The House of Representatives voted on December 18 to impeach President Trump.
It was only the third time in American history that a president has been impeached, and the decision to take such an extraordinary step fell largely along party lines.
“It represents not just a historical rarity,” says Frank Bowman, a law professor at the University of Missouri and an expert on impeachment, “but also a pretty serious judgment of one house of the legislature that an American president has done something bad enough that he ought to be removed from office before the American public has a chance to judge for themselves.”
The Founding Fathers created the impeachment process as a way to remove a president for significant wrongdoing. The House approved two articles of impeachment, voting 230 to 197 to charge President Trump with abuse of power and 229 to 198 to charge him with obstruction of Congress.
The next step is a trial in the Senate. What happens there will determine the future of Trump’s presidency. Here’s a guide to following the action.
The U.S. House of Representatives voted on December 18 to impeach President Trump. It was only the third time in American history that a president has been impeached. The decision to take such a huge step fell largely along party lines.
“It represents not just a historical rarity,” says Frank Bowman, a law professor at the University of Missouri and an expert on impeachment, “but also a pretty serious judgment of one house of the legislature that an American president has done something bad enough that he ought to be removed from office before the American public has a chance to judge for themselves.”
The Founding Fathers created the impeachment process as a way to remove a president for significant wrongdoing. The House approved two articles of impeachment. Representatives voted 230 to 197 to charge President Trump with abuse of power. On the second charge against him, obstruction of Congress, they voted 229 to 198.
The next step is a trial in the Senate. What happens there will determine the future of Trump’s presidency. Here’s a guide to following the action.