- The House of Representatives is voting on the first of two articles of impeachment against President Trump, following a marathon day of bitter debate by lawmakers.
- Mr. Trump is likely to become just the third president in American history to be impeached.
- Download the free CBS News app to stream live coverage of the impeachment proceedings.
Washington — The House is voting on the first article of impeachment against President Trump, setting the stage for an extraordinary constitutional rebuke from the lower chamber.
Lawmakers will vote on two articles of impeachment separately: first, the article accusing Mr. Trump of abuse of power, followed by a vote on the article alleging obstruction of Congress.
Members engaged in bitter debate over the articles over the course of nearly eight hours on Wednesday. Republicans denounced Democrats for what they see as a partisan witch hunt that has produced no evidence of wrongdoing by the president. Democrats painted Mr. Trump as an urgent threat who must be removed from office.
“Today, as speaker of the House, I solemnly and sadly open the debate on the impeachment of the president of the United States,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi said from the House floor shortly after noon. “It is tragic that the president’s reckless actions make impeachment necessary. He gave us no choice.”
The votes are the culmination of months of investigation into the president’s efforts to pressure the government of Ukraine to announce investigations that would benefit him politically, including a probe into a company that employed the son of former Vice President Joe Biden, one of the president’s chief potential rivals in his 2020 reelection bid.
Mr. Trump is likely to join Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton as the only presidents to be impeached since the adoption of the Constitution in 1788. Johnson was impeached in 1868 and Clinton in 1999, and both were acquitted in Senate trials.
