Impeachment: Overview

Introduction

Impeachment is written into the Constitution of the United States as a democratic method for Congress to hold the president or other federal officials accountable for serious misconduct. The framers of the Constitution described the conduct that could warrant impeachment as “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” Impeachment of federal officials, including judges, in the United States is a two-step process. First, the House of Representatives must pass “articles of impeachment,” which consist of the formal charges, much like an indictment. A simple majority vote to impeach will then send the case to the Senate for a trial. Generally, the trial is presided over by the vice president of the United States; in the case of the impeachment of a president, the chief justice of the United States presides over the proceedings. Two-thirds of the senators must vote guilty for there to be a conviction; the only penalty is removal from office and disqualification from holding future federal office. Impeachment may also happen at the state level, as of a governor by the state legislature.

Many presidents have been the target of impeachment threats, but by 2024, only three had been impeached: Andrew Johnson, Bill Clinton, and Donald Trump (twice). All three were acquitted by the Senate and thus remained in office. Richard Nixon likely would have been impeached, but he resigned during the impeachment hearings.

Other officials in the United States who have been impeached include Supreme Court justice Samuel Chase (1741–1811) and Secretary of War William W. Belknap (1829–90), both of whom were acquitted. Fourteen federal judges and several governors have been impeached as well, including Arizona governor Evan Mecham, who was impeached and removed from office in 1988, and Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich, who was impeached and removed in 2009.

The use of impeachment as a mechanism to remove political figures from office has been controversial, largely because of the severity of the required charges and evidence necessary to ensure that the charges meet the broad criteria set forth in the Constitution. Historically, votes for and against presidential impeachment have generally been cast along party lines, which has raised questions about the motivation behind impeachment. However, in the face of clear evidence, there has generally been greater bipartisan support for an impeachment. The increasingly frequent use of impeachment inquiries in the early twenty-first century has prompted further concerns over its impact on democracy and its utility as a political tool or weapon.

Understanding the Discussion

Impeachment: An indictment by Congress that brings charges of a crime worthy of removing a president, vice president, cabinet member, Supreme Court justice, or other federal judge from office. Following impeachment, a trial and conviction is required to remove the official. Article 2, section 4 of the Constitution of the United States provides guidelines for impeachment: “The president, vice-president and all civil officers of the United States shall be removed from office on impeachment for and conviction of treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”

Obstruction of justice: Efforts to prevent or interfere with an investigation or other official proceeding, such as juror intimidation, witness tampering, bribery, contempt of court, or obstruction of documentary evidence.

Perjury: A lie stated under oath about an issue that is material to the outcome of a case or matter being investigated.

History

The concept of impeachment is rooted in British governance. Many earls and dukes were removed from office during the reigns of James I (1603–25) and Charles I (1628–48) and other tyrannical rulers, who themselves were immune from impeachment. In addition to removal from office, an impeached British official could be fined, receive a prison sentence, or even face execution.

In 1787, the Framers of the US Constitution drew upon British doctrine when they selected the reasons for impeachment but abandoned the other punishments beyond removal from office. The individual states also enacted impeachment procedures for the removal of governors and other elected officials. Ten years later, the first federal impeachment took place—that of Senator William Blount of Tennessee, who was charged with conspiracy against the US but was expelled from office and charges dropped. Over the decades that followed, four federal judges were impeached as well.

In 1868, Andrew Johnson became the first United States president to be impeached. Johnson did not share the same vision for the country as the Radical Republican majority in Congress, which resulted in major tensions. After the Radical Republicans passed the Tenure of Office Act, intended to prevent the president from unilaterally dismissing officials who had been selected by the Senate, Johnson fired Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, thus providing the fuel that the Republicans needed to begin impeachment proceedings. Impeached by the House, Johnson was acquitted by the Senate, but only by a margin of one vote.

