Politicians need to be held accountable for their actions. 

No matter what side of the political spectrum you are on, I hope we can agree on the fact that politicians and other people in positions of power must be held accountable for their actions. 

Currently, there is an impeachment hearing going on in the country we live in. 

Impeachment, for those who do not know, is the process in which a legislative body levels charges against a government official.

In July of 2019, the White House administration delayed 400 million dollars in security aid to the country of Ukraine. This was the start of the impeachment inquiries that began in September.

Withholding or giving something to get something you want for personal gain is bribery, a crime, an example of this could be paying the referee of a baseball game to give your team the advantage, with false call and penalties. The advantage is the thing you wanted for personal reasons, very much like the advantage you would get from the investigation of one of your rivals, leveling aid against a country until they agree to investigate that rival. The example that is laid out above is what happens between the White House staff, who act on the part of the president, and the country of Ukraine.

A sensible person would agree that withholding aid until you get something is an example of quid pro quo, also known as bribery. The only reason the aid was released before it had expired was that a whistleblower informed Congress of what was going on. When takling on the subject Trump stated, “We have an obligation to investigate corruption. And that’s what it was.”  That is a wild claim. If you reworded the president’s statement to include what happened, it would look something like this: “We needed to commit a crime and break the law, so we could see if they were committing crimes.” 

Some of the actions of the president are borderline authoritarian; demanding that the whistleblower publicly testify is a problem. The whistleblower went through the right channels and did everything they were supposed to, having them appear or having their name released would put the person in danger. The president’s supporters have in the past attacked people the president calls out and

he knows this, demanding the whistleblower’s name be released is something you would only do if you wanted to put them in danger. 

People need to be held accountable for what they do, no matter who they are or what power they pose. If the country lets the president of our country commit crimes in the open without repercussions, what does that say about us?