Impeachment using Article II - treason, bribery, high crimes and misdeamors

Congress needs to investigate and act upon those findings in accordance with our Constitution. A theoretical analysis of impeachment of the Administration under Article II Section 4.

1. The Constitutional Basis

· Article I, Section 2, Clause 5: Grants the House of Representatives the "sole Power of Impeachment."

· Article I, Section 3, Clauses 6-7: Grants the Senate the "sole Power to try all Impeachments."

· Article II, Section 4: Defines the standard: "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."

The phrase "high Crimes and Misdemeanors" is not defined in the Constitution and is inherently political. Historically, it is understood to mean serious abuses of public trust and violations of the oath of office, not necessarily violations of criminal statute. The ongoing lies, attacking the press and Americans as “enemy within”, the Administration’s use of force and illegal processes to use the military and ICE in American cities imprisoning Americans and those with visa without due process, etc.

2. The Process: A Two-Stage Procedure

Stage 1: Impeachment by the House of Representatives

· Inquiry: An investigation is launched, often by the House Judiciary Committee, to determine if grounds for impeachment exist.

· Drafting Articles of Impeachment: If the inquiry finds evidence, the Committee drafts "Articles of Impeachment," which are the formal charges against the official. Each article addresses a specific alleged offense.

· House Vote: The full House debates and votes on each article. A simple majority (218 out of 435 members) is required to pass an article and thus impeach the official. Impeachment is analogous to a criminal indictment—it means the official is formally accused, not convicted.

Stage 2: Trial in the Senate

· Trial Proceedings: Once impeached, the official faces a trial in the Senate. The House appoints "managers" who act as prosecutors. The Senate serves as the jury, with the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court presiding if the President is on trial.

· Defense: The impeached official has a defense team and the right to present evidence and call witnesses.

· Senate Vote and Conviction: At the conclusion of the trial, the Senate votes on each article of impeachment. A two-thirds supermajority (67 out of 100 senators) is required to convict.

· Consequences of Conviction: The penalty for conviction is removal from office. The Senate may also vote to disqualify the individual from holding any future federal office. There is no appeal.

Part 2: Analysis and Arguments for Impeachment

The call for impeachment is a political act, grounded in a belief that the President and others in his Administration has committed "treason, bribery, and other high Crimes and Misdemeanors." Below is an analysis of how the issues you listed—economic issues, human rights violations, and war crimes without due process—could be framed as grounds for impeachment.

1. Economic Issues as "High Crimes and Misdemeanors"

· Abuse of Power: If a President were to use tariff or spending powers not for legitimate economic policy, but to reward political allies, punish political opponents, or personally benefit (e.g., through businesses they own), this could be construed as bribery or an abuse of power.

· Violation of the Public Trust: Knowingly enacting policies that are demonstrably harmful to the national economic interest, or gross negligence in managing a crisis (e.g., a pandemic) leading to severe economic damage, could be framed as a violation of the oath to "preserve, protect and defend" the well-being of the nation.

· Obstruction of Congress: Defying lawful subpoenas from Congress for documents or testimony related to economic decision-making could form a separate, standalone article of impeachment for obstruction.

2. Human Rights Violations

Human rights violations, particularly those enacted through policy, strike at the heart of the President's constitutional duty to "take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed."

· Cruel and Unusual Punishment: Policies that systematically separate migrant families and detain children in unsafe and inhumane conditions could be argued as a violation of the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, a foundational principle of U.S. law.

· Equal Protection: Implementing immigration or law enforcement policies that explicitly target individuals based on religion, race, or national origin could be framed as a violation of the Fifth Amendment's guarantee of equal protection under the law.

· Article of Impeachment: Such actions could be packaged into an article of impeachment for "abuse of power" and "betrayal of the nation's founding principles and constitutional guarantees."

3. War Crimes and Authorized Killings Without Due Process

· "High Crime" in the Historical Sense: The term "high Crimes and Misdemeanors" originates from English common law, where it referred to offenses against the state by public officials. Authorizing the extrajudicial killing of a foreign national (or a U.S. citizen) without due process, especially if it violates international laws of war (e.g., targeting cultural sites, killing non-combatants), fits this classical definition perfectly.

· Violation of Oath and Law: The President is Commander-in-Chief, but is not above the law. Authorizing assassinations or drone strikes that violate both U.S. law (e.g., the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable seizure) and international treaties (like the Geneva Conventions) that the U.S. has ratified could be considered a profound breach of the constitutional oath.

