On Thursday, people in the United States started talking about the 14th Amendment to the Constitution and ended talking about the 25th. In the morning, a hearing at the Supreme Court debated whether former President Donald Trump should be disqualified from running for office for having taken part in an insurrection, in reference to the assault on the Capitol on January 6, 2021. In the afternoon, congressmen Republicans argued that the time had come to apply the 25th Amendment, intended to incapacitate the president if he is unfit to hold office. This was prompted by the report of special prosecutor Robert Hur, which portrayed him as “an old man with a bad memory” who did not remember when he was vice president or when his son died. These mentions, and many others in the same sense, have outraged Biden, his lawyers and the Democrats.
The 25th Amendment, passed after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, is a procedure to replace the president in the event of death, removal, resignation or incapacity. “Does Biden not remember his time as vice president? But is he somehow qualified to be president for another 4 years?” Missouri Senator Josh Hawley asked. “Biden's new defense in the face of otherwise criminal conduct: he is an old man incapable of remembering who he is, where he is or what he has done,” he insisted. “It's time for the 25th Amendment,” he said, in reference to that constitutional norm, which states that the person who holds the vice presidency replaces the president if he is “incapable of complying with the powers and obligations of his office.”
“Either Biden is mentally fit to stand trial and should be charged for mishandling classified documents as vice president or he is not fit to serve as president. “There is no middle ground,” New York Congresswoman Claudia Tenney tweeted, which has called for exploring the application of the 25th Amendment in a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland: “It is up to you to explore the procedures for removing the president under the 25th Amendment to the United States Constitution. “President Biden needs to be impeached, or he needs to be removed,” Tenney wrote, according to the text of the letter advanced by the conservative Fox.
In fact, there has been an avalanche of messages along those same lines: “This report calls Biden a 'well-intentioned old man with a bad memory.' That does not describe someone who should be the commander in chief of our armed forces and the defender of American freedoms. It's time for his Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment, he has written Florida Senator Rick Scott. “If there was ever a time to invoke the 25th Amendment, wouldn't it be now?” asked Utah Senator Mike Lee. Georgia Representative Mike Collins, no wonder, but he affirms it: “There has never been a stronger case for the 25th amendment than now.”
“His current mental and physical state should prevent him from being president of the United States,” North Carolina Rep. Greg Murphy tweeted. “Today's report from Robert Hur tells us two things: there is a double standard of justice in this country. And Joe Biden is not fit for office,” said Jim Jordan, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. “We must demand that the 25th amendment be invoked or impeachment [proceso político]”, tweeted Marjorie Taylor Greene, congresswoman from Georgia and loyal supporter of former President Donald Trump, who has redisseminated many messages in that regard.
“For the security of our nation, Joe Biden must resign,” wrote Mary Miller, Republican representative from Illinois. “He can't remember basic facts about his life. He is not competent to remain commander in chief and every day he continues, he puts America at risk. If he does not resign, the Cabinet must invoke the 25th Amendment,” he added.
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The prosecutor's report has outraged Democrats, starting with the president himself: “I am well-intentioned and I am an older man. And I know what the hell I'm doing. I have been president, I put this country back on its feet. “I don't need your recommendation,” Biden said in an appearance this Thursday at the White House. “My memory is fine,” he said in that small press conference, in which at times he showed mental agility, but he also made an inopportune slip when referring to Egypt as “Mexico.”
Biden's lawyers unsuccessfully asked that some of the “inflammatory” mentions of the former president's memory and mental acuity be removed from the report, which they considered out of place and a misrepresentation of what happened.
The prosecutor hits where it hurts the Democrats. Voters consider that Biden is too old to run for re-election and a report with the seal of the Department of Justice seems to sign it, although the authors are not doctors but lawyers. For Trump, who appointed Hur as prosecutor, it is the perfect gift in an election year in which he aspires to return to the White House.
Some Democrats have also come out in public to defend the president. “He did very well in this discussion with members,” Pennsylvania Rep. Susan Wild told NBC News after seeing the president Thursday. “He is very sharp, he has no memory problems, and his only stumble is when he stumbles over words consistent with his lifelong speech impediment.” Biden struggled with stuttering and frequently made lapses and gaffes when he was young. Now, however, those mistakes are used as ammunition against him.
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