Philly DA Larry Krasner has been impeached. Here’s what you should know.

A Pennsylvania House committee on Tuesday approved articles of impeachment against Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner, continuing Republican lawmakers’ attempts to remove him from office for what they’ve described as his dereliction of duty amid the city’s gun violence crisis.

The House Judiciary Committee voted along party lines Tuesday morning to approve the resolution, which accuses Krasner, a Democrat, of not adequately enforcing state laws and says his policies have contributed to the rise in gun violence across the city.

The resolution now moves to a full House vote, which a spokesperson for House Republicans said he anticipates will happen Wednesday.

The attempt to oust an election official is exceedingly rare, experts say, and is expected to set in motion a lengthy, litigious process. Krasner has already filed a suit challenging the validity of a legislative committee investigating his office and has repeatedly cast the GOP-led effort to impeach him as an illegitimate and antidemocratic attempt to disenfranchise Philadelphia voters who reelected him last year.

So why are they seeking to impeach him, and how does that process work? Here’s what we know, and what remains unclear:

Krasner was first elected district attorney in 2017, then reelected by a wide margin last year.

A former civil rights attorney, he ran on a pledge to reform the prosecutor’s office, seeking to divert some low-level offenders away from the criminal-justice system, release wrongfully convicted people from jail, and implement alternatives to cash bail for people accused of nonviolent crimes.

» READ MORE: Pa. House Republicans file articles of impeachment against Philly DA Larry Krasner

For a deeper explanation on what the DA’s Office does, and an overview of the criminal justice process, read this.

In early June, three Republican state lawmakers — none from Philadelphia — said they intended to file articles of impeachment against Krasner over what they called his dereliction of duty in addressing Philadelphia’s gun violence crisis.

Shortly after, the House formed a committee to investigate the DA’s Office and search for grounds to impeach Krasner. The five-person committee, with three Republicans and two Philadelphia Democrats, has until the end of November to investigate, review, and draft a report on Krasner’s tenure amid Philadelphia’s rise in violent crime; the enforcement and prosecution of crime; the use of public funds for that purpose; and his office’s treatment of victims, among other things.

Last month, the committee also recommended that a separate financial audit be conducted into how Krasner’s office spends state dollars that are allocated to the Gun Violence Task Force, an investigative effort led by prosecutors, police, and field agents from both Krasner’s and Attorney General Josh Shapiro’s offices.

In October, the committee released a 63-page report that took aim at Krasner’s tenure, highlighting issues including a declining conviction rate, an increasing number of firearms cases being withdrawn or dismissed, and high staff turnover, seeking to link those issues and others to the city’s ongoing gun violence crisis.

It was critical of Krasner’s work, noting in particular that a higher number of prosecutions, including gun cases, were being dismissed or withdrawn during his tenure than in years past. This, the report noted, came as shootings and homicides were on the rise, and it said there was “no doubt” that “criminals are emboldened” by a lack of arrests and failing prosecutions.

But the report also highlighted issues not directly connected to the prosecutor’s office — such as the Police Department’s staffing shortages, and its low arrest rates in shootings and homicides, which have left thousands of cases unsolved. Krasner has frequently pointed out that his office approves charges in nearly every shooting or killing in which the police make an arrest.

And the report criticized Krasner’s response to the committee’s probe, citing his “repeated and ongoing obstruction” of its work.

State Rep. Martina White, a Philadelphia Republican and frequent Krasner critic, is the prime sponsor of the legislation. She introduced two articles of impeachment.

One accuses Krasner of “misbehavior in office,” saying his “lack of proper leadership” caused a two-year spike in gun violence in the city. The article says Krasner’s policies “have eviscerated the District Attorney’s Office’s ability to adequately enforce the laws of this Commonwealth” and endangered the people of Philadelphia.

Krasner has said that the rate of gun-related incidents has soared in jurisdictions across the country and that his policies have been aimed at making the system more just.

The second article accuses him of obstructing the work of the committee that was formed to investigate him. It notes that he was held in contempt after refusing to comply with a subpoena and says his response to the subpoena “fall[s] far short of what could be described as a reasonable good faith effort.”

Krasner and his legal team filed a petition in Commonwealth Court in September arguing that the committee and the subpoena are illegal, and that challenge remains pending.

And after Krasner was held in contempt, his office provided the committee with some records on his office’s policies. He said the committee’s attempt to obtain case files related to the investigation of a Philadelphia police officer violated grand jury secrecy laws.

Pennsylvania’s constitution says an official can be impeached and removed “for any misbehavior in office.”

But that requires evidence of corruption or clear misbehavior in office, not simply political or ideological disagreements, said Bruce Ledewitz, a Duquesne University professor of state and federal constitutional law.

The majority of what is set out in the articles of impeachment released Wednesday does not meet that standard, Ledewitz said.

“Ninety-percent of this is a campaign ad,” he said. “It has nothing to do with impeachment and removal.”

There are two arguments that could meet those grounds if Republicans can prove them, he said: The accusation that Krasner’s office denied former police officer Ryan Pownall his due-process rights when charging him with murder in an on-duty shooting of a fleeing suspect, and the notion that Krasner is not enforcing laws against crimes such as prostitution, theft, and marijuana possession.

But even if Republicans succeed in proving either of those allegations, Ledewitz said, adding in the other bits of policy objections, which he called “unlawful,” runs the risk of a court rejecting the whole case.

The last person to be impeached and ultimately removed was Rolf Larsen, a onetime state Supreme Court justice, who in 1994 was ousted for making legal decisions based on improper conversations with a political supporter.

By that point, he’d already been convicted of a drug-related conspiracy. At sentencing, the judge removed Larsen from the bench. Even so, the state Senate voted 49-0 on an impeachment article later in the year.

The only other examples of impeachments that led to removals occurred more than 200 years ago, according to a memo prepared several years ago by a House Democratic lawyer. In 1803, Alexander Addison, a judge, was removed for improperly interfering with a grand jury. And in 1811, another judge, Thomas Cooper, was found to have committed an array of misdeeds, including fining and imprisoning people who wore hats to court, the memo said.

Now that a House committee has approved the legislation, it will be sent to the full House for a potential vote. A spokesperson for House Republicans said that would likely happen Wednesday.

To approve the impeachment, the Republican-controlled House would require a simple-majority vote. Then, it would move to the state Senate, where a trial would be held.

A conviction and removal from office would require a two-thirds majority vote from the Senate. If convicted by the Senate, Krasner would be removed from office. It’s unclear how he would be replaced.

In the Senate’s current makeup, conviction would require a vote from every Republican, the lone independent, and five Democrats.

When the committee subpoenaed the DA’s Office, Krasner and his legal team challenged the subpoena and the committee’s validity in Commonwealth Court.

They could do the same if the House votes to impeach him, Ledewitz said.

Krasner could argue that it’s an intolerable burden to defend himself in the Senate if it’s not on lawful grounds, he said. Ledewitz suspects, though, that the courts would not intervene until after the Senate’s vote. The matter would likely go to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.

If the House impeaches Krasner, the timeline for when a trial could take place in the Senate is up for debate. Legislation typically needs to be approved by both chambers in a single legislative session, and the current session ends at the end of November.

Democrats say that means if Republicans want to hold a trial in the state Senate, it would need to take place in the same session in which impeachment was approved. Ledewitz said he wasn’t aware of any rule codifying that as a mandate.

And Benninghoff has suggested that’s not necessarily the case, saying that because the entire Senate does not turn over at the end of the legislative session, “we believe we can continue the process.”

Political and legal observers say the dispute over timing could be grounds for a challenge in court.

Staff writer Craig McCoy contributed to this article.