will be impeached. The Republicans have tolerated and refused to go against the president in the past despite his actions and such, so I don't really see why they would change their minds now and agree on his impeachment. Even if they don't like Trump, I think they would prefer him over the idea of possibly "losing" or giving in to the Democrats, which might have been the mindset that they've been clinging to this whole time. In terms of partisanship in the impeachment process, I think it would be ideal to have more bipartisanship in both the House and the Senate, but I also believe that partisanship is inevitable in the impeachment process as there will always be people trying to expand power and influence for their political party, especially now when polarization is intense.
I don't believe that President Trump will be impeached only because that republicans control the senate and they have been very lenient with Trump, which I find unfair. Trump's impeachment should not be in the hands of the senate, especially since there can be a bias. If the president is being charged there shouldn't be bias in the decision making, it is an unequal process.
It's important to note that impeachment and removal are two different things. Impeachment is just the levying of a formal accusation of a crime against the president, and it may or may not lead to his removal from office. Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton were both impeached, but neither was removed (although Andrew Johnson was spared removal by only one vote). Impeachment votes nearly always fall on party lines--in both Clinton and Johnson's impeachments, not a single member of their respective parties voted to impeach. Since the house is currently majority-Democrat, is is likely that Trump will be impeached, but since the senate is majority-Republican, and a vote in the senate is required to remove Trump from office, I find it unlikely that Trump's position as president will be jeopardized.
*This is from 12/12 at around 3:30 but did not post, so I am posting it now*
I agree that President Trump will be impeached, but not convicted. But this isn't necessarily the end of the world for democrats and those who oppose the President. Impeachment still sends a powerful message to every president, in the future, that they are not above the law and can still be held responsible for misconduct by Congress and the Constitution. The problem here is that the last impeachment, Clinton's, helped the party of the impeached win seats, as the people didn't even support the move in the first place. That being said, I, and a majority of Americans, do support impeachment, but I think that the democrats need to be very careful and thoughtful on how they approach this as it can blow up in their face, fast. While this impeachment is very political (which can be dangerous), that does not mean that it does not have any legs to stand on. Thus, the focus of democratic lawmakers and leaders should be to emphasize the illegal actions of the President (that there is clear evidence of) and keep the proceeding as nonpartisan as possible in the process.
Honestly, I don’t think Trump will be impeached. Although the committee and House are headed by Democrats, like Sam said, Republicans lead the Senate and that’s where the impeachment hearings are heard. So, like people have already said above, that requires a bunch of Republicans to vote against their political party. So, no, Trump will probably not be impeached based on these circumstances. And partisanship is definitely a huge factor in an impeachment because partisanship is when there is prejudice in favor of a particular case or, in other words, biased. In an impeachment, there is is obviously strong support for one’s party and their policies and they will always stand with their party. And in this instance, Republicans will always stand with Trump.
Since the Republicans control the Senate, removal of President Trump from office will be almost impossible unless some new information is revealed that gives evidence that the entire nation will listen to. However, even though the House may be set to impeach, the situation could result badly for the democrats if they handle the impeachment in the wrong manner. There have been recent reports of moderate democrats and their standings on the impeachment with some of them choosing not to vote for impeachment in the House and stating that they are going to switch parties. This obviously does not look as the ideal plan that the House democrats would like, but they will most likely still get a majority to vote for impeachment. To me, the entire proceeding is a lot of mixed feelings because I believe that President Trump committed an impeachable offense, but I know that he won't be removed for it, so I know that the democrats could come out of the impeachment with less support than they did before, but they might not depending on what happens, so the next few weeks will be very telling toward the future.
I find it very difficult to predict the outcome of the situation. As many people previously mentioned, the democrats are skating on thin ice regarding the impeachment vote. It's obvious to me that Trump has committed acts worthy of impeachment, but, within Congress, this isn't as important as partisanship. I know there was a lot of talk around the beginning of Trump's presidency about republicans that simply were not in support of Trump. However, this has definitely changed as parties fight for power rather than their values. I think people in the Senate would be right to be confident about their vote going against Trump, but the HOR is a different story. I am doubtful that the HOR will pass a vote against Trump, but I also am thinking about what would happen if he didn't get impeached? Many people would be very angry. And as Franklin said, impeachment doesn't mean the president's immediate removal; there's another part for that. Unfortunately, if Trump doesn't get impeached, it is setting an example for future presidents. Clinton was impeached for what I would describe as "sexual misconduct" (???), and I honestly don't see that as big of a deal as the numerous "scandals" surrounding Trump. Hell, Trump is famous for making tons of inappropriate comments regarding his DAUGHTER. He is very good at getting away with mischief I will give him that.
The interesting thing about this whole debacle is that most of the public is likely ill-informed of political vocabulary, and likely equates impeachment with removal from office. I wonder how much public opinion for impeachment would shift towards either side if more people were really aware of what the word impeachment means. Would more people lobby their House Representatives to vote in support of impeachment? Public opinion generally plays more of a role in the House than the Senate (which is the main roadblock for getting an impeachment through - it's a shame that nowadays, impeachment is not a matter of guilty or innocent, but republican or democrat) but I would imagine that at least a few Senators would shift their votes based on a shift in public opinion.
I don't think Trump is going to get impeached because of the partisanship in the federal government. The Republicans will side with Trump to keep their hold of the government. Though there have been accounts for which Trump should be impeached for, the majority in the Senate will make it likely that he will not be impeached. Unless the Democrats can find something extremely shocking, it will be unlikely to shift the mood in the Senate and honestly it would just end up being a waste of time. But who knows? It is was kind of a shocker when he won so maybe he might get impeached.
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