01-02-2020 - CHEC BULLETIN

President Trump is the third president in the nation’s history to be impeached. The two others — Bill Clinton and Andrew Johnson — were eventually acquitted in a Senate trial, the expected outcome for the current president.

The latest impeachment inquiry involves allegations that Trump withheld military aid to Ukraine to secure an investigation into former Vice President Joe Biden, a potential 2020 political rival.

The complicated and highly divisive process can lead to fraught discussions in class. Teachers say they are careful to remain objective and render facts about the procedure without injecting personal beliefs.

“I don’t want to be accused of trying to influence students with whatever my political leanings or biases may be,” said Todd Smith, chair of the social studies department at Southern High School in Harwood, Md. “I generally tend to be kind of reserved when it comes to talking about modern-day politics, because it can get so heated, it can get so contentious.”

Smith, who teaches in a rural, Republican-leaning community, said he has not heard many students talk or ask about impeachment on their own.

But the topic has emerged in lessons about checks and balances and the rule of law. After the House of Representatives voted to impeach Trump this week, Smith devoted half a class period to cover the vote and the process moving forward.

“That’s historic stuff,” he said.

In liberal Arlington County, social studies teacher Michael Palermo said he thinks his students are paying close attention.

During lessons about the Enlightenment, Palermo said he usually introduces students to Montesquieu’s ideas on the separation of powers. And in the past, he has used impeachment as an example of a legislative check on the president’s power.

“Now that it’s happening, that’s something that I can point to that they’ll be able to understand, they’ll be able to connect with better,” said Palermo, who is planning on holding a simulation of the Senate trial in class.

Even before the inquiry into Trump’s dealings with Ukraine, his presidency and the hyper-partisan political climate have affected the way some teachers talk to students and teach government.

At the Columbia Heights Educational Campus, Connor still explains how a bill becomes a law. But he also feels he has to talk about how political gridlock has prevented Congress from passing laws.

After Trump was elected in 2016, Connor said the mood on campus was “somber.” The city is heavily Democratic and students at the school are majority black and Hispanic.

He strives to remain apolitical while calming students’ fears about immigration crackdowns and the threat to Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which allows children who were brought to the country illegally to stay in the United States.

It’s the first impeachment any of the students in Connor’s class have witnessed — the teenagers were not alive in 1998 when Clinton was impeached by the House and later acquitted of perjury and obstruction of justice by the U.S. Senate.

The teenagers are learning just how tough it is to remove a president from office.

“He’s the president, but I don’t think anyone should be above the law,” Strong said.

The Senate trial on abuse of power and obstruction of Congress is expected to begin in January.

When the time comes, Connor and his students will be paying attention.