William_T._Bianco,_David_T._Canon]_American_Polit

446 Chapter 12Chapter 12 || The PresidencyThe Presidency

Congress also has the power to remove the president or vice president from office

through the impeachment process. However, removing a president is much more

difficult than passing a law to undo a unilateral action. First, House members must

impeach (indict) the president by majority vote, which accuses him or her of a crime or

breach of his or her sworn duties. Then senators hold a trial, followed by a vote in which a

two-thirds majority is required to remove the president from office. Only two presidents

have faced an impeachment vote: Andrew Johnson in 1866 and Bill Clinton in 1999 (a

third president, Richard Nixon, resigned from office to prevent an impeachment vote).

Johnson was involved in a political dispute over administration of the southern states

after the Civil War; Clinton was alleged to have lied under oath in a sexual harassment

lawsuit. Although both of these presidents were impeached by the House, they were

not convicted by the Senate, so they stayed in office. One reason impeachment is

difficult is that members of Congress who are upset about certain presidential actions

might nevertheless oppose removing the president from office. They might approve

of the president’s other initiatives, want to prevent the vice president from becoming

president, or have concerns about the political backlash that impeachment could

generate against them or their party. Thus, even though Democrats took over the House

in the 2018 midterms, they still lacked a plurality in the Senate (let alone the 67-vote

supermajority) necessary to remove Trump from office.

In sum, ambiguities in the Constitution create opportunities for unilateral presidential

action. These actions are subject to reversal through legislation, court decisions, and

impeachment, but members of Congress face significant costs if they undertake any of

these options. As long as presidents are careful to limit their exercise of unilateral power

to actions that do not generate intense opposition in Congress, they can implement a wide

range of policy goals without official congressional consent—provided that bureaucrats

go along with the president’s wishes, a question we take up in the next chapter.

Presidents as Politicians

Aside from situations in which the president has (or has been given) the authority to

act unilaterally, the reality of presidential power is that much of what presidents do

(or want to do) requires support from others, including legislators, bureaucrats, and

citizens. As a result, the presidency is an inherently political office—something that

all presidents learn is true, regardless of their expectations when they take office.^35

Presidents have to take into account the political consequences of their decisions: the

effects on their political support, reelection prospects, and party. A president must also

contend with the reality that achieving his or her personal policy goals often requires

bargaining and compromising with others, both inside and outside government. Many

accounts of President Trump’s first two years in office have emphasized that Trump’s

experience as a CEO, the head of an organization in which his word was law, did not

prepare him for being president, a role in which he faces members of Congress and

bureaucrats who often have the power to reject presidential initiatives.

In part, presidents must keep their eyes on the political implications of their actions

in office because they want to be reelected to a second term. One important indicator

of presidential performance is the presidential approval rating, the percentage of the

public who think the president is doing a good job in office. Figure 12.2, which shows the

presidential approval ratings for the last nine presidents who ran for reelection, reveals

that first-term presidents with less than 50 percent approval are in real trouble. No

recent president has been reelected with less than a 50 percent approval rating.

Of course, it would be wrong to say that presidents are single-mindedly focused

on keeping their approval rating as high as possible. For one thing, as we discussed

He’ll sit here, and he’ll say, “Do

this! Do that!” And nothing will

happen. Poor Ike—it won’t be

a bit like the Army. He’ll find it

very frustrating.

—President Harry Truman,

describing incoming president

Dwight Eisenhower

presidential approval rating

The percentage of Americans who

think that the president is doing a

good job in office.

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