House Democrats Can Impeach Trump Any Time They Want

The buzz-phrase of choice in the lengthy and fractious debate among Democrats over what to do now about Trump’s serial misconduct has been “initiating impeachment proceedings.” That’s what many Democrats want to do, and a smaller but more powerful number of Democrats who happen to run the U.S. House of Representative don’t want to do, at least right now.But as Andrew Prokop lays out in a particularly useful Vox “explainer,” there’s no required procedure for “initiating” impeachment “proceedings.” All the Constitution prescribes are a vote on Articles of Impeachment, which in turn triggers a Senate trial about the contained list of “high crimes and misdemeanors.” Everything else is, well, optional, as the last two impeachment drives illustrated:The Nixon inquiry was an intensive, lengthy investigative effort that proceeded alongside the special prosecutor’s continuing grand jury investigation into the Watergate break-in and cover-up and a Senate select committee inquiry into the matter. Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon (D-PA) characterized the committee’s probe as “an investigation to see if we should recommend articles of impeachment” — an investigation that started “months ago.”“A lot of people believe we’ve been in an impeachment inquiry ever since we started looking into high crimes and misdemeanors,” Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) said, while clarifying that his own preferred word choice was “impeachment investigation.”Raskin also made a point that’s becoming increasingly popular among impeachment-curious Democrats — that “there’s no formal or statutory or House rule for how an impeachment inquiry is to begin.”This argument, which basically holds that an “inquiry” is an “impeachment inquiry” if it later leads to articles of impeachment, has a convenient ex post facto quality for nervous Dems. I’m asking all Democrats — Democrats who want to run for president and come into the state of New York — Just make it a simple, clear choice for the American people.”… Specifically, he wants Democrats to endorse a ban on “assault weapons and high-capacity magazines,” the creation of a database that would be used to keep those diagnosed as mentally ill from buying guns, an expansion of background checks to buy guns, and “red flag” legislation that would let individuals seek court orders blocking others from obtaining firearms.Another report of highly questionable financial activity by the NRADocuments indicate that the National Rifle Association planned to purchase a luxury mansion in the Dallas area last year for the use of chief executive Wayne LaPierre, according to two people familiar with the records.The discussions about the roughly $6 million purchase, which was not completed, are now under scrutiny by New York investigators.