US president Donald Trump has been cleared of all impeachment charges following his trial in the Senate.
On Wednesday, Trump was acquitted of the charges of abuse of power and an obstruction of Congress by 52 votes to 48 and 53 votes to 47 respectively.
Democrats pursued charges following accusations that Trump requested the Ukrainian government to open a corruption investigation into Joe Biden, one of the Democrat presidential candidates.
Trump said that Biden’s son, Hunter, was inappropriately appointed a board member at a Ukrainian natural gas company during his father's stint as head of international relations between the US and Ukraine.
Democrats accused Trump of diverting $391 million [£300 million] of security aid to bribe the Ukrainian government into a smear campaign against Biden.
The president is also believed to have made a personal phone call to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky on July 25, 2019 requesting "a favour" following complaints by an anonymous government source.
The obstruction of Congress charge stems from when the White House frustrated the efforts of impeachment investigators to acquire testimony and documents relating to the first charge.
The Democrat controlled House of Representatives approved the impeachment articles on December 18 2019, leading to Trump’s trial in the Senate. However, a two-third majority vote out of the 100 senators was required to remove him from office.
After being cleared in the Senate, which is largely dominated by his fellow Republicans, Trump will become the first impeached president to campaign for re-election. Only one Republican senator, Utah's Mitt Romney, broke ranks with the party and voted to convict Trump on the first charge of abuse of power in his alleged campaign against the Bidens.
Gallup has reported that Trump's approval ratings with voters in the US has hit a high of 49 per cent this week.
The campaign to re-elect Trump issued a statement following the verdict, accusing the impeachment proceedings of being a Democrat campaign tactic.
It said: "President Trump has been totally vindicated and it's now time to get back to the business of the American people.
"The do-nothing Democrats know they can't beat him, so they had to impeach him.
"This impeachment hoax will go down as the worst miscalculation in American political history.”
