What Joe Biden's Impeachment Would Look Like 

• Republicans are threatening to impeach Joe Biden over an alleged "criminal scheme" said to be contained in a FBI document.
• While the GOP may win an impeachment vote in the House, getting it through the Democrat-led Senate is another story.
• Some see the action as a tit-for-tat retaliation by the GOP after House Democrats impeached Donald Trump.
• One expert told Newsweek the process is "likely to make the next election cycle as ugly as the U.S. has ever seen."

President Joe Biden is facing the prospect of impeachment by Republicans in Congress amid as-yet unspecified allegations of a "criminal scheme" involving bribery and an unnamed foreign individual.

Senator Chuck Grassley and Representative James Comer, both Republicans, are demanding that the FBI produce an unclassified record "alleging a criminal scheme involving then-Vice President Joe Biden and a foreign national."

Comer, who is chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, has issued a subpoena to the FBI seeking an unclassified FD-1023 document that a whistleblower has told the Republicans exists.

The FBI was given until May 10 to comply with the subpoena, though it was not clear what information the document might contain.

No specific allegations have been made against Biden but the record in question "allegedly details an arrangement involving an exchange of money for policy decisions," according to a press release from Grassley and Comer last week.

White House spokesman Ian Sams strongly criticized the Republicans in a statement shared with Newsweek last Wednesday, saying they were "floating anonymous innuendo, amplified by the megaphone of their allies in right-wing media, to get attention and try to distract and deflect from their own unpopular ideas and lack of solutions to the issues the American people actually care about."

Republicans' Willingness to Impeach Biden

Some Republicans in Congress have been itching to impeach the president almost since his inauguration in January 2021. One of the most prominent advocates of impeachment is Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene.

Greene, who sits on the House Oversight committee, said last week that she now has evidence to prove President Biden's criminality and predicted he will face impeachment.

"Now on the Oversight Committee, because we have real subpoena powers, we have the power to investigate and we have the power to do what we're doing now," Greene told former White House senior adviser Steve Bannon's War Room: Battleground podcast.

"We're calling for Christopher Wray, the director of the FBI, to come before the Oversight Committee and bring with him a form, FD-1023—it's unclassified right now, but I bet very soon it will be classified—and that form shows the proof that Joe Biden took a money payment from a foreign national in exchange for policy decisions while he was vice president of the United States," she said.

"This means that Joe Biden will be impeached," Greene added.

Nonetheless, Republican Representative Jim Jordan appeared to pour could water on the possibility of impeaching Biden.

Jordan, chair of the powerful House Judiciary Committee, told Punchbowl news last week that while Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas "certainly warrants impeachment" when it comes to Biden "that's a decision that's going to be made by the full Republican Conference and the speaker, and no one's really focused on that now."

While House Republicans seem somewhat divided on the issue, the results of Comer's subpoena could act as a catalyst for impeachment.

How Impeachment Works

The process of impeaching a sitting president is relatively simple. Articles of impeachment are introduced in the House and if a simple majority of its members approve one or more of the articles, then the president has been impeached.

Republicans currently have 222 seats in the House to Democrats' 213, meaning the GOP has the necessary votes to approve articles of impeachment.

Article II, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution states: "The President, Vice President and all Civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors."

The term "high crimes and misdemeanors" has never been particularly clearly defined.

Once the House approves articles of impeachment, they are then sent to the Senate, where the Constitution provides for a trial. The president can only be removed from office if he's convicted in the Senate and the Constitution requires a two-thirds supermajority for conviction.

Democrats currently have the slimmest majority in the Senate—there are 48 Democrats, 49 Republicans and three independents who currently caucus with the president's party.

"The hard-core, MAGA-oriented, constituency base of the Republican Party believes that the two impeachments of former president Donald Trump were partisan 'witch hunts,' without legitimate justification, and hankers for retaliation," Paul Quirk, a political scientist at the University of British Columbia in Canada, told Newsweek.

"The idea is essentially, 'the Democrats impeached Trump, so we should impeach Biden.' Some House Republicans—Oversight Committee Chair James Comer, Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan, and the militantly delusional Marjorie Taylor Greene—are eagerly promoting the impeachment project," he added.

