Republicans split on whether Biden should be removed from office
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Republicans are at odds about whether President Joe Biden should remain in office through the election as doubts about his mental and physical health increase. Since Biden announced he won’t be seeking reelection on Sunday, scores of GOP lawmakers have come out saying he needs to be removed from office immediately because he’s not fit to serve.
They are calling on Biden’s Cabinet to trigger his removal through the 25th Amendment, which has never been used in history. Former President Donald Trump, however, made it clear Thursday that he is against the maneuver, saying, ‘I don’t think they should use the 25th Amendment.’
‘I will say this, the world is in a very dangerous place. I think if (Biden) goes, (Kamala) then takes over and she’s worse than he is,” Trump said on Fox & Friends, calling her a ‘San Francisco radical.’ Despite Trump’s warning, some Republicans are still insisting that the never-before-used amendment must be invoked immediately to boot out Biden.
The 25th Amendment, which outlines presidential succession, gives the vice president and Cabinet power to remove the commander in chief from office in the event it’s determined he or she is no longer fit for office. Under Section 4, a two-thirds vote in both the House and Senate is necessary to find the president is ‘unable to discharge’ their ‘powers and duties.’
Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, first filed a resolution just after the debate to call on Harris ‘to convene the Cabinet and declare President Joe Biden as unable to carry out his duties as Commander-in-Chief.’ Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters on Monday he was still considering whether to put the resolution on the House floor.
Rep. Andy Ogles, R-Tenn., has called for Harris to invoke the 25th Amendment and on Tuesday introduced articles of impeachment for the vice president failing to uphold border laws. Additionally, Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., wrote a letter to every one of Biden’s Cabinet members urging them to invoke the 25th Amendment.
‘I wrote a letter and sent it to Kamala Harris asking her to invoke the 25th Amendment,’ Rep. Derrick Van Orden, R-Wis., told DailyMail.com. ‘I have a little book on my desk. It’s called the Constitution. And she is the Vice President of the United States and the President of the United States is compromised mentally and physically.’
‘So it’s her duty to invoke the 25th Amendment, get the cabinet together, write a letter, submit to Joe Biden and that millisecond she becomes the acting president United States.’ He said Biden is ‘pretending’ to be president and he would ‘rather have an acting president than him pretending.’ Van Orden says he is still supportive of Trump, but adds ‘I’m looking at this from a national security perspective.’
Other Republicans, meanwhile, said they are fully on board with the president’s resistance to the 25th Amendment. ‘I think the (former) president’s position is my position,’ Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., told DailyMail.com. ‘That’s a Kamala Harris question. It’s not for us. You know, we can all see that Joe Biden has some limitations. But since the White House and frankly a lot of elements in our media, not all of you guys but definitely elements in our media, have hidden Joe Biden from the public, that falls on their shoulders. That’s their responsibility.’
Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., agreed with Donalds and Trump. ‘It won’t pass the Senate. So I don’t know that is needed.’ ‘I don’t think the President has any capacity to govern. And he hasn’t been quite some time and it’s been covered up completely by the media.’ ‘Everybody in Washington talks about it, Democrats and Republicans.’
