Current Affairs Of Pakistan & World: Impeachment is back on the menu

Impeachment is back on the menu

Oct 21, 2026

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THE CATCH-UP

Impeachment dominated much of Donald Trump’s first presidency. Voters think it should come back for a sequel.

Half of Americans support impeaching Trump and more than two-thirds expect Democrats to try if they flip the House — even though they have doubts about whether doing so would materially weaken the president, according to new results from The POLITICO Poll, reported here for the first time.

In total, 54% of Americans — including 81% of voters who plan to support Democrats in the midterms and a quarter of Republican midterm voters — say Trump has committed impeachable offenses, the poll found. More than 41% of respondents said Trump had used the presidency to benefit himself or his family financially, and a third said Democrats should prioritize investigating how he’s enriched himself, while another third said they should focus on probing his immigration crackdown.

At the same time, Americans acknowledge that impeachment may have little impact.

Majorities on both sides of the aisle said Trump’s first two impeachments made no difference to the president or his agenda. More Americans believed another impeachment would make Trump more popular (24%) than less popular (18%).

A chart shows voters' views on impeachment from The POLITICO Poll

Democratic voters are also split on whether their candidates should talk about impeachment in their midterm campaigns. Forty-three percent say they should announce plans to impeach, even if it costs votes, while 41% favor avoiding the issue if that helps them win. That mirrors the dilemma Democratic politicians are facing this cycle, with Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and other Democratic leaders remaining noncommittal about potential impeachment, even though it polls well among their base. Democrats this cycle have campaigned more openly on oversight investigations into Trump and his associates rather than all-out impeachment.

The results indicate that even as Americans agree that the increasingly unpopular president’s conduct has been poor enough to pursue removing him from office, they also think little would happen if Democrats did so. The House impeached Trump twice during his first term — once in 2019 for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, and again in 2021 for incitement of insurrection. Just one presidential cycle (and 34 felony counts) later, he roared back to the White House with 312 electoral votes.

While the president may not be as impacted, Democrats are eyeing his Cabinet members as fair game: Democratic midterm voters say they want to see the House impeach HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (65%), Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth (63%), VP JD Vance (58%) and Secretary of State Marco Rubio (49%). However, fewer than half of all Americans agree.

Good Wednesday afternoon. Thanks for reading Playbook PM. Drop me a line at isentner@politico.com.

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7 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW

1. FIRST IN PLAYBOOK: Republicans’ top Senate super PAC is currently slated to stay off broadcast TV in Georgia's Senate race for the second consecutive week, according to AdImpact, POLITICO's Erin Doherty reports. The move by Senate Leadership Fund comes after the Chuck Schumer-aligned Senate Majority PAC announced Monday it was going dark in Georgia for the second week, the latest twist in an ongoing game of chicken over money in what was once considered a premier battleground.

The two main super PACs have closely mirrored each other's spending in the race as polls show Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff with a lead over GOP Rep. Mike Collins. An Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll out today showed Ossoff leading Collins 48% to 40%. Both SLF and SMP technically still have airtime reserved for the final week before the election, but those reservations are not binding, leaving both groups the flexibility to redirect their money elsewhere. Republicans are assessing their spending situation across the map day by day.

2. OUTLOOK NOT SO GOOD: With just days to go until Election Day, Trump’s approval rating has hit new lows in two new polls and Democrats with wind behind their sails. An NYT/Siena poll found voters giving the president a 36% approval rating among likely voters and preferring Democratic candidates over Republicans by 11 percentage points. And a new CNN/SSRS poll has Trump’s approval rating at 32% and gave Democrats a 10-point advantage nationally. More from POLITICO’s Casey He

3. WAR AND PEACE: Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to resume U.S.-led peace talks with Ukraine as soon as next month after meeting with envoy Steve Witkoff in Saint Petersburg, per Reuters. Witkoff called Putin, who has waged Europe’s bloodiest war since World War II, “a humanitarian” like Trump. “I salute that,” he said, according to Russian state media. More from POLITICO’s Paul Dallison

Speaking of humanitarianism, Putin released Stephen Hubbard after Trump asked him directly on a phone call last week, Trump said this morning on Truth Social. Hubbard, a retired teacher who has been held in Russia since 2022, “is on his way back home and will soon be with his family,” Trump wrote. He added that the U.S. was “not required to give anything in return.”

