The US House of Representatives has voted in favour of proceeding with the next stage of the impeachment investigation into President Donald Trump.
Today’s vote was the first formal test of support for the impeachment process.
The House, which is controlled by the Democrats, voted by 232 to 196 to establish how to hold public hearings in Congress.
The margin of victory showed the Democrats have enough backing to bring articles of impeachment - or formal charges - if they feel the evidence is strong enough.
Only two Democrats voted against today’s motion and it was not backed by any Republicans.
Mr Trump is accused of putting pressure on Ukraine to examine his political rival Joe Biden during a phone call with the country’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy in July.
He has denied all the accusations.
Mr Trump previously compared the process to "a lynching" and tweeted following today’s result that the investigation “was the "Greatest Witch Hunt In American History!".
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said "what is at stake is nothing less than our democracy".
She had commented before the vote that it was a "sad day", adding: "No one comes to Congress to impeach a president."
A spokesperson for the White House said following the vote that Ms Pelosi and the Democrats’ “unhinged obsession with this illegitimate impeachment proceeding does not hurt President Trump; it hurts the American people”.
Statement from @PressSec: https://t.co/iH0GQ8LF4U pic.twitter.com/8C0LRvXkGL
— The White House 45 Archived (@WhiteHouse45) October 31, 2019
The statement said that the Democrats “have done nothing more than enshrine unacceptable violations of due process into House rules” and that this was “unfair, unconstitutional, and fundamentally un-American”.
A decision to vote on actually impeaching Mr Trump is understood to be weeks away.
Additional reporting by IRN
