All this news about impeachment abuzz in the political world probably has a lot of people wondering what impeachment is and what it means for President Trump. I’m gonna give you guys some background on impeachment and all the news about why it’s such a big deal right now!
Impeachment is the act of an official charge being brought against a government official. The charge is brought by a legislative house and then it is voted on by the House of Representatives. If there is a majority vote in the House of Representatives, then the president is impeached. This does not however, mean that the president or government official is removed from office. Once impeached, the president must go through a trial in the Senate to determine if they will be completely removed from office. For more information on how this process works, the senate website has many links to the further inner workings of the impeachment process.
There have only been two presidents that have been impeached. Bill Clinton and Andrew Johnson were both impeached but were subsequently not removed from office. Richard Nixon was also most likely going to be impeached but removed himself from office before Congress had the chance to. Overall, impeachment is just a way to say that the president is doing something that is unfit for the presidential role that was given and being put on trial for it.
The reason that impeachment is so relevant in today’s political climate, if you’ve been living under a rock, is because Donald Trump has become the third president in United States history to be impeached. The House of Representatives claimed that Trump abused his power, especially due to his continuous communication with Russia and his investigation on Joe Biden’s son and his works in Ukraine. Since he was already impeached in the House, the trial to remove him from office has officially begun. This trial could go on for weeks considering the high stakes of removing a president from office. The likelihood, however, of Trump being removed from office is very slim considering it has never happened before. Many news networks are covering the impeachment trial live so here is one website, just in case you don’t want to miss out on any of the action!
While the possibility of removal is very slim, I’m gonna give out some information on what could happen should Trump be removed in the coming weeks. In the case that a president is removed from office, their vice president will become the president for the remainder of the presidential term. The rest of the presidential election process will commence until a new president is chosen for a new term.