This explainer on impeachment is signify for our elementary and mediate - school readers . If you would wish to read more on this issue , dive into our long articleHow Impeachment Works .
The president of the United States has a operose line . He or she is the leader of theU.S. governmentand the head of the military . Sometimes , in the midsection of their time in the White House , wad of people start to observe the president is not doing a just job , or did something illegal . This is when Congress — the House of Representatives and the Senate , which make the laws of the United States together — decide whether a chairman has failed at their job . This process is call impeachment .
One thing we often get incorrect about impeachment is that it is the same thing as fire the president . Impeachment is actually how a president gets accused of doing something wrong , and it means they might get fired by and by . Three American president have been impeached , but none of them has had to leave behind his job because of it .
Impeachment Is Not Just for Presidents
We get word a lot about presidential impeachment , but chair , vice United States President and anyone who has a line in the federal government ( except military policeman ) can be impeached . Congress has go the impeachment process about 60 sentence in American account , but only eight of these have resulted in the person being raise . All of these have been judges .
Presidential impeachment is rare , but it is big news when it happens . Only three chairman in history have been impeached : Andrew Johnson in 1868 who might be theworst president ever , Bill Clinton in 1998 and Donald Trump , who was impeached twice during the four years he was president — once in 2019 and again in 2021 . Richard Nixon resigned from office before the House of Representatives was able to incriminate him in 1974 .
Everything we know about how to criminate a chair comes from a small section of the Constitution of the United States , which is the document that outlines the high practice of law of the farming and tells us how the government should work . consort to the Constitution , you might be impeach if you confide any of these crimes : “ Treason , Bribery , or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors . " The men who wrote the Constitution did n’t recite us what any of these things mean , but we have it away treason is the act of trying to reverse the government , and bribery is trading money or gifts for a favour . The Constitution does n’t tell apart us what " High Crimes and Misdemeanors " is , but we empathize they are very bad crimes .
The Constitution gives the House of Representatives the ability to impeach . The Senate has the job of holding the test to decide whether the prexy will be recover guilty or sinless of the law-breaking named by the House of Representatives .
How Does an Impeachment Begin?
The House of Representatives starts the impeachment process by set together evidence that the president has done something wrong and giving that evidence to a special radical , called a citizens committee , to review . If this citizens committee finds enough grounds , it creates a list of thing the president could be guilty of — these are call the Articles of Impeachment . The House votes on these article , and if more than half of the members vote for one or more of the care in the Articles of Impeachment , the president is officially impeached .
Next comes the Senate impeachment test . A few appendage of the House of Representatives call " Managers " act as the prosecution — they accuse the president of wrongdoing in the trial . The impeached president and their attorney defend the president . The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court acts as the judge in the test . All the penis of the Senate act as the jury , hear the evidence and deciding what to do about it . If two - thirds of the Senate finds the president guilty , the Chief Executive is fired from their chore , and the frailty president takes over the office of President of the United States .
Depending on the specific criminal accusations they faced , if the Chief Executive is observe guilty , it might disqualify them from hold office again .
