Donald Trump’s Impeachment Battle Continues……
Donald John Trump became the 45th US president on November 8th, 2016 with a small share of popular votes than the other candidate is now facing the possibility of becoming the third president ever impeached by the congress.
Donald trump has been in the talks for impeachment since the first year of his presidency in 2017 by two representatives Al Green and Brad Sherman. In June there were various news, comments and twitter discussions on the matter such as whether or not Trump tried to improperly influence or coerce James Comey and the reasons why Trump fired him may well have voided the validity of an executive privilege claim in this instance. There were articles circulating in the congress about his impeachment, as he had obstructed justice and in so doing and the remedy for obstruction of justice is impeachment.
Timeline- Articles Of Impeachment For Donald Trump
In July 2017 Brad Sherman formally
introduced the Article of Impeachment in the House of Representatives which accused
the president of impeding and obstructing justice regarding the investigation
of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
The
republicans demurred, rewriting the request in favor of investigations into
Hillary Clinton’s email, despite the House of Judiciary Committee demanded for
the hearings to begin soon.
Again in August 2017 impeachment talks came up because of the controversial statement given by Trump about the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. Representative Steve Cohen announced he would introduce articles of impeachment because Trump had “failed the presidential test of moral leadership.
In late October a President impeachment Campaign was started by Tom Steyer which gained immediate attention and by December 2018, the signature count is over 6.5 million.
On 6th December a second resolution was brought to the representatives by Al Green on articles of impeachment for the president. It listed various reasons for impeachment like ‘Neo- Nazism and hatred’, ‘Inciting Hatred and Hostility’ and White Nationalism but this article was tabled by Kevin McCarthy. Though these articles of impeachment were considered for making legitimate points but still was postponed.
This article was again brought by Al Green in January 2018 which like last time got tabled.
On January 17, 2019, new accusations came up regarding trump, that he made his long time lawyer commit perjury in the matter surrounding Trumps Involvement with the Russian government to establish a Trump Tower in Moscow. This led to calls for resignation or impeachment of the President.
As of September 2019, 4 Resolutions were introduced in the congress regarding possible impeachment. After the Mueller Report in April 2019 which wrote that it is up to the congress to determine that what Trump did was obstruction of Justice or not and do something about it, up to 140 representatives supported the impeachment.
On 24th September Pelosi announced the formal impeachment inquiry as he had betrayed the oath of his office, security of the nation and integrity of elections.
On 8th October 2019, the white House released a letter refusing to cooperate with the Trump Impeachment inquiry and also accused the democrats of trying to reverse the result of the presidential elections of 2016.
Following Days, many high profiled people like Marie Yovanovitch, the former ambassador to Ukraine, Fiona Hill, senior director for Europe and Russia in the National Security Council; P Michael McKinley,a top Pompeo deputy; Gordon Sondland; Tim Morrison and Alexander Vindman testified.
On 31st October the House voted on a resolution to move the open hearing rather than closed door hearings.
The impeachment committee started to release testimony transcripts on 5th of November 2019 and on 13th November the Public Impeachment hearings began.
The depositions started from 15th November. David Holmes; Mark Sandy were deposed reveling that the hold on the military aid in the Ukraine Controversy was highly unusual and no there were no explanations given and everybody was in loop and followed the president’s orders.
On 3rd December, the intelligence committee released a report which asserted that the president abused the power of his office for political and personal benefit at the expenses of the country’s national security and the impeachment inquiry was referred to the judiciary committee.
On 4th December, the house of Judiciary began Public hearings with the help of 4 constitutional experts, the democrats who held that Trumps actions were of impeachable conduct and the republicans preached that more time was required to investigate.
On 5th December Pelosi announced that she was directing the Judiciary Committee to draft articles for impeachment of Donald Trump.
On 13th December a straight party line vote, the judiciary committee votes to move the articles of impeachment to the house floors.
On 18th December the House of Representatives impeached Donald Trump with charging him of abuse of power, the vote was approved 230- 197 and the second article, charging obstruction of congress was approved by 229-198 with one present vote in both cases.
Further the Trial is setting up in the Senate.
Trump Ukraine Controversy
This controversy started after a phone call made by Trump to his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky on 25th July. As said by trump it was made to congratulate him for his recent for president in a landslide win in April. But an anonymous whistleblower reported the matter to the CIA speculating that there was more to their exchange and a formal report was filled for the same on 12th August. They said that there was an “urgent concern” that Mr. Trump had used his office to “solicit interference from a foreign country” in the 2020 presidential election.
Later through a rough transcript of the call it was revealed that Trump had urged President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate former US Vice-President Joe Biden, a frontrunner to take on Mr. Trump in next year’s election, as well as Mr. Biden’s son.
It was seen that a week before the call, Trump withhold the $ 400 million worth of Military Aid to Ukraine for the fiscal year of 2019. This allegation was denied by Mr. Trump saying that he wanted to ensure that the country is corruption free before giving the aid.
The call transcript showed that Trump had urged Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate corruption allegations against former Vice president Joe Biden and his son. Trump and his allies have been putting for consideration that the former Vice president (at the time of Barack Obama) had encouraged the firing of Ukraine’s top prosecutor in 2015 because he was investigating an energy company where Hunter Biden was employed.
The transcript of the call showed that Mr. Trump had urged Mr. Zelensky to investigate discredited corruption allegations against former Vice-President Joe Biden, a 2020 Democratic frontrunner, as well as Mr. Biden’s son.
Mr. Trump and his allies have been suggesting that Mr. Biden, as Barack Obama’s vice-president, encouraged the firing of Ukraine’s top prosecutor in 2015 because he had been investigating an energy company which employed Hunter Biden. It was cleared by the prosecutor succeeding the fired that there was absolutely no reason for Ukraine to investigate in this matter because any corruption with that company happened before Mr. Biden joined.
Mr. Biden is considered Trumps biggest rival of Presidential Elections 2020, it opens up for speculation that Trump was working with a foreign power to influence the election which is highly against the law and it has been described as an ‘Unprecedented situation in the history of the country’
This has led for the Democrats to have launched a formal complaint for impeachment and have left no time to start the proceedings. The president’s personal lawyer has also been subpoenaed for documents relating to Ukraine and the former US ambassador for Ukraine has also been called for depositions.
Samaira Nakra
Student Reporter