House Votes Against Trump Impeachment
The US House of Representatives on Wednesday voted by a large majority of 332 to 95 to kill the first articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump, The Hill reports.
A majority of Democrats, along with the chamber’s Republicans, voted to table the measure sponsored by Rep. Al Green (D-TX), while 95 Democrats voted in favor of it.
This marks the first time the Democratic House has been confronted with a vote on impeachment, and comes a week before former special counsel Robert Mueller is set to testify before two committees on Capitol Hill.
Green, whose previous impeachment votes have accused Trump of inflaming racial tensions, offered the measure immediately after the House on Tuesday voted to condemn Trump over tweets targeting four minority Democratic congresswomen.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has sought to quash talk of impeachment, and her side won the vote on Wednesday. But it also made clear a large number of Democrats want to take action against Trump even before hearing from Mueller.
Green argued that the House should go further and move to impeach Trump for a pattern of inflaming racial tensions in America.
He forced a vote on his articles of impeachment by filing them as a “privileged” resolution, triggering a process that requires House floor action within two legislative days.
“Today’s vote is to determine whether or not we will punish the president. The effort yesterday was wonderful. I supported it. But it does not punish the president,” Green said in a House floor speech.