· Obstruction and Lack of Transparency: If the administration then obstructs congressional oversight into these actions by classifying evidence, refusing to provide legal justifications, or misleading the public, it strengthens the case for impeachment on grounds of obstruction and abuse of power.

4. Bribery and Treason - All examples are “alleged” and hypothetical based upon the information known to date:

The Quid Pro Quo on Military Aid

· Scenario: A President is alleged to have orchestrated a temporary freeze on congressionally approved military aid to a strategic ally (e.g., Ukraine). Evidence suggests the freeze was not based on a formal policy review but was contingent upon that ally's government initiating a criminal investigation into a domestic political rival's business dealings in that country. The official act (the release of vital military aid) was conditioned upon a thing of value to the President: the public announcement of an investigation that would damage a political opponent and aid the President's own re-election campaign. This constitutes a quid pro quo, where a public office is used for a private, personal (electoral) benefit, fitting the classical definition of bribery as an impeachable offense.

The Personal Enrichment Scheme

A foreign government (e.g., Russia or Saudi Arabia) consistently directs its state-owned enterprises and wealthy, government-connected oligarchs to engage in lucrative business with properties owned by the President. This includes paying above-market rates for hotel rooms, booking entire floors for years without using them, or approving valuable intellectual property rights and development deals for the President's company that would not be offered on the same terms to anyone else. The payments and deals are not arm's-length transactions but are effectively disguised conduits for funneling money to the President. The "favor" or official act on the part of the President is a sympathetic foreign policy, such as shielding that nation from sanctions, supporting their military actions, or sharing sensitive intelligence. The continuous flow of money constitutes "compensation" for official acts, which is the core of impeachable bribery.

The Compromising Intelligence Sharing

· The President, in a closed-door meeting with senior officials, is briefed on a highly sensitive intelligence asset (a "mole") deeply embedded within a hostile foreign power's intelligence apparatus (e.g., Russia). Despite warnings from the intelligence community, the President subsequently reveals this asset's existence and codename to that foreign power's diplomats in an Oval Office meeting, using specific details that could only have come from the classified briefing. The asset is subsequently extracted in a panic or eliminated. This action directly and severely compromises a critical national security operation, resulting in the loss of a vital intelligence source and potentially the death of an asset. By providing this information to a hostile state, the President can be argued to have given "Aid and Comfort" to a nation engaged in active, hostile measures against the United States. This would be a primary exhibit in an article of impeachment for "high Crimes and Misdemeanors," even if the strict legal definition of Treason is debated.

The "Blind Eye" in Exchange for Election Assistance

· U.S. intelligence agencies provide the President with a definitive, high-confidence assessment that a foreign adversary (e.g., Russia) is actively engaged in a cyber-influence campaign to interfere in the U.S. election on the President's behalf. Instead of mobilizing the government to defend against it, the President is alleged to have privately instructed officials to "stand down," publicly denounced the intelligence as a "hoax," and lobbied foreign leaders to publicly support the denialist narrative. The "thing of value" received is the foreign power's election interference. The "official act" given in return is the President's willful failure to defend the nation from a hostile attack and his active obstruction of efforts to expose it. This dereliction of duty, undertaken for personal electoral gain while benefiting a foreign adversary, constitutes a profound betrayal of the national security oath and would be a powerful component of an impeachment article for "abetting a foreign adversary."

Conclusion: The Political Reality

The arguments above outline a legal and constitutional rationale for impeachment. However, impeachment is ultimately a political process.

· A Political, Not Judicial, Standard: The House does not need to prove a crime beyond a reasonable doubt; it needs to persuade a majority of its members and the public that the President has committed grave abuses.

· The Ultimate Check: Proponents of impeachment would argue that it is the essential constitutional tool designed for precisely such scenarios—when a President's actions, whether criminal in a technical sense or not, so severely violate the public trust, endanger the nation's moral standing, and undermine the rule of law that Congress has a duty to act.

Therefore, a call for impeachment based on these issues is a call for Congress to exercise its most powerful check on executive power, asserting that the alleged actions—from economic abuses of power to human rights violations and unauthorized lethal force—collectively represent the "treason, bribery, and other high Crimes and Misdemeanors" the Framers intended to guard against.