Trump impeachment charges finally unveiled as president accused of abuse of power and obstruction

House Democrats have announced they will proceed with articles of impeachment against Donald Trump, charging the president with obstruction of congress and abuse of power surrounding his dealings with Ukraine.

“Today, in service to our duty to the constitution and to our country, the House Committee on the Judiciary is introducing two articles of impeachment, charging the president of the US, Donald J Trump, with committing high crimes and misdemeanours,” House judiciary chair Jerrold Nadler said. “No one, not even the president, is above the law.”

Democrats said the president abused his power in demanding political investigations from Ukraine to aid him in his 2020 re-election, while withholding crucial military aid and an important White House visit to the country as it fights a war with Russia-backed insurgents.

The historic decision came after key impeachment witnesses described a quid pro quo involving US-Ukraine relations under Mr Trump, in which the president was demanding announcements of the probes from his Ukrainian counterpart in exchange for support from the US.

The articles of impeachment describe Mr Trump’s dealings with Ukraine as a “scheme” and say he “solicited the interference of a foreign government” in the 2020 election, adding: “President Trump engaged in this scheme or course of conduct for corrupt purposes in pursuit of personal political benefit.”

“In all of this, President Trump abused the powers of the presidency by ignoring and injuring national security and other vital national interests to obtain an improper personal political benefit,” the articles read. The charges also said Mr Trump obstructed congress “without lawful cause or excuse”, and added: “In the history of the Republic, no president has ever ordered the complete defiance of an impeachment inquiry.”​

Katherine Clark, a Massachusetts Democrat and the vice chair of the Democratic caucus, said the impeachment articles demonstrated and “urgency” that was “reflective of our concern of the clear and present danger the president poses to the 2020 elections”, in a statement to The Independent.

“We are confident that we are holding the president accountable,” she added, “which is the right thing to do, not only to address his behaviour of the past but to make sure future presidents know that no one is above the law.”

Some Democrats went so far as to accuse Mr Trump of bribery after his White House withheld nearly $400m (£304m) of military aid to Ukraine while seeking political probes from the country’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky. However, the House Judiciary Committee declined to draft an article charging the president with bribery – one of the three categories of impeachable offences written in the US constitution.

Still, Democratic leadership said the efforts on the part of the White House reflected a pattern of misconduct by Mr Trump and his closest aides. The house speaker Nancy Pelosi has also tied the White House efforts to block key witnesses from testifying during the Democrat-led impeachment inquiry to its similar intervention in former special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election.

“President Trump engaged in unprecedented, categorical and indiscriminate defiance of the impeachment inquiry”, Mr Nadler said in announcing the articles of impeachment. “This gives rise to the second article of impeachment, for obstruction of congress. Here, too, we see a familiar pattern in President Trump’s misconduct.”

He added: “We do not take this action lightly, but we have taken an oath to defend the constitution. And unlike President Trump, we understand that our duty, first and foremost, is to protect the constitution and to project the interests of the American people.”

House Intelligence chair Adam Schiff also joined Democratic leaders in announcing the impeachment articles, saying Mr Trump “abused the power of his office by conditioning two official acts to get Ukraine to help his re-election”.

Mr Schiff also shot down arguments from Republicans throughout the impeachment inquiry that Democrats should wait for American voters to decide the president’s fate in the 2020 elections.

“The argument, ‘why don’t you just wait’ amounts to this: why don’t you just let him cheat in one more election? Why not let him cheat just one more time? Why not let him have foreign help just one more time? That is what that argument amounts to,” he said.

The announcement marked the fourth time in American history that congress has unveiled articles of impeachment against a US president. With a Democratic majority in the House of Representatives, it appears likely both articles will pass a vote and move on to the US Senate, where a full trial is expected.

When the trial begins in the Senate and how exactly that process might look is left up to Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell and the Republican leadership. The president has asked the Senate to take on the trial process swiftly, while demanding Republicans call on Mr Schiff and other Democrats to testify.

Mr Trump’s 2020 re-election campaign manager, Brad Parscale, called the impeachment process “political theatre”, in a statement to The Independent.

“For months, Nancy Pelosi said she wouldn’t move forward on impeachment because it was too divisive and it needed bipartisan support. Well, it is divisive and only the Democrats are pushing it, but she’s doing it anyway,” he said. “Americans don’t agree with this rank partisanship, but Democrats are putting on this political theatre because they don’t have a viable candidate for 2020 and they know it.”

After the announcement, Mr Trump fired off a series of tweets asserting his innocence and making misleading claims about Mr Schiff.

He wrote: “Nadler just said that I ‘pressured Ukraine to interfere in our 2020 Election.’ Ridiculous, and he knows that is not true. Both the President & Foreign Minister of Ukraine said, many times, that there “WAS NO PRESSURE.” Nadler and the Dems know this, but refuse to acknowledge!

“WITCH HUNT!

“Shifty Schiff, a totally corrupt politician, made up a horrible and fraudulent statement, read it to Congress, and said those words came from me. He got caught, was very embarrassed, yet nothing happened to him for committing this fraud. He’ll eventually have to answer for this!

“Read the Transcripts! “us” is a reference to USA, not me!”