Displaying items by tag: impeachment

(Washington)

Trump’s legal team put out a bold proclamation today. In a 171-page briefing that preceded the launch of his impeachment trial in the Senate, Trump’s lawyers argue that he cannot be removed from office for abusing power. They contend that since he did not break any laws, he cannot be removed from office. The team summarized their view, “House Democrats’ novel theory of ‘abuse of power’ improperly supplants the standard of ‘high crimes and misdemeanours’ with a made-up theory that would permanently weaken the presidency by effectively permitting impeachments based merely on policy disagreements”.

FINSUM: This is a very interesting argument as the legal team seems to have changed tactics. Rather than arguing the underlying facts in the case, they are now trying to say that even if all the facts are true, Trump still cannot be removed from office.

(Washington)

While it never really seemed to be in doubt, it is all but certain now that Democrats are going to bring articles of impeachment against President Trump. The party is likely to bring two separate articles against Trump by today, with an additional one possible. One will be focused on abuse of power, and the other one or two on obstructing Congress and obstruction of justice. In response to Republican criticism that the Democrats are rushing the impeachment process, Jerrold Nadler said “I want to be absolutely clear: the integrity of our next election is at stake. Nothing could be more urgent”.

FINSUM: No surprises here, but this will likely all be for nothing because of the Senate.

(Washington)

In any interesting twist, President Trump has announced that he may personally testify in his impeachment probe. Trump has indicated he is interested in the idea of being able to set the record straight himself. He says “Even though I did nothing wrong, and don’t like giving credibility to this No Due Process Hoax, I like the idea & will, in order to get Congress focused again, strongly consider it!”. Trump’s comments came at the urging of House speaker Nancy Pelosi’s request for him to testify. The president could testify via writing or in-person.

FINSUM: We doubt this will happen (Trump’s lawyers would probably be remiss in letting him testify in person), but it is an interesting turn. Imagine the media frenzy!

(Washington)

Between all the whistleblowers, and the questions over whether they actually had first hand knowledge, the ongoing impeachment inquiry centered on Trump’s phone call with Ukraine has become more confusing by the day. However, fresh news today has added weight to the situation. In particular, career US envoy to Ukraine William Taylor gave a deposition to the House inquiry which stated that Trump made the payment of US security assistance to Ukraine explicitly tied to the Ukrainian president opening a public investigation into Biden. Taylor says that in exchange for the aid to Ukraine, “President Trump did insist that President Zelensky go to a microphone and say he is opening investigations of Biden and 2016 election interference, and that President Zelensky should want to do this himself”.

FINSUM: Regardless of your position on this, Taylor’s testimony adds a lot of weight to the situation, as this is no longer an anonymous whistleblower. The impeachment inquiry just got more serious.

(Washington)

House Speaker Nany Pelosi made big waves yesterday when she announced a formal impeachment inquiry into President Trump, all stemming from the alleged Ukrainian incident. The political implications are one aspect, but what does this mean for the stock market? The answer is that nobody knows. Nixon’s impeachment process saw a big loss in stocks, but it was also the Oil Crisis; while Clinton’s impeachment was quite positive for equities. Each situation was completely unique, as was the market environment at the time.

FINSUM: Our best guess is that this won’t do much to stocks, mostly because there has been so much political theater over the last few years that, for better or worse, this likely just seems to be more of the same for investors.