A Few Details You Need to Know About the Trump Impeachment

Alright, so I have to call attention to the proverbial “elephant in the room”: the Trump impeachment. What on earth is actually going on? If you are like most Americans (myself included), the Trump impeachment inquiry is a muddled mess in your head, full of differing stories that you’ve heard from various sources. If you’re conservative or even libertarian, you know not to trust the media…BUT that leaves you in a pickle when it comes to handling your obnoxious liberal co-workers who want to puff their chests out in vindictive arrogance, proclaiming that they thought the Trump presidency was illegitimate all along.

So, I’ve made it my job to do the dirty work of researching this topic and condensing it so that you can read my blog post, become educated, and have real facts and knowledge to back up your opinions when faced with your puffer fish liberal co-workers/acquaintances.

I’ve broken up the facts into a couple different sections. I’m of the belief that in order to know anything, source material is essential. In other words, don’t rely on what other people tell you that other people have said. Just go to the source!

Which means, don’t even rely on me! I’m here to provide you with a brief explanation of what the linked source material says. For your own education and knowledge, I encourage you to take a look at the material I source.

I. What is impeachment anyway?

The American founders got impeachment from their British ancestors. Using the Webster 1828 dictionary (which I highly recommend BTW. If you want to get a clearer understanding about what the American founders meant when they used certain words, use the dictionary that is closest to their era. Our modern definitions correspond loosely but not enough to capture the intent of the founders when using the words they used), impeachment means:

“An accusation or charge brought against a public officer for maladministration in his office” AND “Censure; accusation; a calling in question the purity of motives or the rectitude of conduct, etc.”

Ok, terms are important. So, the House of Representatives, House Democrats really, are bringing an accusation against Trump for maladministration in his office and calling into question the purity of his motives. (BTW: rectitude means “In morality, rightness of principle or practice”. In case you, like me, were wondering 😉 ).

Now that we know what impeachment means, what does it mean in the Constitution of the United States?

II. The Constitution and Impeachment

The Constitution mentions impeachment a few times. The first time is in Article I, Section 2, where it says:

“The House of Representatives shall chuse their Speaker and other Officers; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.”

Ok, that’s pretty straight forward. The US House has the sole power of impeachment. Let’s see what else the Constitution says. In Article II, Section 3, it says,

“The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath or Affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no Person shall be convicted without the Concurrence of two thirds of the Members present.

Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States: but the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law.”

In other words, once the House has impeached, the Senate must vote to convict. If the President is on trial, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court is tasked with directing the trial. The President (or whoever is on trial) can only be convicted if 67 of the 100 senators vote to convict.

Finally, impeachment only removes someone from office and prevents them from holding the same position again, but it is not a criminal conviction. If any criminal charges will be made, these will happen outside of Congress.

Finally, in Article II, Section 4, the Constitution says,

“The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.”

This description is very vague, unfortunately. Basically, anyone in government can be removed from office by impeachment if they are found guilty of treason, bribery, or other high crimes or misdemeanors. The key word here for the Trump impeachment is bribery. What is bribery then? According to Webster’s 1828 dictionary it means:

“The act or practice of giving or taking rewards for corrupt practices; the act of paying or receiving a reward for a false judgment, or testimony, or for the performance of that which is known to be illegal, or unjust.”

So, if this is what the Democrats are accusing Trump of, it is upon them to prove that Trump has indeed given or taken rewards for corrupt practices.

III. What did Trump actually do?

Remember, I prefer to use source material when forming my opinions about things. The media and politicians are far too interested in manipulating me for me to believe their twist on the story. So, what did Trump actually do or say (besides being elected) that has led the Democrats to engage in impeachment and why is it only the Democrats who are engaging in the impeachment?

Here’s a link to the transcript between Trump and president elect Zelensky of Ukraine.