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4. GRADE INFLATION: Peggy Flanagan, the Democratic Senate nominee in Minnesota, claimed during a March 2016 legislative hearing that she had “graduated Phi Beta Kappa,” a top academic honor. But after the WSJ requested proof, Flanagan’s campaign admitted she had never belonged to the honor society, WSJ’s John McCormick reports. “The lieutenant governor was nominated for Phi Beta Kappa, but like too many other students, she couldn’t afford the application fees to become a part of the honor society,” campaign spokesperson Alexandra Fetissoff said in a statement to the Journal. The current lifetime membership fee at the University of Minnesota, Flanagan’s alma mater, is $99.

5. ILHAN’S COMMUNITY: The federal raid on Rep. Ilhan Omar’s (D-Minn.) home last week — including seizing per personal phone — is raising thorny bipartisan questions about how strongly Congress wants to defend itself from federal prosecutors, POLITICO’s Kyle Cheney reports. Lawmakers use their phones to communicate with aides, colleagues and other stakeholders about official congressional business — material that the Constitution’s “speech or debate” clause makes absolutely immune from scrutiny by federal prosecutors. A representative for the DOJ declined to comment. Representatives for Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Speaker Mike Johnson and Omar did not respond to requests for comment.

6. MICHIGAN MEN: The Senate race has been the big-ticket draw in Michigan, but another tight statewide contest with major implications is playing out there, POLITICO’s Joseph Schatz reports. Republican Doug Lloyd and Democrat Eli Savit are running to replace the state’s term-limited Democratic AG Dana Nessel — and the Republican Attorneys General Association thinks Lloyd is the party’s best chance to flip a seat in a punishing electoral environment.

7. BRAVE NEW WORLD: “Data center real estate is getting hard to find,” by POLITICO’s Kelsey Tamborrino and colleagues: “They say real estate is all about location, location, location. The prime spots for the construction of data centers are getting sparser, sparser, sparser. … Instead of ramping up tax incentives, 16 state legislatures have considered outright bans on their development. As the glut in projects strains U.S. electrical grids and voters from both parties increasingly sour on the bulky facilities, developers are rethinking what they really need.”

TALK OF THE TOWN

BUNCH TELLS ALL — City Cast DC’s Michael Schaffer speaks with Lonnie Bunch, the outgoing Smithsonian secretary, about his exit amid intense scrutiny from the Trump administration. “[T]he one thing that I will stand strongly for is the notion that the Smithsonian is a place where the staff loves America. The notion that somehow the Smithsonian is anti-American is just farthest from the truth,” Bunch told Schaffer. “There are 7,000 public servants who work at the Smithsonian in all parts of the organization whose job it is simply to help people find understanding, clarity, and a little bit of truth.”

OUT AND ABOUT — Washingtonian magazine and Ned’s Club hosted the Most Powerful Women in Washington reception last night. Guests enjoyed passed hors d’oeuvres by chef Joshua Smith including lobster lollipops, garden tarts and fried chicken topped with caviar, alongside signature cocktails named the “Leading Lady” and the “Changemaker.” SPOTTED: Cathy Merrill, Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger, U.S. Attorney for D.C. Jeanine Pirro, D.C. Councilmember and mayoral nominee Janeese Lewis George, Chief Judge Anna Blackburne-Rigsby, Judge Ebony Scott, Gina Adams, David Urban, Jennifer Griffin, Tammy Haddad, Susan Carroll, Linda Rabbitt, Joiwind Ronen, Emma Mears, Sherene Joseph and Alexandria Hammond.

TRANSITION — Davis Pace is joining Jones Walker LLP as special counsel. He most recently was president and CEO of the Mississippi Enterprise for Technology and is a House Foreign Affairs alum.

ENGAGED — Gabriella Borter, a D.C. breaking news editor at Bloomberg, and Affan Ahmad, a director of business development at Bora Biologics, got engaged Sept. 30 in Ravello, Italy, where he proposed while they were on vacation. They met on Bumble and had their first date at Pearl’s Bagels in February 2023. Pic … Another pic, courtesy of Gianni di Natale

WELCOME TO THE WORLD — Lesley Byers, comms director for the House Intelligence GOP, and John Byers, chief of staff for Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas), recently welcomed Navy Katherine Byers. She joins big siblings Madison and John. Pic … Another pic

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