Quirk told Newsweek the push to impeach Biden was "premature," however.

"The advocates have not offered credible evidence of any significant misconduct on Biden's part, much less the significant evidence of 'high crimes' that could warrant a formal impeachment investigation," he said.

Removing a President

While several presidents have been impeached, none has ever been removed from office and with the numbers in the Senate, it appears highly unlikely that Biden will become the first president ever removed by senators.

At the moment, there are no specific allegations against the president and much may depend on whether Democratic senators find any allegations credible—the vote may not necessarily be entirely partisan.

While former President Donald Trump was acquitted by the Senate in his second impeachment trial in early 2021, seven Republican senators joined all Democrats in voting to convict him.

In 1999, several Republican senators voted to acquit then President Bill Clinton on two charges. Ten Republicans voted with Democrats to find Clinton not guilty on a charge of perjury, and five GOP senators joined all Democrats in finding the president not guilty on a charge of obstruction of justice.

Risks to Republicans

The GOP is likely to find little support among Democrats for any impeachment effort and bringing forward articles of impeachment could pose political risks ahead of the crucial 2024 presidential election.

"Republicans need to tread carefully with impeachment talk, as it has a huge potential to backfire," Thomas Gift, founding director of University College London's Centre on U.S. Politics, told Newsweek.

"Defenders will say that Democrats already weaponized impeachment under Trump, and so taking on Biden is well within the bounds of the GOP House majority," he said. "But a big risk is that the maneuver would be seen for what it is: petty, overtly partisan, and a distraction from delivering on policy promises for the American people."

President Biden could make political hay out of a likely failed attempt to remove him from office.

"All of that could enable Biden his own opportunity to take a page out of Trump's playbook and cry 'witch hunt,'" Gift told Newsweek.

"If there's one thing that might mobilize enthusiasm among the liberal base for Biden, it's him being subject to a Marjorie Taylor Greene-led political assassination. Heading into 2024, where the president is already vulnerable, energizing rank-and-file Democrats is the last thing Republicans want," he added.

Satisfying the Party Base

Short of impeachable offenses, Republicans in Congress are likely to keep pressure on the Biden administration, and the House GOP is already using its investigative powers.

Quirk pointed to the Judiciary Committee's "weaponization of the federal government" investigation but said it had been "producing epic fails."

"House Republicans will probably be content to allow the Judiciary and Oversight Committees to continue soliciting informants, demanding documents—appropriately or not—and making reckless accusations against Biden or other administration officials. Conceivably, they will eventually turn up useable evidence of an impeachable offense. Hope springs eternal," Quirk said.

"Failing that, the ongoing efforts will at least keep the party base satisfied with the appearance of impending retaliation," he added.

Following Democrats' Example

If Republicans are motivated by the fact that former President Trump was impeached twice, they may seek to follow Democrats' example in bringing impeachment charges against Biden.

Quirk told Newsweek that if at some point "House Republicans decide to initiate a formal impeachment investigation, it will presumably begin with closed-door proceedings—staff research, interviewing and deposing of witnesses, and miscellaneous sleuthing—in the Judiciary Committee."

"If they follow the example of the Democrats' procedures in the Trump impeachments, the committee will not hold public hearings unless and until it has developed credible evidence of one or more impeachable offenses—supporting charges that appear likely to gain virtually unanimous agreement in the party and to be taken seriously by mainstream media," he said.

"The Democrats' charges against Trump even persuaded a few Republican legislators and many conservative commentators," Quirk noted. "It is also possible, however, that the Trumpist Republicans will force public hearings, or perhaps even impeachment votes, on the basis of sketchy evidence and obviously flimsy charges."

"The spectacle would energize the party base while alienating moderate Republicans and swing voters," he added.

Draining Voter Confidence

Any attempt to impeach Biden will almost certainly be seen in light of the fact that he's now officially running for a second term. Though removing him from office may already be off the table, Republicans could try to damage him in the eyes of the electorate through impeachment.

