Republicans say impeachment will backfire — history says it won’t
1 / 2 -- Citing their experience in the 1990s, Republicans warned Democrats this week that an impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump’s dealings with Ukraine would backfire politically.Only three U.S. presidents have ever faced a serious threat of removal by Congress – Andrew Johnson, Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton -- and in each case the party that initiated the inquiry ended up benefiting in the next election.
Brenda Wineapple, author of “The Impeachers,” said that Republicans who impeached but failed to convict Johnson after the Civil War “didn’t suffer politically,” as they maintained control of Congress and their party’s candidate, Ulysses Grant, won the White House in the 1868 elections. Nonetheless, the conventional wisdom has long been that the Clinton impeachment effort hurt Republicans because they lost House seats in the 1998 midterm elections.
But political scientists say that leaves out the effect on the presidential election two years later. Impeachment and the scandal that brought it about complicated Vice President Al Gore’s presidential campaign, leading to a narrow victory by Republican George W. Bush, who pledged to “restore honor and dignity” to the White House.
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