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Another Coup? Parallel of Democrats' 25th Amendment Obsession and Impeachment
Townhall.com ^ | October 9, 2020 | Fred Lucas

Posted on 10/09/2020 10:17:07 AM PDT by Kaslin

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., is applying a new pretext to reach a pre-desired outcome of using the 25th Amendment to oust President Donald Trump from office in nearly the same fashion House Democrats did with the last impeachment. 

Readers of “Abuse of Power: The Three-Year Campaign to Impeach Donald Trump” will find that just as Democrats began talking about impeachment in 2017 before settling on a reason in 2019, Democrats began talking about using the 25th Amendment in 2017 before coming up with a reason to do so today. 

Pelosi and Rep. James Raskin, D-Md., are introducing legislation to establish a 25th Amendment commission to assess Trump’s mental and physical capacity to hold office, in light of the president’s bout with COVID-19. 

The 25th Amendment allows for the vice president and the majority of the Cabinet secretaries to determine if a president is physically or mentally unfit to do the job. The vice president, in this case Mike Pence, would become the acting president on a temporary basis. Congress could remove him from office permanently with two-thirds vote in both the House and Senate. This would actually be an even higher bar than impeachment.

So, this is essentially political theater. It is, nevertheless, similar to the impeachment drama that played out a year ago, which is an attempt to do political damage. 

Many Democrats began talking about impeachment before Trump was even inaugurated. When special counsel Robert Mueller came up empty on the Russia collusion probe, Democrats wanted to impeach Trump for something—anything—and had to settle for the Ukraine phone call. 

Similarly, the left began talking about the 25th Amendment just a few months into the Trump presidency. They can now point to COVID-19 as a justification.

For Raskin, this is a return to legislation he pushed in 2017 when he similarly proposed a commission to examine Trump’s mental health. That bill gained 56 Democratic co-sponsors. But the 25th Amendment was on the fringes.

As “Abuse of Power” notes, another link between the two means of booting a president without an election came on Aug. 17, 2017 when Andrew Bakaj tweeted: “The 25th Amendment concerns @POTUS’ inability to discharge the powers and duties of office. Says nothing about mental health. We’re there.” In 2019, Bakaj was one of the two lawyers representing the anonymous whistleblower who prompted the impeachment probe.

Fomenting a 25th Amendment obsession prompted several partisan psychologists to violate the “Goldwater Rule,” which was meant to stop psychologists from offering a “professional opinion unless he or she has conducted an examination and has been granted proper authorization for such a statement.”

USA Today published a column by psychologist John Gartner in May 2017 asserting of the president, “you have no choice but to conclude that he is psychotic.”

The “Duty to Warn” movement launched a cottage industry of sorts. Psychiatry professor Dr. Bandy X. Lee, who edited the book “The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump,” even provided a Capitol Hill briefing for anti-Trumpers in Congress. 

Then and now, the 25th Amendment chatter is more about promoting a narrative in the media than about actually pushing such legislation through. Why bring this up weeks before an election? It makes about as much sense as a politicized impeachment less than a year before an election.



TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 25thamendment; nancypiglosi; presidenttrump
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1 posted on 10/09/2020 10:17:07 AM PDT by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin

I just heard Pelosi talking about this and she loudly sniffled twice.

Coronavirus?


2 posted on 10/09/2020 10:20:12 AM PDT by Cowgirl of Justice
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To: Kaslin

This is not about Democrat leaders losing elections.

This is about Democrat leaders going to prison and losing all the money they stole.


3 posted on 10/09/2020 10:20:52 AM PDT by blueunicorn6 ("A crack shot and a good dancer”)
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To: Kaslin

this isnt for Trump, trust me...if Biden wins,, this is to get Kamala to take over.


4 posted on 10/09/2020 10:21:06 AM PDT by basalt
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To: Cowgirl of Justice

They are setting up the narrative to remove Trump and of course Joe in 2021


5 posted on 10/09/2020 10:21:31 AM PDT by Jimmy The Snake
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To: Kaslin

“sing the 25th Amendment to oust President Donald Trump from office in nearly the same fashion House Democrats did with the last impeachment.”

Trump and Rush said they think this effort is to be ready to replace Biden with Harris, not necessarily for Tump.


