Horse 2796 - Mike Pence Should Grow A Spine And Invoke The 25th Amendment Immediately

 I woke up this morning Sydney time to hear that the count which should have taken place in the US Capitol building has not because of armed protesters storming the building. This has also involved civil property damage, with windows being broken and several fixtures inside the US Capitol building also being broken.

The only conclusion that I can come up with is that as these people were in some instances flying the Confederate Battle Flag, that because virtually all of them were white, they are entitled to get a free pass. Had they been black, there would have been shots fired, as has happened previously. 

This comes on the heels of President Trump threatening to invoking martial law to overturn the results of the 2020 election and seizing supposedly fraudulent voting machines in an effort to prove his case. I also note that in a rally, Trump called for Vice President Pence to reject the Electoral College votes and send them back to the States for recertification; in an act which the Vice President would have absolutely zero authority.

As he's basically called his supporters to storm the capitol while Congress voted to certify Joe Biden’s election victory, and as his rhetoric grows ever erratic and dangerous, I think that the only legal course of action left may very well to invoke the 25th Amendment. The problem with this is that Mike Pence is a craven coward and is currently acting as the enabler of a psychopath.

Section Four of the 25th Amendment to the US Constitution provides that:

"If the vice-president and the majority of the Cabinet decide that, for whatever reason, the president has become unfit to carry out the powers and duties of the office and they transmit a letter to Congress to that effect, then the vice-president becomes the acting president and remains so unless and until Congress refuses to allow that transfer of power to stand."

The 25th Amendment was passed after a period of tumult which saw Franklin D Roosevelt die in office, and after John Franklin Kennedy was assassinated. The ability for someone to take over and act as President came into sharp focus.

The usefulness of the amendment became even more apparent during the Watergate scandal, and Section 3 has been invoked on three occasions where a sitting President was undergoing medical treatment and it was assumed that they would be temporarily incapacitated but return to assume the office again.

The amendment was created to deal with rather boring and not at all controversial instances where the President might be unfit to carry out the duties of the office (being shot, falling into a coma, maybe after being taken hostage) but Section Four appears to deal with what happens in moments of extreme outrage and controversy. This is different to Impeachment and removal from office in the case of high crimes and misdemeanors; which have especially in the last week been comprehensively proven by evidence. Section Four exists specifically with instances where the president’s unfitness or inability to hold or execute the office of the President is being contested by the President himself.

Now I know that the text of the Amendment does require that two-thirds of each house of Congress would has to take a vote to allow the Vice President to continue in the position of acting President however, the actual wording of the text is such that Mike Pence could send the letter to the Congress that makes him acting president, and Trump would have to contest the Vice President's actions by his own letter to Congress. As there is a limit upon the filibuster in the House but not the Senate, the House could simply tie the whole thing up for three weeks and the Senate could dither and filibuster upon it until the clock ran out.

I know that this sounds stupid and wouldn't actually remove the President from office because no substantive vote would be take but it would gum up the wheels of government for 21 days; which is longer than the number of days that remain in Mr Trump's term. Had this happened several months or even years ago, then Mr Trump would merely return to the office after 21 days if Congress failed to act.

As long as Democrats in the House accepted this as the temporary arrangement, then this would be fine. While not actually legally holding the office of President, and probably not genuinely in a proper acting capacity, Pence would have in effect become acting president without actually acting in any capacity at all and would remain in that weird nebulous state for the rest of the current administration’s term in office of only a few weeks.

Aside:

After having posted this on Twitter, someone asked about the removal of a Prime Minaister in Australia.

As there is no such position mentioned in the Australian Constitution, then however the caucus of the party in charge decides, with the approval of the Governor General, is all that is needed to make and unmake a Prime Minister. For instance, Frank Forde was Prime Minister for just seven days while the Labor Party hastily rearranged itself after the death of John Curtin.