The impeachment of the United States president, Donald Trump, has received more attention after speculations have come up citing that the president allegedly paid hush money to two women that he had affairs with in the past. The information was sourced from a testimony given by the president’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen who testified at the Russian enquiry and attested to having paid the two women in an attempt to keep their alleged affair with Donald Trump secret. Despite being a violation to the campaign finance laws, Michael Cohen admitted to have paid the women but he was coordinating, and was being instructed by a candidate running for federal office. Since Donald Trump was the candidate at the time, it then means that he conspired with the lawyer and engaged in a criminal act as the hush money that bought the women’s silence influenced the way the election turned out and can therefore be considered a campaign contribution.

            Since Donald Trump did not disclose the reimbursement he made to Michael Cohen in the financial disclosure he made in 2017, it then means that he sought to conceal the arrangement with him. In his defense, Donald Trump claimed that Cohen was a proven liar and that his statement is not credible (Stephen, 2018). Despite the serious nature of the allegations made against the President, it is impossible to prosecute Donald Trump during his presidency and the only way to hold him accountable for his actions is through impeachment which would, if successful, see him vacate his office and therefore make it possible for him to stand trial. While there is enough evidence to support the call for impeachment, it would be unwise to impeach Donald Trump as such a move would either fail to hold in court or even end up making him more popular which could be beneficial for him in the coming elections.

            Impeachment means taking charges to congress which could act as the basis for a trial against the person whom the charges are made against. It is a provision in the United States constitution that makes it possible to remove the president from office so as to try him for crimes such as bribery, treason and other crimes after impeachment. The process to impeach is initiated by the House of Representatives where it can be passed by a simple majority. The trial is then taken to the senate but a president can only be removed from office if two thirds of the senate votes to have him impeached. While there is enough evidence to make a case to impeach Donald Trump, there are various reasons as to why he should not be impeached.

            To begin with, it would require a house of representatives that is fully controlled by the democrats to carry out a successful impeachment as they would have enough votes. However, the republicans control the senate and the House of Representatives making it difficult to guarantee enough votes to remove the president from office (BBC, 2018).                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               The success of the impeachment is further threatened by the fact that majority of the republicans are loyal to the president. Despite the serious nature of the charges made against the president, the republicans are likely to overlook the claims and continue with their support for Donald Trump and turn down any call for impeachment.

            Another reason why Donald Trump should not be impeached is due to the advantage that the move will create for him especially if the case goes in his favor. With the presidential elections being held in 2020, any move to impeach the president is likely to create publicity and make him more popular (Washington, 2018). If the case is presented, all the Trump supporters will rally and back the president, a move that could gain the sympathy of other moderate voters if Donald Trump is presented as the victim. Since the case against him does not have concrete evidence that warrant the removal of a president from office, Trump supporters could use the impeachment case to gather more support from other voters that seek out justice more than propaganda and as a result, gain more support for the president regardless of whether he is guilty of the allegations made against him or not (Young, 2018). If that happens during the election period, more people may end up voting for Donald Trump and see him becoming president for a second term instead of removing him from office as the impeachment sought to achieve.

            Furthermore, initiating the impeachment process is likely to draw attention from the 2020 elections and direct manpower and funds towards the impeachment process. Despite the likes of Tom Steyer donating 120 million dollars to fund the impeachment process, any donations made to impeach Donald Trump take away from the capital that would have been used to support a suitable candidate in the coming elections (Washington, 2018). Instead of allocating the resources, to the impeachment, the money should be used to gather support and fund another candidate so as to reduce the chances of Donald Trump being reelected. Since only 39% of the voters support the impeachment process (Washington, 2018), it means that majority of the voters are either satisfied with Trump’s rule or that they would rather wait for the president to finish his term and elect a new candidate. Rather than creating popularity for trump, it would be wiser to allow him to finish his term and then try to persuade the voters to elect a new candidate.

            Lastly, the impeachment history in the United States should act as a caution to discourage any ideas to impeach Donald Trump. Throughout history, only two of the impeachment cases brought against seating presidents have been successful. The most recent case was the impeachment of Bill Clinton who was found guilty of obstruction of justice and committing perjury in front of a grand jury when he claimed to not have had an affair with Monica Lewinsky. It was however proven that he had an affair with Monica and even tried to persuade her to lie about the affair and this led to his impeachment. Other than Bill Clinton, the only president to eve be impeached in the United States was Andrew Johnson in 1868 (BBC, 2018). With the history of failed cases of impeachment in the United States, any impeachment attempts to remove Donald Trump from office are likely to result in failure especially with the continued support he gets from the senate. Republican senators are likely to overlook any evidence presented against Trump as they have done in the past.

            The United States remains divided with voters supporting either the democrat or republican candidates. Since it is already difficult to convince the senate to agree on one thing, it will be even difficult to get them to cooperate and get enough votes to remove a sitting president from office (Trahant, 2018). Although a significant number of people may consider Donald Trump to be a bad president, his shortcomings are more of personal opinions and cannot be classified as impeachable offences (Culbertson, 2018). There is little evidence to get the senate to agree on impeaching the president as most of the allegations are offences that his supporters are likely to overlook. Impeaching a seating president for offences based on ambiguous evidence or those that cannot be classified as criminal offences greatly threaten democracy in the United States.

            In conclusion, the decision to impeach Donald Trump is mostly influenced by personal opinions, backed by weak evidence that does not warrant the removal of a seating president from office. Since the aim of impeaching the president is to force him to vacate the president’s seat, all measures should be taken to ensure that the move does not end up making Trump popular amongst supporters whose allegiance can easily be swayed. Instead of focusing time, money and efforts towards the impeachment, especially with the elections drawing near, it would be wise to wait for Trump to finish his term and then try to support a new candidate to replace him. Such a move will ensure that there is enough support for the new candidate and that there are better chances to get a new president through the constitutional approach of elections. With Trump’s presidential term ending in just a year’s time, it would be pointless to waste resources and political energy removing from office when the same can be achieved backing a more worthy candidate in the next elections.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

References

BBC News, (22018) “Trump: How could he be impeached?” retrieved from,             https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-39945744

Culbertson A, (2018) “Donald Trump: People will be very poor if I’m impeached” Sky News,      retrieved from, https://news.sky.com/story/donald-trump-claims-markets-will-crash-if-         he-is-impeached-11479985

Stephens B, (2018) “Donald Trump’s high crimes and misdemeanors” The New York Times,        retrieved from, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/22/opinion/donald-trump-cohen-  impeachment.html

Trahant M, (2018) “Should President Donald J Trump be impeached?” Indian Country Today,     retrieved from, https://www.indianz.com/News/2018/08/22/mark-trahant-should-      president-donald-j-t.asp

Washington L, (2018) “Plenty of danger for dems if they win house and impeach Trump”             Chicago Sun Times, retrieved from, https://chicago.suntimes.com/columnists/president-  donald-trump-democrats-house-impeachment-2020-election-laura-washington/

Young J, (2018) “Of Course Donald Trump should be impeached” Statesman, retrieved from,             https://www.statesman.com/news/20180828/young-of-course-president-donald-trump-      should-be-impeached