6 posted on 10/09/2020 10:22:13 AM PDT by be-baw
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To: Kaslin
This would actually be an even higher bar than impeachment.

Yeah. Good luck with that. And to even get started, you need Mike Pence to be the ringleader of your next little coup.

7 posted on 10/09/2020 10:22:29 AM PDT by ClearCase_guy (If White Privilege is real, why did Elizabeth Warren lie about being an Indian?)
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To: Kaslin

Impeachment was a disaster for the Dementiacrats - they don’t even talk about it any more. This latest 25th amendment garbage is just another “kitchen sink” to throw at Trump.


8 posted on 10/09/2020 10:23:15 AM PDT by Qiviut (Fox "News": Unfair, Unbalanced & Unhinged.)
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To: Kaslin

Actually, the latest theory is Pelosi has her sights set on sleepy Joe. If Joe should win he will be out before Trumps Oval Office chair is cold.


9 posted on 10/09/2020 10:24:00 AM PDT by snoringbear (,W,E.oGovernment is the Pimp,)
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To: Kaslin

As someone on TV said this morning; Pelosi is coup coup (Kookoo)


10 posted on 10/09/2020 10:24:44 AM PDT by antidemoncrat (Biden's)
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To: Kaslin

It’s not happening folks. More Dem hysterics. They will pass probably 10 more nutty nut nutty bills that will all die in senate committee.


11 posted on 10/09/2020 10:25:31 AM PDT by Georgia Girl 2 (The only purpose of a pistol is to fight your way back to the rifle you should never have dropped)
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To: blueunicorn6

That is it. This had less to do with Trump than what Trump is uncovering. Besides, if they are winning so handily, why not wait a month. The whole thing is going to backfire. On the flip side, I wish Trump would settle down.


12 posted on 10/09/2020 10:26:11 AM PDT by Hildy (In an unforgiving world, only the shameless survive.)
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To: Kaslin

If the President wins, I expect a very serious attempt on his life. Maybe before that. I’m a little surprised they haven’t already done it. Maybe they have tried. I’m sure they will do the Russia thing again and all of the rest, but the violence will ramp up. Antifa/BLM are talking about rushing the White House. The 25th Amendment play looks more like a way to get Biden out of the way.


13 posted on 10/09/2020 10:26:25 AM PDT by cdcdawg (Biden has dementia.)
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To: All

This is to get rid of Biden should he win and install the “Harris administration” as Harris already called it.

Biden has dementia. It’s obvious to anyone that’s had family suffering from it. It’s elder abuse to keep him in the campaign.


14 posted on 10/09/2020 10:26:49 AM PDT by TigerClaws
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To: Cowgirl of Justice

Yeah and her pointy nose was sticking out from her mask.


15 posted on 10/09/2020 10:27:09 AM PDT by funfan
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To: Kaslin
This is, as the article stated, political theater.

Think of it as the pig doing ballot harvesting from the gullible, the lazy and the stupid.

16 posted on 10/09/2020 10:27:48 AM PDT by pfflier
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To: Cowgirl of Justice

“Coronavirus?”

Cocaine


17 posted on 10/09/2020 10:28:13 AM PDT by bk1000 (Banned from Breitbart)
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To: basalt

It is also used to take all the stuff out of the news that is bad for democrats like the emails and fake Russian collusion made up by Hillary Clinton.


18 posted on 10/09/2020 10:29:12 AM PDT by funfan
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To: Kaslin

This is Pelosi’s attempt to end run around a supermajority in the Senate.

It’s easier to get the majority of 17 commission members to agree to replace Trump than to get a supermajority of the senate to agree to replace him. She basically has to get 9 partisan doctors on the commission to say the President is unfit.

The committee would have to be approved by both houses. So the idea is dead UNLESS the Dem’s take the Senate. But if the dem’s take the Denate, then they can delegate by majority vote to this committee of doctors, bypassing the Senate supermajority requirement.

“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, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.”


19 posted on 10/09/2020 10:31:20 AM PDT by DannyTN
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To: Kaslin

Do they know if they would succeed with this, the shit would really hit the fan!


20 posted on 10/09/2020 10:31:32 AM PDT by spincaster (g)
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