Expect a political process that goes to next autumn and produces salacious but unfounded allegations.
For much of the early history of the United States, the impeachment of a president was constitutional but unthinkable.
That was so from 1789, when George Washington took office, and for the next three-quarters of a century or so. Whatever the furies, rages and swells of politics, the House of Representatives refused to exercise its exclusive power to impeach.
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It wasn’t until 1868 that a majority of legislators decided that Andrew Johnson, who was Abraham Lincoln’s vice-president, was guilty of “high crimes and misdemeanors.” They voted articles of impeachment against him. In the subsequent trial in the Senate, he was acquitted by one vote.
That was the last impeachment for another century or so. In 1974, Democrats voted in committee to indict Richard Nixon. Facing impeachment and conviction in the Senate (therefore removal from office), Nixon resigned.
Americans didn’t hear about impeachment until 1998, when Republicans impeached Bill Clinton for lying about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky. The Senate acquitted him.
We now see Clinton’s impeachment — introduced by Newt Gingrich, the brass-knuckled, scorched-earth speaker of the House — as the beginning of a sad season of partisan warfare in national politics. Ultimately, it cost Republicans seats in the mid-term election of 1998 and toppled Gingrich.
Now we live in the Age of Impeachment. The Democrats twice impeached Donald Trump, which, were he to die today, would be the first line in his obituary. Like his impeached predecessors, the Senate acquitted Trump, falling short of the required two-thirds majority to remove him from office.
Ever since, Trump has denounced both proceedings as “a witch-hunt,” which he promises to avenge if he returns to office in 2025. Revenge is his raison d’être.
Which brings us to today, and the hunting of Joe Biden. From the time the Republicans narrowly regained control of the House in 2022, their leaders have threatened to impeach Biden. To that end, they created a committee last autumn to investigate, which was a fishing expedition. Having found nothing, but understanding its publicity value, they have now authorized a more formal inquiry by vote of the whole House. Predictably, it split on partisan lines.
The Republicans are gleeful about the charges Biden’s son, Hunter, faces, and are sure — absolutely sure, scout’s honour — that the president is tied to something nefarious. So sure that they’re going to spend months trying to find something, anything, they can use against him.
Should we be surprised? The House has fallen into the hands of a cadre of nihilists, conspiracists and reactionaries aligned with MAGA nation. The Speaker, the personable Mike Johnson, thinks the election of 2020 was stolen, or says so to placate Trump.
Johnson and most Republicans are in thrall to Trump and his big lie. They push the narrative that Biden is corrupt because it sounds bad and they can.
So, the committee will spend months investigating, an opportunity to magnify and amplify every innuendo, conspiracy and rumour, no matter how flimsy.
They won’t find much, but that’s not the point. The point is “to muddy the waters.” To use their office, their megaphone, to attack, diminish, soil and smear so everyone lands in the cesspool.
It’s about perception, not reality. The perception they want to create is that Biden is guilty. Then they can say, “You see, he is worse than Trump. And that’s why we’re going to impeach him.”
But there’s a problem. The Republicans have just a three-seat majority in the House. Seventeen Republicans represent districts Biden won in 2020. If they impeach Biden, they risk losing moderates who see this a political exercise, a vendetta, pure and simple.
Republicans are already in danger of losing the House next year because of retirements and redistricting that favours the Democrats. Republicans cannot afford to lose those districts, and with an impeachment vote, they could.
So, expect an inquiry that goes to next autumn and produces salacious but unfounded allegations, forcing all Republicans to decide whether to impeach a president on virtually nothing. A modest prediction: they won’t.
Andrew Cohen is a journalist, a professor at Carleton University and author of Two Days in June: John F. Kennedy and the 48 Hours That Made History.
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