AOC files articles of impeachment against Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito

BonesOfTheMoon@lemmy.world to News@lemmy.world – 1552 points –
AOC files articles of impeachment against Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito
nbcnews.com
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Wasn't trump impeached twice? What does this even mean concretely?
Not knocking the sentiment, just questioning the practicality

Put simply, an impeachment happens in the House of Representatives and is akin to an indictment by Grand Jury. If successful, the proceeding then moves to the Senate for trial, where the party is either convicted or acquitted. A conviction would mean removal from office and the possibility of facing criminal charges.

Trump was impeached twice, but he was not convicted either time.

Also good to note that the Constitution doesn't mandate the Senate convict the president under any circumstance other than treason.

Gives Dem voters something to rally around in the lead up to the election...

Like. This is literally the time and place for performative actions, but I swear it's like everyone's forgot what the word "campaign" means.

Without getting too technical, and someone please correct anything that may be represented incorrectly: It's basically like a trial. The House is the prosecutor, and jury and the Senate is the judge. The plaintiff is the United States itself, and the defendant is the political figure (president, SC justice, etc)

The House gathers / presents evidence and tries them then renders a verdict (Impeachment)

The Senate is responsible for sentencing or acquitting. Without a 2/3 majority voting to remove them from office, the impeached is acquitted.

In both of Trump's, the House found him guilty of the charges (impeached) but the Republican controlled Senate acquitted him.

Hard to edit it in on mobile, but see @ricecake@sh.itjust.works 's clarifications below to my analogy.

Impeachment is the decision to press charges, and the Senate trial is closer to the actual trial.

"Charged and convicted" -> "impeached and convicted"

Otherwise a perfectly good analogy. :)

The distinction only matters for people who bring up due process concerns. The impeachment proceedings aren't actually a trial, but a decision to have one, as such you aren't obligated to the same ability to speak in your own defense as you would be at a proper trial. With the Senate trial there's more expectation of due process because it's an actual trial.

I see. I shall remain optimistic then--Thanks!

Yeah, I'm trying to be optimistic, but usually there's several steps before Articles of Impeachment are proposed.

The House still needs to vote on the articles, and that requires only a simple majority vote. So they would need at least a few Republicans to vote "yea" for it to go anywhere. What I'm unclear on is if the Speaker of the House can prevent it from getting a vote (researching this on mobile is harder than I thought lol).

Unfortunately it means as much as it did for the Trump impeachments. There is zero chance any, let alone enough, Republicans would vote to convict these conservative judges regardless of the evidence and validity of the charge(s).

For Trump, they wouldn't even allow the evidence to be presented to the senate.

It means nothing. It's political theatre to distract from the party's current issues.