what is an impeachable offense by a presidentWith Trump now president, people have been asking “What is an impeachable offense? Can we Impeach Trump?” I have worked on projects related to impeachment for over a decade, and know that the answer is not simple. The Constitution reads “The President, Vice President, and all civil officers of the United States” may be impeached and removed only for “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”

british-lawBefore we discuss how impeachment applies to Trump in specific, let’s look at what impeachment is, and it’s history in this country. We have a reasonable understanding of what treason and bribery are, and statutes in the books help us to evaluate these words. However, “high crimes and misdemeanors” is a bit more vague, and is actually language borrowed from old British law. So if we are to interpret the intent of the framers, we need to interpret how this language was used in Britain at the time. Without digging into the weeds too far, it is initially important to realize that the word “high” does not refer to how egregious the offensive actions are. Rather, “high” refers to the office the official holds. The reason this is important, is that it is meant to call attention to the fact that the public grants powers to these officials (like military power) that the average citizen does not wield. Therefore, the type of offenses these officials can commit is outside the bounds of the criminal law that has been fashioned for the average citizen. Therefore, behavior that might be considered a “high” crime may break no law written in a law book. It is a crime which is unique to the powers wielded by the “high” office. Lying to the public about the nature of secret military intelligence related to a pending war, is an example of something that you and I cannot do, but is a “high” crime.

house_large_seal.gifOf course, this still leaves a lot of room for interpretation. So, who does the interpretation? Unfortunately, it is left to the House of Representatives to determine what constitutes an impeachable offense. This means that the process is essentially political. So, the House of Representatives can decide that a president’s willingness to perjure himself in order to avoid talking about his sex life is impeachable, while lying to Congress and the public to initiate a war which kills hundreds of thousands of people is not impeachable. Given what I laid out above, we see that that lying to a courtroom about your love affair is not something unique to the power of the presidency, but it is clear that lying about military intelligence regarding a pending war is specific to the office. So, while we might be able to come up with some guidelines about what SHOULD be considered impeachable, ultimately it is up to the House of Representatives.

fdr_eo9066This brings us to another point, what is the effect of pursuing impeachment for partisan purposes as opposed to more legitimate purposes? Historically, there is a long and bloodied history in England that led to the creation of impeachment. Impeachment is a way to avoid some of the biggest calamities (think war) that can be caused by a runaway executive. It didn’t come about as an afterthought, but it’s necessity became obvious as a result of a destructive period in England that included the beheading of Kings. Therefore, it should be revered as a tool that we only use (but we definitely use) when an official commits a legitimately impeachable offence. When the Japanese were interned during World War II, we missed an opportunity to impeach FDR. However much you might like FDR, this executive action was clearly impeachable. Our country did well to threaten Nixon with impeachment. Nixon’s resignation reinforced the power and usefulness of the impeachment tool. Unfortunately, the attempt to impeach Clinton exposed a weakness in the process, that the House of Representatives can decide for partisan reasons to pursue impeachment. That view was only strengthened when the House of Representatives failed to pursue impeachment when George W. Bush lied to Congress and the American people regarding the war in Iraq. As a result, many people see impeachment today as merely a partisan way to threaten and possibly remove your political opponents from office.

obamadroneattacks061513So how do we breathe life back into impeachment? Unfortunately, presidents now regularly engage in behavior that would’ve been considered impeachable early in American history. It would be difficult to name a president in the last 50 years who would be immune. Certainly our use of drones to bomb foreign countries with whom we are not at war (Bush/Obama) would’ve easily been considered an impeachable offense a hundred years ago. However, most of the impeachable offenses Obama has committed in office pale in comparison to his predecessor. Should we have pursued impeachment of Obama? This is a difficult question. If you fail to impeach someone who commits larger offenses, but then impeach someone who commits lesser offenses (who also happens to be our first black president), what does this do to the perceived legitimacy of the impeachment tool? I would argue that it further diminishes impeachment as a legitimate process. That being said, I would have a hard time opposing impeachment of a president who bombs other countries without first getting a declaration of war by Congress.

image3088283xSo again, to breathe life back into impeachment, I believe it is important to use the tool the next time a president commits a “high crime” that is seen as being anomalous given current norms for behavior as president. Unfortunately, a drone strike is not in this category. Once we have re-legitimized the tool of impeachment through its use in a way that is seen by the public to be obviously appropriate, I believe we could start to implement the tool more frequently, and in regards to some of the behaviors that have become normalized over the last number of decades (like using drone strikes without a declaration of war). But first we must put impeachment back into the category of a legitimate tool in the eyes of the public.

