The Democrats' articles of impeachment include a 'death blow' for Trump

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The articles of impeachment announced and published by House Democrats on Tuesday obviously aim to remove President Trump from office. But the goal apparently doesn't end there.

Buried on page five of the resolution is a line that says Trump has shown he also deserves to be disqualified from holding "any office of honor, trust, or profit under the United States." Basically, it seeks to banish Trump from any aspect of U.S. political life. That might seem like a given for a president removed from office, but it actually requires a separate Senate majority vote, so this doesn't appear to be something the House Democrats just threw in to make the text sound more dramatic.

The language was also included in former President Bill Clinton's articles of impeachment, but not in former President Richard Nixon's. Tim O'Donnell

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Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.