A transcript of the call revealed that Trump wanted both Joe Biden and his son; Hunter Biden investigated in relation to…
On the 25th of July this year, President Trump placed a call to the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate Joe Biden, the former Vice President of the US who also doubles as his contender for the 2020 elections should he be chosen as flagbearer for the democrats. A transcript of the call revealed that Trump wanted both Joe Biden and his son; Hunter Biden investigated in relation to claims that Joe used his power unduly in closing a scandal involving his son, who was staff of a Ukrainian energy company. The catch here is that this call was placed some days after he denied the Ukrainian government of military aid amounting to $391m, which has led many to believe he was using that as a bait to get what he wanted. However, according to Trump, this is untrue as he was only calling Zelensky to congratulate him on his appointment as president.
In August, an unnamed whistleblower, who is also an intelligence official, expressed concern regarding the call made by Trump in a letter on the 12th of August, stating that the president had used his office to welcome meddling from a foreign country in the upcoming elections. Soliciting foreign interference against a political candidate in order to win an election is against the law in the US and is what has led to processes that could lead to the impeachment of the president. Should the president be found guilty of the crime accused of, he would be the third president to be formally impeached by Congress; the other two being Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton.
A look at the Constitution reveals how almost impossible it will be to attempt stripping a sitting president of his office. The impeachment process starts with a formal inquiry at the House of Representatives where should the judiciary committee find solid grounds, write an article of impeachment to the House so it can be voted on. Should majority agree on the content of the article, the process graduates to the final stage which is the Senate trial. In this stage, should two thirds of the senate pronounce the president guilty, he is removed from office. However, per the sole power of the senate to try impeachments, they can change all rules regarding the proceedings of a trial.
As regards Trump’s impeachment process, the intelligence committee on Tuesday, voted 13 against 9, approving the impeachment report to be sent to the judiciary committee of the House for proceedings to commence. The Democrats are intent on voting on the impeachment report before the year ends so the possible senate trial starts as early as January next year.
According to President Donald Trump, all of this is just a witch hunt and he is not guilty. The Whitehouse has however, refused to be a part of the hearings.