4eor1flcSo how does this apply to Trump? Many people called on Trump to be impeached even before he was elected. However, he could not yet have committed a “high crime,” because he had not yet had access to the high office. On the other hand, Trump had made many campaign promises which, were he to follow through on them, would constitute fairly egregious high crimes. A few of these were the infringement on First Amendment rights (taking citizenship away from people who burn flags), restricting immigration based upon religious affiliation, refusing to divest himself from business activities which would violate the emoluments clause of the Constitution, and promising to use torture techniques beyond even what George W. Bush allowed. And indeed, since he has been in office he has implemented an executive order banning immigrants from seven Muslim majority countries, which gave preference to Christians. Regarding the emoluments clause, he may already be in violation, but a more egregious instance of this violation would probably be necessary before the public would acknowledge a serious problem. As it relates to pushing for impeachment, we should attempt to temper our rhetoric. We don’t want to further delegitimize impeachment by seeming to pursue it for partisan reasons. Although, we should pursue it rigorously in the cases where he has engaged in egregious impeachable offences.

Regarding his illegal executive order on immigration, we are now encouraging people to submit Formal Impeachment Petitions to start the process of impeachment. The rules of Congress stipulate citizens can initiate the process. If you would like to pursue impeachment of Trump for this or any other reason, you can find the form to submit to Congress here…
Formal Impeachment Petition

15 Comments

  1. I am an independent, who voted for President Trump. I will NEVER vote for another Democrat; well maybe after death- that’s how it seems to work in my state these days. As far as impeachment is concerned, the House of Representatives really should have at it. And PLEASE continue to call Trump supporters names at the same time. Denial is more than a river in Egypt.

  2. 212(f) allows the President to prohibit entry into the US of any foreign national he deems would be detrimental to US interests.

    That includes religious affiliation. And out of +45 Muslim dominate countries only 7, that were deemed terroist countries by the previous admins intelligence, were deemed dangerous.

    Do your homework.

  3. Nancy pisi shumer and waters should be impeached for failing to work and represent Americans
    Causing a resistance blocking the country from functioning. They represent America and all Americans not ideology.

  4. Sorry folks, but you have nothing to qualify for impeachment here, other than your disdain for the person and the fact the election went diametric to what you wanted. There have to be legitimate facts to hold up through the process. Remember, POTUS is still our highest office and we need the world to know we stand strong, otherwise nuts like Kim cow dung in NK would feel emboldened.

  5. I am in the process of reviewing the vast list of infractions that are captured on the internet and spoken by his own words. Please everyone, when you see anything you feel is inappropriate or is an infraction go to the internet wayback machine at url: https://archive.org/web/ and save the web page. this will make a permanent archive on systems that are beyond the reach of operatives that would seek to destroy the history of Trump’s corruption. This will safeguard the the truth and the truth of his reprehensible and illegal conduct.

    • Who are you to be doing this reviewing? There are no legitimate facts to impeach this president no matter how much you think there are. It is a waste of your time.

  6. It should be impeachable that Mr. Trump is “tweeting” untruths such as Mr. Obama ordering a wire tap of Trump Towers. This and other tweets disrupts the business of Congress by demanding time and treasure (intellectual and monetary) to follow up on these allegations. The intentional disruptions are the impeachable offenses, not necessarily the allegations themselves. Let’s uncover the reason for the disruption and move on to impeachment.

    • He has done much and revealed much by his words and he has already said and done more than enough to impeach himself.

      • Alan Hitchner, your making unfounded claims about President Trump of “he has done much” is not sufficient for impeachment. If the Left would hold themselves to the same standard they are holding President Trump to, in this case making false accusations, there would be no comments here for the impeachment of President Trump. Like others have said here, because you don’t like it doesn’t mean it’s an impeachable offense.

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