Can Trump be re-elected if he is impeached? (Representatives, votes, Congress)
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And if he is impeached, does that open him up to criminal prosecution when before, it would be delayed by 4 yrs?
Thanks
Not at all. Impeachment is only a political event. It's only punishment, if it can even be called that, is removal from office. This can come from reasons that have no criminality as such in them, such as a case of advancing mental illness, a physical infirmity like a stroke or heart attack, or something else that is not criminal at all.
Representatives and Senators cannot be impeached. The Constitution allows both Houses to vote a member out under some strict restrictive causes.
There are steps Congress can take against either an offending member that are less severe than impeachment. Censure is one of them, a reprimand is another. Neither kicks a person out, but both limit the person's power in Congress.
The Founders always wanted the people's representatives to have the power over Congress and how it's run. But the Administrative and Judicial branches are both independent of Congress, so the founders decided something was needed to remove someone who is unfit to serve from those branches. Impeachment was their solution.
A serving President is immune from criminal charges for as long as he is serving. Whether or not he can be charged with a criminal offense that was committed while serving in office is something that is possible, but has never been done before, so it a charge was to happen, it would undoubtably go to the Supreme Court to decide the legality of the charge.
Since any President could possibly break the law in order to protect the nation, I'm sure the legality would all depend on the charges.
Lying to a foreign leader, for example, might be a crime, but if the President lied to protect the USA, it would all come down to which was a better course for the President; to lie, or to protect?
But if a President was colluding with a foreign leader in ways that would harm the United States, then that's a criminal offense that would be prosecutable by a state government.
No former President would be immune from the prosecution of state crimes. If a former President assaulted someone, that's a state crime. If a former President committed fraud, that crime could be both state and federal.
There's nothing I know of that has any grace period of delay in prosecuting any crime of a former President. Any former President could be charged with a crime the day after he left office, as once gone, he's back to being an ordinary citizen again instantly as soon as the oath of office is given to the incoming President.
Not at all. Impeachment is only a political event. It's only punishment, if it can even be called that, is removal from office. This can come from reasons that have no criminality as such in them, such as a case of advancing mental illness, a physical infirmity like a stroke or heart attack, or something else that is not criminal at all.
Representatives and Senators cannot be impeached. The Constitution allows both Houses to vote a member out under some strict restrictive causes.
There are steps Congress can take against either an offending member that are less severe than impeachment. Censure is one of them, a reprimand is another. Neither kicks a person out, but both limit the person's power in Congress.
The Founders always wanted the people's representatives to have the power over Congress and how it's run. But the Administrative and Judicial branches are both independent of Congress, so the founders decided something was needed to remove someone who is unfit to serve from those branches. Impeachment was their solution.
A serving President is immune from criminal charges for as long as he is serving. Whether or not he can be charged with a criminal offense that was committed while serving in office is something that is possible, but has never been done before, so it a charge was to happen, it would undoubtably go to the Supreme Court to decide the legality of the charge.
Since any President could possibly break the law in order to protect the nation, I'm sure the legality would all depend on the charges.
Lying to a foreign leader, for example, might be a crime, but if the President lied to protect the USA, it would all come down to which was a better course for the President; to lie, or to protect?
But if a President was colluding with a foreign leader in ways that would harm the United States, then that's a criminal offense that would be prosecutable by a state government.
No former President would be immune from the prosecution of state crimes. If a former President assaulted someone, that's a state crime. If a former President committed fraud, that crime could be both state and federal.
There's nothing I know of that has any grace period of delay in prosecuting any crime of a former President. Any former President could be charged with a crime the day after he left office, as once gone, he's back to being an ordinary citizen again instantly as soon as the oath of office is given to the incoming President.
If you compare Clinton vs Trump on what they did one lied about a BJ the other asked 4 countries to investigate Biden and his son. One was morally wrong and the other is treason like 2 or 3 times over. The longer the impeachment hearings go on and the more Trump opens his mouth the more his approval rating will tank.