Although there would be further judicial impeachments, it would be nearly another century before the next executive-branch impeachment—that of President Richard Nixon. In 1972, a few months after Nixon, a Republican, began his second term in the White House, five men were caught breaking into the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate Hotel in Washington, DC, for the purpose of gaining intelligence information that would benefit the Republican Party. A subsequent investigation by the FBI and the work of two journalists, Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, eventually connected Nixon and his administration to the break-in and additional wrongdoings, including attempts to cover up the scandal.

In 1974, the House Judiciary Committee approved three articles of impeachment against Nixon: obstruction of justice, abuse of power, and contempt of Congress. More than a third of the Republicans on the committee joined with all the Democrats in voting to impeach, but before a vote of the full House on impeachment could be held, audio tapes surfaced that provided additional incriminating evidence. With the loss of even more Republican support, Nixon faced certain impeachment in the House followed by conviction in the Senate, so he resigned in August, before the House could vote, and the impeachment process was brought to an early end.

In December 1998, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives impeached President Bill Clinton on charges relating to an illicit affair he had with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. The articles of impeachment included perjury and obstruction of justice.

Much debate surrounded the Clinton impeachment. Democrats believed the Republicans were essentially conducting a “witch hunt,” arguing that the president’s personal life should remain private and had no effect on his ability to fulfill the obligations of his office.

In the end, support for President Clinton’s impeachment waned among the American public, who found the investigation itself to be tawdrier than the president’s indiscretions. Clinton was acquitted by the Senate and completed his second term as president.

In the early twenty-first century, a movement to impeach President George W. Bush was supported by some Democrats, the Green Party, and other liberals who believed that Bush committed crimes far worse than Clinton’s indiscretion. Some far-right conservatives, including the John Birch Society, also favored impeachment. Some of the reasons cited by these groups as grounds for impeachment included the allegations that the 2003 invasion of Iraq was carried out under false pretenses, wiretaps and other surveillance activities were authorized in violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), and the Bush administration’s sanctioning of torture for use in the war on terror violated the Geneva Conventions. A December 2005 House resolution to investigate allegations against Bush gained thirty-eight cosponsors but died in committee.

Talk of impeachment also came up during President Barack Obama’s two terms. In November 2014, Obama issued an executive order to hold off the deportations of nearly five million undocumented immigrants. This move angered Republicans, many of whom expressed the view that Obama had abused his power by writing his own laws. A few of Obama’s other actions created a similar uproar, but no formal moves were made toward impeachment.

Following the election of Donald Trump in November 2016, talk of impeachment began before he even took office, in part because of his refusal to divest himself of his interest in the Trump Organization, an international conglomerate. Rather than follow precedent and put his business interests in a blind trust, Trump handed the running of his businesses over to two of his sons, which ethics experts said was inadequate to prevent the conflict of interest created by Trump’s businesses receiving revenue from, in some cases, foreign governments. Many saw this as a violation of the Foreign Emoluments Clause of the Constitution, which prevents a president or other federal official from receiving payments from foreign governments.

Looming even larger over the Trump presidency was the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 US presidential election. That investigation included probing whether the Trump presidential campaign had knowingly colluded with the Russian effort to sway the election in Trump’s favor and whether Trump had obstructed justice in trying to derail the investigation. The investigation was first led by FBI director James Comey, whom Trump fired in May 2017, an act that many of Trump’s critics said was itself obstruction of justice. The investigation was then taken up by special counsel and former FBI director Robert Mueller. In December 2017, articles of impeachment were introduced but overwhelmingly voted down by every House Republican and most House Democrats. Leading Democrats said the Mueller investigation and the investigations of multiple congressional committees should be allowed to run their course before impeachment proceedings against the president were seriously considered. Mueller’s official report did not include any direct evidence of collusion and took no position on the question of obstruction of justice, however.