While the media and the Democrats are trying to paint the conversation between the two men one way, reading the conversation for yourself is the best way to know if what you are being told, is, in fact, true. So, the media are saying that Trump asked Zelensky to do him a personal favor and investigate Biden in a nefarious attempt to tamper with the 2020 election.

Below is the line that most in the media, as well as the Democrats, are using to say that Trump has engaged in bribery.

“I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it. I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say Crowdstrike…”

So, Trump is drawing attention to CrowdStrike. CrowdStrike is a cloud based cybersecurity firm that was hired to look into what happened in the Democratic National Convention (DNC) hack during the 2016 election. This means that Trump is asking for help understanding what Ukraine knows about any hacking that occurred and would have harmed the DNC.

Trump continues:

“There are a lot of things that went on, the whole situation. I think you’re surrounding yourself with some of the same people. I would like to have the Attorney General call you or your people and I would like you to get to the bottom of it.”

Without getting into Ukrainian politics, understand that Trump is concerned that the new president of Ukraine is still surrounded by corrupt politicians and is encouraging him to investigate and get to the bottom of the corruption from the previous Ukrainian administration.

Finally, Trump says,

“The other thing, There’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the Attorney General would be great. Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it… It sounds horrible to me.”

Yup, that’s it. Do you see any bribary? Does Trump threaten to without anything from Zelensky if he does not acquiesce? You can read the rest of the transcript yourself, but this is the extent of what was said by Trump to Zelensky that the Democrats are investigating. I’ll let you decide for yourself if any of this fits the definition of bribery but I can you tell you that, based on what I see, there is no such thing going on here. Further, I would ask the question, is there anything wrong with a US president attempting to investigate and acquire information about nefarious dealings within the US government and during an election? I’m not aware of any law that would call this action illegal or make a president unfit for his role.

IV. What does this all mean?

The question I ask you to think about is this: Why have the Democrats completely dropped the Russian collusion narrative?

Really. Think about it. For three years, the Democrats and those opposed to the Trump presidency harped and harped on the story that Trump had colluded with Russia to tamper with the 2016 election. The Democrats held hearings and investigations and trials that were made public and yet they were found little to no substantive evidence to support their claims of collusion. And then, all of a sudden, when the Russian narrative began to feel like beating a dead horse, the Democrats begin whispering about questionable dealings between Trump and Ukraine before any “whistleblower” leaked a story. Seriously.

Take this tweet for example. Adam Schiff (the chair of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and a representative from the 28th district of California) implied that Trump was working with Ukraine to investigate a political opponent. Now, Schiff’s tweet should not be surprising given what has transpired over the past few months, specifically as it related to the “whistleblower” coming forward saying that he was told about the “call”. BUT, Schiff wrote this tweet on August 28th, 2019—almost a full month before the “whistleblower’s” claim became public.

Curious, right? It’s almost as if Representative Schiff was salivating at the mouth, wanting and waiting for a chance to find Trump at fault—-specifically for investigating a political opponent and ——eventually for engaging in bribery. Did Schiff know about these claims earlier and do nothing about them until September 26th? He was tweeting about it in August!

It’s all a bit bizarre. Looking at how the Democrats are handling the process does not inspire confidence in the process, nor their claims. Read the transcripts for yourself, there is nothing hidden here.

This whole impeachment “trial” appears to be yet another attempt for Democrats (who are still struggling to accept their loss in the 2016 presidential elections) to try to take down their own political opponent (the irony: Democrats are attacking Trump for presumably investigating a political opponent while they themselves are investigating their political opponent!). If indeed Trump engaged in impeachable offenses, wouldn’t it make sense for Republicans to also be on board with this impeachment?

Americans are learning the game. I know you know the game. You know that the impeachment is just a game, just like the whole Russian collusion narrative. The game is, how can we take down President Trump?

Democrats are testing the American public. How naive are we? Are we going to buy this whole game and consider it legitimate? I hope you, my readers, won’t. I hope this post has helped to clarify a few fuzzy details for you. I’ll post more, don’t worry.

Until next time!

The Liberty Belle