Civics 101 — Impeachment, or How to Bring Charges to Remove a Federal Government Official from Office

Jane Jewell • August 2, 2022

Don’t like the mayor or governor? Think the local sheriff is lazy? Convinced that Sen. So-and-So is corrupt? Disapprove of the president? Well, you could wait and vote them out in the next election, but what if the situation seems very serious and you want them out now? Then you may feel like joining the cry to “have the scoundrel impeached.”

However, at the national level, impeachment is the first step of a multi-step process contained in the United States Constitution to authorize the removal of government officials from office. It doesn’t apply to ordinary citizens, just to certain federal officials. That process begins with impeachment in the House of Representatives.

There are many misunderstandings about what impeachment can and can’t do. In fact, it can’t do what many assume are its main purposes; impeachment can’t remove someone from office nor can it impose a fine or send anyone to jail. Presidents Bill Clinton and Donald Trump were both impeached but neither was removed from office. The impeachment procedure only allows the House to investigate and then recommend for or against handing an impeached official over to the Senate for trial. The House impeaches or indicts; the Senate convicts and removes from office, or acquits.

The impeachment process is much like a grand jury that meets to evaluate if there is enough evidence for a particular criminal case to go to trial.

England used a form of impeachment as far back as the 14th Century. Ironically, Britain's use of impeachment began to decline at about the same time that an impeachment process adapted from England's process was written into the new U.S. Constitution. The last impeachment in Britain was in 1806. While still legally available, Britons rely these days on a vote of no-confidence when they want to oust leadership.

Although the rules and grounds for impeachment vary, every state except Oregon has an impeachment clause in their state constitutions. In fact, several of these state impeachment clauses — including Maryland’s first constitution — were adopted before the U.S. Constitution was even written. Recently, in 2021, the New York state legislature began an impeachment inquiry into then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo, but Cuomo resigned before he was impeached. In February of this year, a Trump-supported Republican lawmaker in Maryland introduced a bill in the state legislature to impeach Republican Gov. Larry Hogan. The bill failed.

The process for the Federal level is outlined in the U.S. Constitution; and some relevant parts are quoted below.

Step 1. Charges or accusations against a government official are presented to the House by a House member or group of members — similar to introducing a bill.

Step 2. The House or a House committee investigates the charges and writes up Articles of Impeachment. Hearings are held.

Step 3. The full House votes yea or nay on the Articles of Impeachment. If the Articles do not pass, then the impeachment process ends and the accused remains in office. If the Articles pass, then the accused person has been officially impeached and the case is turned over to the Senate for trial. Technically, impeachment is over at this point.

Step 4. Trial and vote in the Senate. Senate rules state that the trial must begin at 1:00 pm on the day after the Articles of Impeachment are delivered to the Senate. However, there is no rule or time-table about how or when the House must deliver the articles.

Step 5. If the Senate votes to convict, then the impeached official is automatically and immediately removed from office. There is no other automatic penalty — no fine or imprisonment may be imposed.

Bonus Step. The Senate, in a separate, second vote, may also prohibit the convicted and removed official from ever holding public office again. This prohibition is not automatic upon conviction.

To pass, the Articles of Impeachment need a simple majority of those representatives present and voting. Today, if all 435 members of the House of Representatives are present and vote, passage would require 216 votes in favor of impeachment. While impeachment by the House only requires a simple majority, conviction in the Senate requires a supermajority of two-thirds of those present and voting. Almost everyone — House and Senate — shows up for these votes.

There are some broad conditions and limits. Articles of Impeachment may be brought only against the "President, Vice President, and all civil Officers of the United States" and only if they are accused of “Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.”

Treason and bribery are relatively clear and well-understood terms, having basically the same meaning today as they did in Colonial times. However, the Constitution did not precisely define “high Crimes and Misdemeanors” or "civil Officer of the United States." Over the years, there has been a lot of argument and disagreement over these terms.

At the time the Constitution was written in 1787, “high Crimes and Misdemeanors” was a common term and generally referred to inappropriate and/or illegal activities by those who held a powerful or “high” office, especially when the office itself was used for personal profit, to play favorites, or to promote personal agendas and biases. Most impeachments have been for high crimes and misdemeanors.

While actual impeachment votes in the House are rather rare, demands for impeachment and threats of impeachments, especially of presidents, have been common throughout U.S. history. The ink was barely dry on the Constitution before the calls for impeachment of various officials started way back during George Washington’s administration. The first impeachment vote in the House was in 1797, the second in 1803. In total, the House has initiated impeachment proceedings 63 times but most were unsuccessful or charges were dropped without a vote.

To date, the House has voted to impeach 21 times, on charges against 20 people. Three presidents have been impeached — Andrew Johnson in 1868, Bill Clinton in 1998, and Donald Trump in 2019 and 2021. None were convicted.

Only eight impeachments of the 21 have resulted in a Senate conviction — all of those were federal judges. Another seven judges were impeached but acquitted in the Senate. Two other judges — one in 1873 and another in 1926 — were impeached but they resigned and the proceedings were halted before a Senate trial.

So far, no impeachments have charged treason. Three were for bribery; two of those officials were tried and removed from office by the Senate. The third resigned before trial and was — ironically — later acquitted by the Senate.

Impeachment is not part of the legal system but a congressional judgment on “fitness for office.”

Neither conviction nor acquittal affects the official’s exposure to legal prosecution. The accused person can be indicted in criminal court or sued in civil court regarding the same charges. If convicted in the legal system, there can be fines, imprisonment, or other punishments even if the person was acquitted in the House or Senate.

Likewise, impeachment charges do not need to be for actual “crimes,” that is, illegal activities. Officials have been impeached and convicted on charges of drunkenness and biased decisions. Andrew Johnson was charged in two articles for rude language along with bad behavior that reflected badly on the office of the presidency. These actions did not necessarily break any laws.

Conversely, some actual crimes have been determined to not amount to high crimes or misdemeanors. The Judiciary Committee of the House previously determined that any tax fraud committed by then-president Richard Nixon was not impeachable because it was committed in Nixon’s private life and was not an abuse of his authority as president.

Benjamin Franklin said that impeachment was a needed recourse for when a president “has rendered himself obnoxious.” In 1970, almost two hundred years later, Gerald Ford, then House minority leader and later president, added that "an impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history.”

Sources and More information can be found at these websites:

40 Facts About the History of Impeachment, Trista, History Collection, May 26, 2019.

https://historycollection.com/40-facts-about-the-history-of-impeachment-and-the-presidents-who-couldnt-escape-its-fate/

Constitution Facts

https://www.constitutionfacts.com

Impeachment, history.com editors, History, Feb. 21, 2021.

https://www.history.com/topics/us-government/impeachment-in-us-history

Impeachment Fast Facts, CNN Politics, Sept. 27, 2021.

https://www.cnn.com/2017/08/29/world/impeachment-fast-facts/index.html

Impeachment in the United States.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impeachment_in_the_United_States

Jane Jewell is a writer, editor, photographer, and teacher. She has worked in news, publishing, and as the director of a national writer's group. She lives in Chestertown with her husband Peter Heck, a ginger cat named Riley, and a lot of books.

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Common Sense for the Eastern Shore

“Liberty: The Promises and Paradoxes”

By John Christie • March 3, 2026

Just up the road from Maryland’s Eastern Shore lies Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia. Administered by the National Park Service (NPS), the park is dedicated to the preservation of historical structures and properties associated with the American Revolution and the founding and growth of the United States. The centerpiece of the park is Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence and the United States Constitution were debated and adopted by America's Founding Fathers in the late 18th century. Nearby is the Liberty Bell, an iconic symbol of American independence, displayed in the Liberty Bell Center. In the park as well is what’s called the President’s House, an exhibit on the site of the first official residence of the president of the United States. President Washington occupied the Philadelphia President's House from 1790 to 1797. His successor, John Adams, lived there from 1797 to 1800. Although the original structure no longer exists, the exhibit includes a view of the foundation of the house where our first two presidents lived with their families. Research has turned up information about nine enslaved Africans owned by Washington and brought to Philadelphia’s presidential residence during his time there. To commemorate the lives of those slaves, their names are etched in a wall in the exhibit: Oney Judge, Austin, Christopher Sheels, Giles, Hercules Posey, Joe Richardson, Moll, Paris, and Richmond. The site includes exhibits on how their struggles for freedom represented this country’s progress away from the horrors of slavery and into an era where the founding ideals of “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” could be achieved for every American. An intended theme of the President’s House exhibit is “Liberty: The Promises and Paradoxes.” “The promises of liberty and equality granted in the founding documents present a paradox: not only were they ideals to strive for but they were unfulfilled promises for people who struggled to be fully included as citizens of our nation.” ------------------------------------------------------------ On March 27, 2025, President Trump signed Executive Order 14253, “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History.” EO14253 stated in part: “Over the past decade, Americans have witnessed a concerted and widespread effort to rewrite our nation's history, replacing objective facts with a distorted narrative driven by ideology rather than truth.” In order to “restore truth in American history,” EO14253 directed the Secretary of the Interior to ensure that all public monuments, memorials, or similar properties within the Department of the Interior's jurisdiction do not contain descriptions or other content that “inappropriately disparage” Americans past or living (including persons living in colonial times) and instead focus on the greatness of the achievements and progress of the American people. In response to this order, on January 22, 2026, the NPS suddenly removed 34 educational panels and video exhibits that referenced slavery and provided information about the individuals enslaved at the President’s House. The day these exhibits were removed, the City of Philadelphia filed a lawsuit in the federal district court in Philadelphia against Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, the Department of the Interior, Acting Director of NPS Jessica Bowron, and the NPS itself, claiming that the removal of the displays was unlawful agency action. On February 16, Judge Cynthia Rufe ordered the Trump administration to restore the slavery-related exhibits at the national park site, holding that NPS lacked the power “to dissemble and disassemble historical truths.” In court, the government asserted it alone had the power to erase, alter, remove, and hide historical accounts on taxpayer and local government-funded monuments within its control. According to Judge Rufe, to claim that “truth is no longer self-evident, but rather the property of the elected chief magistrate and his appointees and delegees, at his whim to be scraped clean, hidden, or overwritten” comes right out of George Orwell’s 1984. In her opinion, no government agency can “arbitrarily” decide what is true, “based on its own whims or the whims of the new leadership.” “It is not disputed that President Washington owned slaves.” Moreover, Judge Rufe determined the removed displays were not mere decorations to be taken down and redisplayed; rather, they were a memorial to the “men, women, and children of African descent who lived, worked, and died as enslaved people in the United States of America.” Each person who visits the President’s House and does not learn of the realities of founding-era slavery receives a false account of this country’s history. Removal of the crucial interpretive materials strips the site of that truth and deprives the public of educational opportunities designed to be free and accessible. For Judge Rufe, the abrupt elimination of historically significant educational material is like “pulling pages out of a history book with a razor.” John Christie was for many years a senior partner in a large Washington, D.C. law firm. He specialized in anti-trust litigation and developed a keen interest in the U.S. Supreme Court about which he lectures and writes.

Run for Something Endorses Megan Outten for Wicomico County Council District 7

By CSES Staff • March 3, 2026

Last month, Megan Outten, candidate for Wicomico County Council District 7, was endorsed by Run for Something (RFS), a national organization that recruits and supports the next generation of progressive leaders for state and local office. The organization’s slate of newly endorsed candidates includes young, diverse progressives from across the country who are ready to lead in their communities. Outten said, “This campaign has always been powered by our community. By parents, teachers, small business owners, and neighbors who know we can do better. Run for Something’s endorsement affirms what we already know here in Wicomico: when everyday people step up to lead, we change what’s possible. Together, we’re building the kind of local government that plans ahead, listens first, and puts families at the center of every decision.” “Bold leaders like Megan are at the forefront of the fight for our rights and freedoms at a time when they have never faced greater threats,” said Amanda Litman, Co-Founder and President of Run for Something. “Run for Something is proud to endorse Megan Outten as part of our latest class of young leaders working to secure lasting change in their communities.” Outten’s platform is rooted in real data and shaped by direct community engagement. With Wicomico now the fastest-growing school system on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, and 85% of students relying on additional resources, she points to the county’s lagging investment as a key area for action. “Strong schools lead to strong jobs, thriving industries, and healthier communities,” Outten said. “Our schools and infrastructure are at a tipping point. We need leadership that stops reacting after things break — and starts investing before they do.” About Run for Something: Amanda Litman and Ross Morales Rocketto launched RFS in January 2017 with a simple premise: to help young, diverse progressives run for state and local offices in order to build a bench for the future. RFS aims to lower the barriers to entry for these candidates by helping them with organization building, connecting them with a robust community, and providing access to the trainings they need to be successful. Since its founding, RFS has helped elect over 1,600 candidates across the country — including 43 candidates in red-to-blue seats in the 2025 election cycle. Today, RFS has the largest database of any Democratic organization, with nearly 80,000 people reaching out since November 2024 with interest in running for office. In total, over 250,000 young people from across the country have signed up to run and gained access to RFS’s resources since the organization launched — a powerful signal that a new generation is showing up to lead.

DHS is Violating a Court Order that Prohibits Warrantless Immigration Arrests in D.C., New Filing Alleges

By Liam Bowman, Capital News Service • March 3, 2026

The Trump administration is still arresting immigrants in D.C. without warrants or probable cause despite a judge’s previous ruling that the practice was unlawful, a coalition of immigrant rights groups alleges in a recent court filing. A federal judge ruled in December that the administration’s use of warrantless immigration arrests likely violated federal law and issued a preliminary injunction prohibiting such arrests without probable cause. The ruling was in response to a lawsuit filed by immigrant rights groups and four migrants who were arrested without warrants last year during President Donald Trump’s law enforcement surge in the capital. But federal immigration officials in D.C. are failing to comply with that order, continuing to make warrantless arrests “without the required probable cause determinations,” according to the Feb. 19 motion by plaintiffs. The lawsuit alleges immigration authorities began operating under an “arrest first, ask questions later” policy to comply with arrest quotas imposed after Trump took office last year — and started to ignore the probable cause requirements under immigration law. Click here to read the rest of the article , on the Capital News Service website. The article also details the arrest stories of the plaintiffs who were tricked, and concerns about D.C. police cooperation with immigration authorities. Capital News Service is a student-powered news organization run by the University of Maryland Philip Merrill College of Journalism. For 26 years, they have provided deeply reported, award-winning coverage of issues of import to Marylanders.

“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free”

By John Christie • February 17, 2026

These are the words from Emma Lazarus’ famous 1883 sonnet “The New Colossus” inscribed on a bronze plaque on the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. In 1990, Congress reaffirmed this vision of America by establishing the Temporary Protected Status program. TPS is designed to provide humanitarian relief to foreign nationals in the United States who come from disaster-stricken countries. In its present form, the TPS legislation gives the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security responsibility for the program. However, the legislation prescribes the kind of country conditions severe enough to warrant a designation under the statute, the specific time frame for any such designation, and the process for periodic review of a TPS designation which could culminate in termination or extension. All initial TPS designations last from six to eighteen months. Before the expiration of a designation, the statute mandates that the Secretary shall review the conditions in the foreign state to decide if the conditions for the designation continue to be met, following consultation with appropriate agencies of the government. Extension is the default; the designation “shall be extended” unless the secretary affirmatively determines that conditions are “no longer met.” ------------------------------------------------------------- A massive earthquake devastated Haiti in January 2010, and precipitated an unprecedented humanitarian crisis. Shortly after, then-DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano, after consultation with the State Department, designated Haiti for TPS due to “extraordinary conditions.” Haitian nationals in the United States continuously as of January 12, 2010, could thus apply for TPS, and obtained the right to remain and work in the U.S. while Haiti maintained its TPS designation. Napolitano set the initial TPS designation for 18 months. As Haiti’s deterioration worsened, successive DHS secretaries have extended this program. Gang violence and kidnappings have spiked. In 2021, a group of assailants killed Haiti’s then-President Jovenel Moïse. In 2023, another catastrophic earthquake hit Haiti. In 2024, in response to these conditions, then-DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas once again extended and redesignated Haiti for TPS, this time effective through February 3, 2026. During the 2024 election cycle, the GOP candidate, Donald Trump clearly indicated that time had not tempered his views on Haiti, characterized by him as a “shithole country” during his first term. He stated that when elected, he would “absolutely revoke” Haiti’s TPS designation and send “them back to their country.” On December 1, 2025, Kristi Noem, DHS secretary in the second Trump administration, announced, “I just met with the president. I am recommending a full travel ban on every damn country that’s been flooding our nation with killers, leeches, and entitlement junkies. Our forefathers built this nation on blood, sweat, and the unyielding love of freedom, not for foreign invaders to slaughter our heroes, suck dry our hard-earned tax dollars, or snatch the benefits owned to Americans. We don’t want them, not one.” So says the official responsible for overseeing the TPS program. And one of those (her word) “damn” countries is Haiti. Three days before making the above post, Secretary Noem announced she would terminate Haiti’s TPS designation as of February 3, 2026. Five Haitian TPS holders filed suit in federal court in Washington initially seeking an injunction against the termination of the Haitian TPS program pending the completion of the litigation. These plaintiff TPS holders are not “killers, leeches, or entitlement junkies.” They are instead a neuroscientist researching Alzheimer’s disease, a software engineer at a national bank, a laboratory assistant in a toxicology department, a college economics major, and a full-time registered nurse. The case was assigned to district court judge Ana Reyes who granted the plaintiffs’ injunction request on February 2, 2026, by way of an 83-page opinion. The plaintiffs charge that Secretary Noem preordained her termination decision because of hostility to non-white immigrants. According to Judge Reyes, “This seems substantially likely. Secretary Noem has terminated every TPS country designation to have reached her desk — twelve countries up, twelve countries down.” Judge Reyes also decided that Noem’s conclusion that Haiti (a majority non-white country) faces only “merely concerning” conditions cannot be squared with the “perfect storm” of “suffering and staggering” humanitarian toll described in page after page of the record in the case. In Judge Reyes’ view, Noem also ignored Congress’s requirement that she review the conditions in Haiti “after consulting with appropriate agencies.” Indeed, the record indicates she did not consult other agencies at all. Her “national interest” analysis focuses on Haitians outside the United States or here illegally, ignoring that Haitian TPS holders already live here and legally so. And though Noem states that the analysis must include “economic considerations,” Judge Reyes concluded Noem ignored altogether the billions that Haitian TPS holders contribute to the economy. The administration’s primary response in the litigation has been to assert that the TPS statute gives Secretary Noem “unbounded” discretion to make whatever determination she wants, any way she wants. Yes, Judge Reyes acknowledges, the statute does grant Noem some discretion. But, in Judge Reyes’ opinion, “not unbounded discretion.” To the contrary, Congress passed the TPS statute to standardize the then ad hoc temporary protection system; in Judge Reyes’ words, "to replace executive whim with statutory predictability.” The administration also argued that the harms to Haitian TPS holders were “speculative” if they are forced to return to Haiti. Because the State Department presently warns, “Do not travel to Haiti for any reason,” the administration asserts that harm is “speculative” only because DHS “might not” remove them. However, according to Judge Reyes, this argument fails to take Secretary Noem at her word: “We don’t want them. Not one.” The public interest also favors the injunction, in the opinion of Judge Reyes. Secretary Noem complains of the strains that unlawful immigrants place on our immigration-enforcement system. Noem’s answer is to turn 352,959 lawful TPS Haitian immigrants into unlawful immigrants overnight. Noem complains of strains to our economy; her answer is to turn employed lawful immigrants who contribute billions in taxes into the legally unemployable. Noem complains of strains to our health care system. Noem’s answer is to turn the insured into the uninsured. “This approach is many things – but the public interest is not one of them,” according to Judge Reyes. The opinion of Judge Reyes concludes: “Kristi Noem has a First Amendment right to call immigrants killers, leeches, entitlement junkies, and any other inapt name she wants. Secretary Noem, however, is constrained by both our Constitution and the law to apply faithfully the facts to the law in implementing the TPS program. The record to-date shows she has yet to do that. The administration has already appealed. John Christie was for many years a senior partner in a large Washington, D.C. law firm. He specialized in anti-trust litigation and developed a keen interest in the U.S. Supreme Court about which he lectures and writes.

Gov. Moore Signs Legislation to Prohibit Md. Jurisdictions from Deputizing Officers for Federal Civil Immigration Enforcement

By Office of the Governor • February 16, 2026

Gov. Wes Moore signed legislation on February 17, 2026, to prohibit State and local jurisdictions from deputizing officers for federal civil immigration enforcement activity. The law, created under SB 245/HB 444 , is effective immediately. “In Maryland, we defend Constitutional rights and Constitutional policing — and we will not allow untrained, unqualified, and unaccountable ICE agents to deputize our law enforcement officers,” Moore said. “This bill draws a clear line: we will continue to work with federal partners to hold violent offenders accountable, but we refuse to blur the lines between state and federal authority in ways that undermine the trust between law enforcement and the communities they serve. Maryland is a community of immigrants, and that's one of our greatest strengths because this country is incomplete without each and every one of us.” “As an immigrant, this bill is deeply personal to me,” said Lt. Gov. Aruna Miller. “Immigrants make Maryland stronger every day, and our communities are safer when everyone feels protected and valued. This legislation ensures that our law enforcement resources remain focused on keeping Marylanders safe, not on actions that create fear in our neighborhoods. I thank the bill sponsors and Governor Moore for their leadership in ensuring Maryland remains a place where dignity and opportunity go hand in hand.” U.S. Department of Homeland Security Immigration and Customs Enforcement, also known as ICE, established its 287(g) program to authorize local law enforcement officials to perform federal civil immigration enforcement functions under ICE’s oversight. Under SB 245/HB 444, State and local jurisdictions in Maryland are prohibited from engaging in such agreements. Any local jurisdictions with standing 287(g) agreements must terminate them immediately. The legislation does not: Authorize the release of criminals Impact State policies and practices in response to immigration detainers that are issued by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Prevent the State or local jurisdictions from continuing to work with the federal government on shared public safety priorities, including the removal of violent criminals who pose a risk to public safety Prevent State or local jurisdictions from continuing to notify ICE about the impending release of an individual of interest from custody or from coordinating the safe transfer of custody within constitutional limits State and local law enforcement will also maintain the ability to work with the federal government on criminal investigations and joint task forces unrelated to civil immigration enforcement. Any individual who is charged with a crime is entitled to due process and, if convicted, must serve their sentence.

Farmers Now Owe a Lot More for Health Insurance

By Sarah Boden and Drew Hawkins, Gulf States Newsroom • February 16, 2026

And now, the enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies that many Americans, including farmers, relied on to purchase health insurance are gone, having expired at the end of December.