Impeachment process against Richard Nixon in the context of "Democratic National Committee"

Richard Nixon's tenure as the 37th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 1969, and ended when he resigned on August 9, 1974, in the face of almost certain impeachment and removal from office, the only U.S. president ever to do so. He was succeeded by Gerald Ford, whom he had appointed vice president after Spiro Agnew became embroiled in a separate corruption scandal and was forced to resign. Nixon, a prominent member of the Republican Party from California who previously served as vice president for two terms under president Dwight D. Eisenhower from 1953 to 1961, took office following his narrow victory over Democratic incumbent vice president Hubert Humphrey and American Independent Party nominee George Wallace in the 1968 presidential election. Four years later, in the 1972 presidential election, he defeated Democratic nominee George McGovern, to win re-election in a landslide. Although he had built his reputation as a very active Republican campaigner, Nixon downplayed partisanship in his 1972 landslide re-election.

Nixon's primary focus while in office was on foreign affairs. He focused on détente with the People's Republic of China and the Soviet Union, easing Cold War tensions with both countries. As part of this policy, Nixon signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and SALT I, two landmark arms control treaties with the Soviet Union. Nixon promulgated the Nixon Doctrine, which called for indirect assistance by the United States rather than direct U.S. commitments as seen in the ongoing Vietnam War. After extensive negotiations with North Vietnam, Nixon withdrew the last U.S. soldiers from South Vietnam in 1973, ending the military draft that same year. To prevent the possibility of further U.S. intervention in Vietnam, Congress passed the War Powers Resolution over Nixon's veto.

The Watergate scandal, or simply Watergate, was a political scandal in the United States involving the administration of President Richard Nixon. The affair began on June 17, 1972, when members of a group associated with Nixon's 1972 re-election campaign were caught burglarizing and planting listening devices in the Democratic National Committee headquarters at Washington, D.C.'s Watergate complex. Nixon's attempts to conceal his administration's involvement led to an impeachment process and his resignation in August 1974.

Emerging from the White House's intelligence efforts to stop leaks, the Watergate break-in was an implementation of Operation Gemstone, enacted by mostly Cuban burglars led by former intelligence agents E. Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy. After the burglars' arrests, investigators traced their funding to the Committee for the Re-Election of the President, the fundraising arm of Nixon's campaign. Further revelations from investigators and reporters like the Washington Post's Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein—who were guided by "Deep Throat", the leaking FBI Associate Director Mark Felt—revealed a political espionage campaign illegally funded by donor contributions. Nixon denied responsibility, but his administration destroyed evidence, obstructed investigators, and bribed the arrested burglars. This cover-up was initially successful and allowed Nixon to win a landslide re-election. Revelations from the burglars' trial in early 1973 led to a Senate investigation. In April, Nixon denied wrongdoing and accepted top aides' resignations.

Richard Nixon's resignation speech was a national television address delivered from the Oval Office by U.S. president Richard Nixon the evening of August 8, 1974, during which Nixon announced his intention to resign the presidency the following day, August 9, 1974, due to the Watergate scandal.

Nixon's resignation was the culmination of what he referred to in his speech as the "long and difficult period of Watergate", a 1970s federal political scandal stemming from the break-in of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) headquarters at the Watergate Office Building by five men during the 1972 presidential election and the Nixon administration's subsequent attempts to cover up its involvement in the crime. Nixon ultimately lost much of his popular and political support as a result of Watergate. At the time of his resignation the next day, Nixon faced almost certain impeachment and removal from office.