"Ever since the 117th Congress first came together in January 2021, and especially since the 118th convened with a GOP House majority in 2023, Republicans have been looking for a hook to hang charges of high crimes and misdemeanors on Joe Biden," said Mark Shanahan, an associate professor in politics at the University of Surrey in the U.K. and co-editor of The Trump Presidency: From Campaign Trail to World Stage.

He pointed to the fact Representative Greene "filed articles of impeachment against Biden the day after his inauguration."

"They failed to gain any traction, and subsequently there has been much congressional hot air expelled but little concrete action in terms of impeaching the president," Shanahan told Newsweek.

"Now the GOP believe they have something substantial that might be enough to at least get the impeachment process moving in the House," he went on.

Shanahan said that the grounds for impeachment rest "on potential evidence the FBI may or may not have and, at this stage, appears more of a fishing expedition than any serious threat to the president."

"But any impeachment activity is a distraction, and one that is designed to drain voter confidence in its target," he said. "Republicans know that without a majority in the Senate, their efforts are doomed to failure. They also know that collecting evidence and winning a vote in the House is not likely to be a quick process. But that's the nub of this issue."

'A Dirty Political Race to the Bottom'

Former President Trump remains the frontrunner for the Republican presidential in 2024 and he's facing ongoing legal issues. Trump was indicted in Manhattan on March 30 and he pleaded not guilty to 34 charges related to his alleged hush money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels in 2016. The next in-person hearing is set for December 4.

Shanahan suggested impeaching Biden could be a tactic designed to level the playing field in terms of voters' views on both men's alleged criminality.

"The Republican Party's likely presidential challenger remains Donald Trump," Shanahan said. "He already faces charges in New York while several other judicial investigations rumble on."

"There is a strong element of 'whataboutism' in attempting to align a 'criminal' Biden alongside Trump—a swift and dirty political race to the bottom," he said

Marjorie Taylor Greene's Grenade

Testimony ended last week in a civil case brought against Trump by writer E. Jean Carroll, who has accused Trump of raping her in the mid-1990s. The former president denies the accusation.

Separately, Special Counsel Jack Smith is continuing to probe Trump's actions relating to the January 6 Capitol riot, as well as his alleged mishandling of classified documents discovered at his Mar-a-Lago residence, while a grand jury in Georgia is examining whether or not Trump pushed for 2020 election results to be overturned there.

Shanahan said that as Trump "becomes increasingly mired in legal actions, Republican strategists and legislators need to drag the president down too."

"Allied, and indeed part of this, is the need for Republicans to create as much distraction as possible as the DOJ moves closer to some serious political indictments around the January 6, 2021, insurrection."

"Biden will not be successfully impeached while president of the United States, but it's clearly the intent of the GOP to make the whole political world appear as dark, murky and corrupt as they possibly can," he added.

"This Greene grenade is just one weapon in an 18-month process likely to make the next election cycle as ugly as the U.S. has ever seen," Shanahan warned.

Teasing Allegations Like an 'Avengers' Movie

No specific allegations have yet been made against President Biden, despite calls for his impeachment.

David A. Bateman, an associate professor of government at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, told Newsweek that the current allegations against Biden should be treated with skepticism.

He described Greene as "almost certainly the least credible person in Congress, and not someone whose obvious hype jobs should be given oxygen."

"That this is also coming from Comer and Grassley might provide a patina of credibility to the allegation, were it not for the fact that it's being teased like the release of an Avengers movie or new-model blender," he went on.

Credible Evidence

Bateman said that teasing evidence "is a PR move, not a mark of a serious investigation."

"The very specificity of the claim—the repeated invocation of form FD-1023—should be a tell," he said. "They could just say that someone has made an allegation which they are planning to investigate, which as I understand it is what an FD-1023 form is, but that would be less tantalizing than teasing the possibility of a government document providing concrete evidence of a crime."

Bateman said that "there is no reason for the media to participate in hyping this."

"If they can produce credible evidence, they will produce it," he said. "Until then, or until they've established a track record of producing real evidence, there's neither much real worry of impeachment nor any reason to participate in the hype job."