Just when you thought the political betting markets were going to be put into cold storage, along come the Democrats and their bid to impeach Donald Trump.
The orange-skinned president is only the third n history to face impeachment charges, which relate to an apparent blackmail of Ukrainian officials to investigate the son of Joe Biden, who Trump will likely be battling against in the US election in 2020.
Biden Jr used to work in the Ukraine, and the Republican campaign wanting to dig up some dirt on him prior to the electioneering getting under way. It is alleged that Trump threatened to withdraw military aid to the country if they didn’t comply with his wishes.
He has called the impeachment plot a ‘witch hunt’, and denounced his Democrat opposition as simply trying to point score as attention turned to the electoral process in the US.
Either way, the Senate will now get together to go over the evidence, with the trial likely to start in January and continue until it reaches its conclusion. The US Constitution declares that a resident can be impeached for misdemeanours relating to ‘treason, bribery or other high crimes.’
For the sake of context, no US President has ever successfully been impeached before – not even Bill Clinton over those near-the-knuckle revelations from Monica Lewinsky.
How Does This Affect Trumps Re-Election Odds?
Oddly, according to the bookmakers, the impeachment plan has actually strengthened the president’s position in the White House.
News of the proposed impeaching have coincided with the bookies slashing their odds on Donald Trump being re-elected in 2020, and for the first time in nearly four years he finds himself an odds-on chance to win another four years in the hotseat.
| Candidate | Party | Betting Odds |
|---|---|---|
| Donald Trump | Republican | 4/5 |
| Joe Biden | Democratic | 6/1 |
| Bernie Sanders | Democratic | 8/1 |
| Elizabeth Warren | Democratic | 12/1 |
| Pete Buttigieg | Democratic | 12/1 |
| Michael Bloomberg | Democratic | 14/1 |
| Hillary Clinton | Democratic | 25/1 |
In the 24 hours after the impeachment revelations, it was revealed that nearly two thirds of all bets placed with the bookies were for Trump to defeat his Democrat opposition at the polls.
There’s another betting market of consequence too, in the shape of the ‘To Serve Full Term’ bracket. Impeachment would end those hopes, of course, and yet Trump finds himself as short as 1/7 to hold on as president until the next election.
In short, the betting public believe that not only will Trump survive impeachment, but the so-called witch hunt to get into this position will only serve to strengthen his position.
The bookmakers are historically not the best judges on political markets, and Paddy Power even paid out on a Hillary Clinton victory four years ago….costing the firm millions.
The bookies also over-emphasised the amount of support for Labour in the recent UK general election, ignoring the polls and instead being swayed by the amount of social media support for the left wing party.
As we know, it’s votes that count – not platitudes on Twitter – and there is a real chance that supporters of Trump will be infuriated and energised by the actions of the Democrats.
As a result, this looks to be a great time to place your bets on Trump to be re-elected in 2020. His price will continue to shorten from here despite those impeachment fears.