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19th December 2019
07:28am GMT
Donald Trump has become the third US president in history to be impeached by the House of Representatives, setting up a trial in the Senate that will decide whether he remains in office.
After a full day of debate, the House voted 230-197 to approve a first article of impeachment, charging Trump with abuse of power. A second article, charging Trump with obstruction of Congress, was also approved by 229 votes to 198. Nearly all Democrats voted for the charges and every Republican against. The House first voted to approve the first article of impeachment charging Trump with abuse of power for conditioning military aid and a White House meeting on Ukraine’s announcing investigations into Democrats ahead of the 2020 presidential election. The second article of impeachment Trump faced was in relation to him being charged with obstructing Congress for refusing to cooperate with the inquiry and ordering other officials not to appear. Being impeached places Donald Trump alongside only two other presidents in the nation's history - Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton. Trump now faces a trial in the Senate, where he is expected to be acquitted because the Republicans control the majority. As voting took place in the House, Trump was addressing a campaign rally in Battle Creek, Michigan. "It doesn’t really feel like we’re being impeached. This lawless partisan impeachment is a political suicide march for the Democrat party," Trump said, to cheers from the crowd. The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, described the proceedings as a sad day for the United States and said: "The president’s reckless activities necessitated us having to introduce articles of impeachment" before going on to thank the House committee leaders who headed the impeachment inquiry. A trial will take place in the Senate in the new year, most likely January. Last week, Republican Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said that Republican senators would act in "total co-ordination" with the president's team during any potential trial. McConnell is due to address the Senate on Thursday. Trump took to Twitter to share the following message. https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1207508280207011841 https://twitter.com/SpeakerPelosi/status/1207511782820077569Explore more on these topics:
