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Efforts to impeach Barack Obama
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Efforts to impeach Barack Obama
During Barack Obama's tenure as President of the United States from 2009 to 2017, certain Republican members of Congress, as well as Democratic congressman Dennis Kucinich, stated that Obama had engaged in impeachable activity and that he might face attempts to remove him from office. Rationales offered for possible impeachment ranged from Obama allowing people to use bathrooms based on their gender identity, to the 2012 Benghazi attack, to Obama's enforcement of immigration laws, and false claims that he was born outside the United States.
The closest attempt to impeach Obama occurred on December 3, 2013. On this date, the House Judiciary Committee, controlled by Republicans, held a hearing on whether or not to impeach the president. At the hearing, there were views among Republicans that the president had not done his duty, while simultaneously abusing his executive power. The hearing was attended by Georgetown University law professor Nicholas Quinn Rosenkranz who encouraged impeachment claiming it was a good check on what he perceived as "executive lawlessness" from Obama. Impeachment efforts never advanced past this, mainly due to consistent opposition from Speaker of the United States House of Representatives John Boehner who saw impeachment as politically harmful to congressional Republicans, as well as the near-unanimous consensus that impeachment would not lead to Obama's removal in a senate trial rendering such efforts a waste of time. No list of articles of impeachment was ever drawn up and proposed to the Judiciary Committee for Obama. Obama was the first president since Jimmy Carter to not have any articles of impeachment referred against him to the House Judiciary Committee.
Multiple surveys of U.S. public opinion found that a near supermajority of Americans rejected the idea of impeaching Obama, though a bit more than a simple majority of Republicans did support such efforts. For example, CNN found in July 2014 that 57% of Republicans supported impeachment, but in general, 65% of American adults, disagreed with impeachment with only 33% supporting such efforts.
In October 2010, prior to the elections in which Republicans won control of the House, Jonathan Chait published an article in The New Republic called "Scandal TBD" where he predicted that if Republicans were to win control of the House, and Barack Obama were to win re-election in 2012, the Republicans would try to impeach Obama and use any reason possible as pretext.
In May 2010, Republican Darrell Issa of California stated that the allegation that the White House had offered Pennsylvania Representative Joe Sestak a job to persuade Sestak to drop out of the Pennsylvania Senate primary election against Arlen Specter "is one that everyone from Arlen Spector [sic] to Dick Morris has said is in fact a crime, and could be impeachable". With the possibility of becoming chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform in January 2011, Issa said in October 2010 that the committee would not seek to impeach Obama.
In August 2011, Republican Congressman Michael C. Burgess of Texas agreed with a rally audience member that the impeachment of Obama "needs to happen" in order to prevent Obama from "pushing his agenda". Burgess did not mention any grounds for impeachment.
In June 2012, Senator Jon Kyl mentioned impeachment when discussing the Obama administration policy on immigration. He said on the Bill Bennett radio show, "if it’s bad enough and if shenanigans [are] involved in it, then of course impeachment is always a possibility. But I don’t think at this point anybody is talking about that".
In August 2013, Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma responded to a questioner in a town hall meeting, who had asserted that Obama was failing to carry out his constitutional responsibilities, by saying that "you have to establish the criteria that would qualify for proceedings against the president... and that's called impeachment". Coburn added, "I don't have the legal background to know if that rises to 'high crimes and misdemeanors', but I think you're getting perilously close". Coburn did not specify what grounds he felt would support impeachment, but NBC News noted that Coburn "mentioned that he believes Department of Homeland Security officials have told career USCIS employees to 'ignore' background checks for immigrants". Coburn mentioned no evidence that substantiated his belief.
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Efforts to impeach Barack Obama
During Barack Obama's tenure as President of the United States from 2009 to 2017, certain Republican members of Congress, as well as Democratic congressman Dennis Kucinich, stated that Obama had engaged in impeachable activity and that he might face attempts to remove him from office. Rationales offered for possible impeachment ranged from Obama allowing people to use bathrooms based on their gender identity, to the 2012 Benghazi attack, to Obama's enforcement of immigration laws, and false claims that he was born outside the United States.
The closest attempt to impeach Obama occurred on December 3, 2013. On this date, the House Judiciary Committee, controlled by Republicans, held a hearing on whether or not to impeach the president. At the hearing, there were views among Republicans that the president had not done his duty, while simultaneously abusing his executive power. The hearing was attended by Georgetown University law professor Nicholas Quinn Rosenkranz who encouraged impeachment claiming it was a good check on what he perceived as "executive lawlessness" from Obama. Impeachment efforts never advanced past this, mainly due to consistent opposition from Speaker of the United States House of Representatives John Boehner who saw impeachment as politically harmful to congressional Republicans, as well as the near-unanimous consensus that impeachment would not lead to Obama's removal in a senate trial rendering such efforts a waste of time. No list of articles of impeachment was ever drawn up and proposed to the Judiciary Committee for Obama. Obama was the first president since Jimmy Carter to not have any articles of impeachment referred against him to the House Judiciary Committee.
Multiple surveys of U.S. public opinion found that a near supermajority of Americans rejected the idea of impeaching Obama, though a bit more than a simple majority of Republicans did support such efforts. For example, CNN found in July 2014 that 57% of Republicans supported impeachment, but in general, 65% of American adults, disagreed with impeachment with only 33% supporting such efforts.
In October 2010, prior to the elections in which Republicans won control of the House, Jonathan Chait published an article in The New Republic called "Scandal TBD" where he predicted that if Republicans were to win control of the House, and Barack Obama were to win re-election in 2012, the Republicans would try to impeach Obama and use any reason possible as pretext.
In May 2010, Republican Darrell Issa of California stated that the allegation that the White House had offered Pennsylvania Representative Joe Sestak a job to persuade Sestak to drop out of the Pennsylvania Senate primary election against Arlen Specter "is one that everyone from Arlen Spector [sic] to Dick Morris has said is in fact a crime, and could be impeachable". With the possibility of becoming chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform in January 2011, Issa said in October 2010 that the committee would not seek to impeach Obama.
In August 2011, Republican Congressman Michael C. Burgess of Texas agreed with a rally audience member that the impeachment of Obama "needs to happen" in order to prevent Obama from "pushing his agenda". Burgess did not mention any grounds for impeachment.
In June 2012, Senator Jon Kyl mentioned impeachment when discussing the Obama administration policy on immigration. He said on the Bill Bennett radio show, "if it’s bad enough and if shenanigans [are] involved in it, then of course impeachment is always a possibility. But I don’t think at this point anybody is talking about that".
In August 2013, Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma responded to a questioner in a town hall meeting, who had asserted that Obama was failing to carry out his constitutional responsibilities, by saying that "you have to establish the criteria that would qualify for proceedings against the president... and that's called impeachment". Coburn added, "I don't have the legal background to know if that rises to 'high crimes and misdemeanors', but I think you're getting perilously close". Coburn did not specify what grounds he felt would support impeachment, but NBC News noted that Coburn "mentioned that he believes Department of Homeland Security officials have told career USCIS employees to 'ignore' background checks for immigrants". Coburn mentioned no evidence that substantiated his belief.
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