If you compare Clinton vs Trump on what they did one lied about a BJ the other asked 4 countries to investigate Biden and his son. One was morally wrong and the other is treason like 2 or 3 times over. The longer the impeachment hearings go on and the more Trump opens his mouth the more his approval rating will tank.
Yup. The seriousness to the nation was vastly different between the Nixon and Clinton impeachments.
Really, since the first impeachment was so long ago in times that were so different from those today, those two modern impeachments are really the only ones we have to go by.
Interestingly, the Watergate break-in, the robbery that started it all, was even more confusing to the public back then as the charges Trump has now.
If you compare Clinton vs Trump on what they did one lied about a BJ
Not just lied, but committed perjury.
Quote:
the other asked 4 countries to investigate Biden and his son. One was morally wrong and the other is treason like 2 or 3 times over. The longer the impeachment hearings go on and the more Trump opens his mouth the more his approval rating will tank.
Not at all. Impeachment is only a political event. It's only punishment, if it can even be called that, is removal from office. This can come from reasons that have no criminality as such in them, such as a case of advancing mental illness, a physical infirmity like a stroke or heart attack, or something else that is not criminal at all.
Representatives and Senators cannot be impeached. The Constitution allows both Houses to vote a member out under some strict restrictive causes.
There are steps Congress can take against either an offending member that are less severe than impeachment. Censure is one of them, a reprimand is another. Neither kicks a person out, but both limit the person's power in Congress.
The Founders always wanted the people's representatives to have the power over Congress and how it's run. But the Administrative and Judicial branches are both independent of Congress, so the founders decided something was needed to remove someone who is unfit to serve from those branches. Impeachment was their solution.
A serving President is immune from criminal charges for as long as he is serving. Whether or not he can be charged with a criminal offense that was committed while serving in office is something that is possible, but has never been done before, so it a charge was to happen, it would undoubtably go to the Supreme Court to decide the legality of the charge.
Since any President could possibly break the law in order to protect the nation, I'm sure the legality would all depend on the charges.
Lying to a foreign leader, for example, might be a crime, but if the President lied to protect the USA, it would all come down to which was a better course for the President; to lie, or to protect?
But if a President was colluding with a foreign leader in ways that would harm the United States, then that's a criminal offense that would be prosecutable by a state government.
No former President would be immune from the prosecution of state crimes. If a former President assaulted someone, that's a state crime. If a former President committed fraud, that crime could be both state and federal.
There's nothing I know of that has any grace period of delay in prosecuting any crime of a former President. Any former President could be charged with a crime the day after he left office, as once gone, he's back to being an ordinary citizen again instantly as soon as the oath of office is given to the incoming President.
^^^^^ One of the paragraphs from the above Washington Post article:
"For most of the relevant federal offenses, the statute of limitations is five years, measured from the date of the crime."
The lack of a grace period for the statute of limitations gives the POTUS a perverse incentive to run for a second term.
This is one of the reasons that Harvard Law Professor Laurence Tribe has suggested indicting Trump (nothing in the Constitution prevents it), and then waiting until he is out of office to do the criminal prosecution.
Last edited by RMESMH; 10-06-2019 at 11:21 PM..
Reason: added five words
And if he is impeached, does that open him up to criminal prosecution when before, it would be delayed by 4 yrs?
Thanks
First of all, impeachment is just an indictment. It is not a conviction. Clinton was impeached and got reelected, but he was not convicted.
If Trump is impeached and convicted, he can still run again, but if he had enough Republicans voting against him in the Senate to convict him, it is unlikely he would get the GOP nomination and probably would not win the election anyway.
I suspect if Trump thought he was going to be convicted he would take the same route as Nixon and resign rather than make history as the first President to be removed from office. I suspect that Pence would then pardon him for all offenses, so the issue about criminal prosecution would then be moot.
If Trump were impeached but not convicted and was reelected, that has no effect on the statute of limitations. But since they won't indict a sitting President, if the statute of limitations expires while he is in office, he is a free man.
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