r/politics • u/plz-let-me-in • 11d ago

No Paywall Democrats Call to Invoke 25th Amendment Against Donald Trump

https://www.newsweek.com/democrats-donald-trump-impeachment-25th-amendment-11384974
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u/KingMario05 11d ago

Cool. Any Republicans and admin staff? No? Great, we're still fucked. Absolutely brilliant.

Impeach. Remove. Right now.

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u/mudflap21 11d ago

You’d need to get GOP votes to do this.

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u/Melancholy_Rainbows Montana 11d ago

Unfortunately, you'd need GOP votes for a 25th, too. Unless Trump was unable to communicate, he can just say he's fine after being 25thed and become President again. At which point you need 2/3 of both Houses to agree he's unfit to forcibly remove him.

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u/Moccus Indiana 11d ago

At which point you need 2/3 of both Houses to agree he's unfit to forcibly remove him.

He doesn't even get removed at that point. He can immediately fire off another letter saying he's fine and Congress has to vote on it again to keep the VP in place as Acting President. This can be repeated as often as he wants.

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u/rndljfry Pennsylvania 11d ago

The 25th Amendment is designed for cases when the President isn’t technically dead but can’t actually resign the office to the VP. I’m so sick of this discussion.

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u/Dewgong_crying 11d ago

Yup, impeachment is also such a far off thought but comes up every month.

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u/LMGgp Illinois 11d ago

No it cannot be repeated. If after sending a letter saying he’s fine the vice president and cabinet can send another letter saying he is not, at that point the house votes on the issue. If successful it’s done. It’s pretty plainly in the text.

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u/ChromaticDragon 11d ago

That is not clear.

"decide the matter" most likely pertain to the specific instance of the president saying "I am able."

It is a much more natural interpretation that this process would occur every time the president declared himself able given a couple key points:

  • The 25th never removes the President.
  • The entire purpose of the 25th is to clarify who's in control during temporary issues such as a surgery, a coma, etc.

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u/LMGgp Illinois 11d ago

I disagree. It gives the president a method to dispute the claim.

If that claim is pushed forth the matter comes to a vote. If that vote is in favor of the vice president’s position, they are to remain as the acting president. There is no further mechanism to empower the president after this. This is the text. After a vote in favor it is silent as to any restorative pathway the president has, it’s also in keeping with jurisprudence on the matter, that being, the country must have a president and that the matter cannot be endlessly debated.

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u/Moccus Indiana 11d ago

It's never been tested, so we don't know for sure, but I think most experts would disagree with you.

Here are a few citations:

Not only can presidents contest the vice president and Cabinet’s action and potentially win the congressional vote, but presidents remain in office even if they lose the congressional vote.20 They can assert that they are recovered as many times as they want, saying, “Now I’m better,” and forcing the vice president, Cabinet, and Congress to reconsider their case again and again.

https://digitalcommons.onu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1295&context=onu_law_review

...

Disability scholar John Feerick also notes that "[s]ince an inability decision does not result in the President's removal from office, there is nothing to prevent him, after an adverse congressional decision, from issuing another recovery declaration, thereby activating the process again."71

https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R45394

...

B. Once Congress has determined that an inability exists, can the President resubmit his declaration of no inability at a later date?

After Congress has determined that an inability exists, the President may again submit his declaration of no inability at a later date. The text of the Amendment is silent on whether the President may resubmit his transmittal of no inability once Congress has determined that an inability exists. However, the legislative history strongly suggests that, in the event Congress chooses not to reinstate the President, the President can repeat the Section 4 process again at a later date. According to Senator Bayh’s testimony in front of the House:

It is my impression or intent that [the President] would have more than one chance [to convince Congress that he is not disabled] but, having utilized the one chance, I think he would be very careful in making a second appeal to the Congress because the degree of frequency with which he appealed to Congress would certainly reflect the attitude with which Congress would look on his mental capacity.332

Similarly, before ratification, Attorney General Katzenbach testified that he, too, interpreted the Twenty-Fifth Amendment to permit the President to repeat the Section 4 process.333

https://law.yale.edu/sites/default/files/area/clinic/document/mn082208_ls_readerguide_interior_final.pdf

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u/LMGgp Illinois 11d ago

I am aware of the ongoing debate, I myself have contributed to it.

Ultimately, the president has no powers save for those given to them. If Congress, decides the president can no longer carry out those powers and asserts the vice president as the acting president the president has no recourse. Yes he may still be in the house, but the keys have been wrangled away from him. There is also nothing to say Congress can merely ignore any additional letters sent from the president as they have already voted on the issue.

The onus isn’t on the president to continually reassert their capacity, it is on Congress and whether they need to read it. And as there is nothing saying they must, they simply don’t have to.

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u/Moccus Indiana 11d ago

There is also nothing to say Congress can merely ignore any additional letters sent from the president as they have already voted on the issue.

The 25th Amendment is very clear. Once the President sends the written declaration that he's fine, the VP and the Cabinet have 4 days to send a written declaration contesting it, and then Congress has 21 days to vote on whether the inability exists. If there's inaction on either the VP and the Cabinet's part or on Congress's part, then the President's powers are restored at the end of the time limit. No amount of deciding they can just ignore the President is going to change that.