In September, a whistleblower complaint was publicized, alleging that Trump had pressured Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to open an investigation into former vice president Joe Biden, then the front-runner to become the 2020 Democratic presidential nominee. With this knowledge and amid reports that Trump had withheld congressionally approved aid money for Ukraine shortly before that phone call, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi initiated an impeachment inquiry into Trump. By December 13, the House Judiciary Committee had approved two articles of impeachment, strictly along party lines: one accusing Trump of abuse of power in his dealings with Ukraine, and the other accusing him of obstruction of Congress for ignoring all congressional subpoenas for documents and calls for testimony from White House witnesses in the inquiry. The House voted to impeach Trump five days later, with every Republican voting no, and all but two or three Democrats voting yes. About six weeks later, after calling no witnesses, the Senate acquitted Trump; that vote was also strictly along party lines, except for one Republican, Mitt Romney, who voted guilty to the abuse of power charge.

Critics of the Trump impeachment said that because it took place on a more strictly partisan basis than any before it, with virtually the entire Republican Party lined up behind Trump and virtually the entire Democratic Party arrayed against him, it would turn impeachment into a political weapon more likely to be used whenever the president and the majority in Congress were from different parties.

Trump came under scrutiny again on January 6, 2021, when, during a rally speech in Washington, DC, he falsely claimed that the 2020 election results were fraudulent. During the speech, he not only called on Vice President Mike Pence and the Congress to reject President-elect Joe Biden's win, but his supporters to march on the Capitol to make a peaceful protest. The ensuing protest, however, was not peaceful, and a mob of Trump supporters, attacked the Capitol, preventing a joint session of Congress from counting the Electoral College votes and formalizing Biden's victory. The attack ended with numerous injuries, including to 138 police officers; five related deaths, including one shooting death; and over $2.7 million in damages.

On January 13, 2021, the House voted to impeach Trump for his alleged role in inciting the attack. Although Trump's term as president ended later that month, the impeachment trial proceeded in February. He was found not guilty on February 13, 2021, with a vote of fifty-seven for conviction and forty-three against, thus not meeting the threshold for a supermajority.

Impeachment Today

Impeachment continues to play a role in the ideological gap between Republicans and Democrats. On September 12, 2023, Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy opened an impeachment inquiry into alleged corruption by President Joe Biden involving his son Hunter’s and brother James’s foreign business dealings, without a House vote. This was controversial, and McCarthy, who lost his Speaker post in October, was believed by many to be bowing to pressure from far-right Republicans in an effort to retain his position.

Though House committee investigations had revealed no definitive proof of wrongdoing by President Biden himself, in December 2023, the House voted along party lines to open a formal impeachment investigation. With the vote, the investigation gained more power, including the enforcement of subpoenas. In February 2024, a key witness was indicted for false allegations against the Bidens, and shortly thereafter, Hunter Biden testified before Congress, asserting his father had no role in his business and emphasizing the hypocrisy of House Republicans not investigating Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner for similar behavior. Nonetheless, the inquiry continued.

Critics accuse the Republican-led House of using the impeachment process as a political tool, with the inquiry as a way to keep a stream of negative information in the news during an election year, and the process has not garnered widespread public support.

In addition to the impeachment of presidents, calls for the impeachment of other government members have grown in the 2020s. In 2022, several Congress members, including Democratic representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, began calling for the impeachment of several Republican-leaning Supreme Court justices, including Brett Kavanaugh, Neil Gorsuch, and Clarence Thomas. Claims against Kavanaugh and Gorsuch argued that both had lied to Congress under oath about their views on Roe v. Wade, given that they voted to reverse the landmark decision in 2022. Claims against Thomas included a case for corruption for not disclosing multiple luxury trips paid for by Republican donor Harlan Crow.

In 2023, Republican representatives sought to impeach Biden’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) secretary, Alejandro Nicholas Mayorkas, for his actions regarding illegal crossings over the southern US border. Republicans claimed that Mayorkas deliberately undermined border security, and when two articles of impeachment came to a vote in February 2024, four Republicans initially broke ranks. The dissenters argued that maladministration does not constitute an impeachable offense. The measure nonetheless passed by the narrowest of margins on a second vote, making Mayorkas the second cabinet member ever impeached.

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