The odds that the US Congress will impeach Donald Trump, or force him to resign, before the end of his first term as US president shifted significantly in the days following his one-on-one with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki last week.
Internet sportsbooks that spread political prop bets such as Paddy Power, 5Dimes, and Bovada all lowered their odds on the likelihood of an early end to the Trump presidency.
Bovada has the lowest odds. They have a line of -200 on the chances of impeachment. Bovada also put up two proposition bets on Monday. One was “Will Donald Trump be convicted by the Senate in his first term?” The yes is at +450. Odds that he will he resign before completing his first term are much better at +200.
Paddy Power has a more conservative line, with impeachment chances at 2/1. The line was 4/1 before the two world leaders met in Finland.
That line was as high as 12/1, but since the July 16 Helsinki summit, where the two leaders met in private, the odds have plummeted. After the meeting, Trump seemed to rebuke his own intelligence agency, and said that he didn’t believe Putin and Russia interfered with the 2016 election. He later clarified his statement to say that he misspoke, but he received heavy condemnation from both Democratic and Republican leaders, who said some of Trump’s staff should be fired.
Historic Impeachment Odds
Paddy Power hired a Trump specialist last year to set lines in regards to the controversial American president. They have several prop bets ranging from his chances to win the Nobel Peace Prize to whether he can get Mexico to pay for his proposed border wall.
The resignation and impeachment section has been extremely popular, according to Lee Price, a spokesperson for Paddy Power. He told the Washington Post that the impeachment prop is seeing far more action than wagers on Brexit or any UK elections.
“What this whole Moscow gruel has taught us is that the Donald is still the biggest ticket in town — and people love to bet on his downfall,” Price said. “Given the complexity of the impeachment process, that’s an unprecedented price in terms of how short it is. No president in modern history has had such short odds.”
Presidential Approval Lines
A recent survey of Americans might have influenced the line. A poll conducted for CNN, a news network that Trump calls “fake news,” said that 42 percent thought he should be impeached. Five months before President Richard Nixon resigned, 43 percent of those asked thought he should be impeached.
His approval ratings also took a hit. They had been on the rise, and in May were at 41 percent. This poll dropped them down to 39 percent. Still, the number is higher than the 35 percent in February. Paddy Power has a bet on whether his approval rating will drop below 20 percent in his first term. The yes is 3/1.
The lowest ever approval rating dating back to Franklin Delano Roosevelt belonged to his successor, Harry Truman, who had a low mark of 22 percent twice during his second term in office in the early 1950s.
Legislators have mostly dismissed any serious talk about trying to remove Trump from office.
Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), a member of the House Judiciary Committee, told The Hill on Monday that it was “premature” to discuss Trump’s impeachment.
“We should do all we can to make sure that he’s held accountable, that we conduct the investigations the Republicans have been unwilling to do,” Swalwell said. “If impeachment is the case, it’s because we found impenetrable evidence that we take to the American people and will be accepted by both Republicans and Democrats.”
