Donald Trump’s impeachment hearings are well underway, but many still don’t have a clue as to what it means.
Impeachment has been misunderstood for years, and it doesn’t have the same connotations that many people associate with it.
Glen Morgan is a politics professor at Fanshawe College. He’s well-versed in politics and knows a lot about what impeachment is and how it works.
“So, impeachment in the United States was a process put into their constitution to allow for the removal of the President. If the President has committed treason, bribery and, the other line is high crimes and misdemeanor, they may be impeached and removed from office.”
Only two presidents in the history of the United States have been impeached, although many have been threatened. An interesting thing to note, however, is that neither of the two impeached, (Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton,) has been removed from office.
Morgan says that there’s a good reason for a president not being removed from office after impeachment.
“The 100 senators effectively then become jurors, and if two-thirds of them say, “Yep, what he did was bad enough based on what the impeachment proceedings were from the house”, then he’s removed. So it takes two separate processes for a president to be removed from office.”
The issue for Democrats lies in the make-up of the Senate. The United States Senate currently has 53 seats for Republicans, and 45 for Democrats. This effectively makes a majority vote for removal impossible unless public opinion sways to a point where Senators need to vote against Donald Trump in order to have a chance at re-election.
Morgan says that he doesn’t believe that removal will occur.
“Life goes on. Seriously, he can be impeached. It’s supposedly, you know, this embarrassment aspect to it just like it was for Clinton. But impeachment will not do anything for the further activities of the US government. Donald Trump can continue on as president. He can go to all his rallies and he can run for reelection in the upcoming 2020 election.”
Impeachment hearings will continue into the next week, with a supposed 8 testifications on the way.