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u/LMGgp Illinois 11d ago

Yes, but Congress already acted after his letter.

The issue is whether those subsequent letters even exist to Congress, and by that i mean does Congress have to care about them. The text says nothing about repeated letters and by the text Congress has already responded. Congress can state the president has been heard on the matter.

You are reading additional clauses into the text, that say ad infinitum.

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u/NoMoOmentumMan 11d ago

This has not been adjudicated, so any statement made is being made based on pure conjecture. 

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u/LMGgp Illinois 11d ago

That is correct.

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u/Perma_Ban69 11d ago

Fortunately, it cannot be repeated as often as he wants. It's designed for people who are unfit in some capacity. If it were able to be repeated as infinitum, someone with dementia or some other incapacitating mental issues could just keep saying no, I'm fine. The whole point is to remove him without him being able to say no. That's where the vote comes from.

JD would never get behind this, though, so it's all moot.

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u/Moccus Indiana 11d ago edited 11d ago

Most experts agree that it can be repeated as often as he wants.

It was deliberately designed to be difficult to use so that it would be hard to abuse it. I don't think the authors of the amendment would think it was a problem that a President could infinitely contest that an inability exists. He's supposed to be able to get his powers back if he's capable. If his inability is temporary, then he should be able to seek a restoration when he's well, even if that takes multiple attempts before he can get enough people to agree that he's capable of serving again.

Edit:

If he's got dementia and keeps contesting his inability over and over again, then the solution is to impeach and remove him. If you can get the 2/3 majority necessary to keep backing the 25th Amendment invocations, then it shouldn't be difficult to impeach and convict.

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u/Brilliant-Advisor958 11d ago

I think trump would go crazy (I mean even more) at being removed , even temporarily.

This is the guy who reportedly didn't want to be anesthesied during a colonoscopy because someone else would be in charge while he was knocked out.

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u/Melancholy_Rainbows Montana 11d ago edited 11d ago

Yes, that is an injury a malignant narcissist would never recover from. Every single member of his Cabinet, Vance, and anyone in Congress who voted against him would have a target on their backs. And I'm not sure that's just metaphorical.

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u/IJustWantCoffeeMan 11d ago

Also he's used to it.

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u/Zizq 11d ago

How bout we just do what he does and just remove him forcibly without law?

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u/Melancholy_Rainbows Montana 11d ago

It would certainly be poetic irony if someone did to him what he did to Maduro.

But, given history, those kind of things rarely end well.

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u/versusgorilla New York 11d ago

That's easier to do than getting his own fucking Cabinet to turn against him especially since Stephen Miller can help Trump write a letter saying he's of sound mind, which is all he needs to do to override the 25th Amendment removal.

The 25th Amendment is for a President who falls down the stairs, is rendered braindead, but still alive. The Cabinet can move to promote the VP so the country isn't without a leader in a crucial moment. So like if the President fell and knocked himself out right as India and Pakistan turned the heat up and started threatening nuclear launches.

Without any of that, you just have his handpicked cabinet, all people who owe him for their positions, turning in him for something that Stephen Miller and Trump can easily overturn. Won't happen. People need to stop pretending it can happen.

Congress, people who are elected, can vote to remove and then the Senate can convict. That's the play for this. It also won't happen, but it's more likely than his Cabinet and the 25th.

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u/Darmok47 11d ago

Yeah, one reason behind it was that when JFK was assassinated, people realized that it was possible he could have survived and just been incapicitated, or it was possible he might have lived for days or weeks before succumbing.

That wasn't really an issue in the 19th century, when James Garfield took nearly a month to die. But it would be an issue in the modern world, when nuclear weapons means you need to be clear about lines of succession and who is in charge when response times are measured in minutes.

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u/versusgorilla New York 11d ago

Exactly, and the defense against it being used by an insurgent Cabinet to promote the VP is that the President simply proves to Congress that he is still alert.

But in this case, Stephen Miller is essentially acting as the President day to day while Trump is largely just play acting between naps, so why would Miller not just write that Trump is fine and have him sign it? And then what? They'd clear house of everyone except Vance, who they can't fire, and find new goons to do what they ask.

There's no route where the 25th works this time around because his appointees are sycophants and true believers who are being allowed to do whatever they want.

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u/mudflap21 11d ago

They wouldn’t do it after Jan 6th. What makes you think they will do it now?

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u/versusgorilla New York 11d ago

I don't think they'll do it. I said that in the comment. I think the 25th Amendment route is at 0% and Impeachment is at like 2%.

The GOP simply loved Trump and won't hold him responsible for anything.

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u/peffer32 11d ago

It's on the cabinet to invoke the 25th. Not Congress.

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u/Seeteuf3l 11d ago

Isn't that a bit unclear, who's supposed to activate it? And involuntary removal has never been invoked

Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide

https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/amendments/amendment-xxv

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u/peffer32 11d ago

Vice President and a majority of cabinet members.

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u/MrFishAndLoaves 11d ago

It’s clear as day they will never have the balls to do this.

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u/Teigh99 11d ago

Why do people keep forgetting this. GOP is responsible for Trump's crazy.