Transcription
For a while now, the talk has been increasing about Trump's eligibility to govern, with many analyses suggesting he shows symptoms of dementia or Alzheimer's. These manifest in severe mood swings, difficulty performing daily tasks, problems with bowel control, insomnia, disrupted sleep patterns, and what's called sundowning, which is confusion, anxiety, and aggression as night approaches. They say this is very evident in anything he writes at night or even near dawn. These voices have been growing since his first term, but they've never been louder than in the past couple of days, especially after his infamous post about destroying Persian civilization, after which the world erupted against him. It wasn't just his enemies, but even his closest allies also ignited.
Naturally, you'd find Democrats who wouldn't miss an opportunity like this to tear the man down, like Omar and Rashida Tlaib, and that Democratic representative, Dena U.S. Congresswoman, who wrote that the procedures for the 25th Amendment should begin immediately. And if the government is cowardly and afraid, then the House of Representatives must start the impeachment process now. She's not alone in expressing this discontent; over 50 Democratic representatives have called for Trump's impeachment. And there's another very important Democratic representative who also called for his impeachment: Yasmin Ansari. Yasmin's importance lies in her being an Iranian who opposes the Iranian regime and was against the Iranian regime acquiring nuclear weapons, though she wasn't for war. Yasmin directly stated that the 25th Amendment was created for a reason and that the government must use it, and that the fate of American forces, the Iranian people, and the very foundations of the global order are at stake.
But what's new is that Trump's allies and the pillars of his election campaign have also entered the picture. We all saw Tucker Carlson openly mocking him, and Marjorie Taylor Greene, one of his most important allies, wrote "25th Amendment NOW." And here comes the question: What is this 25th Amendment that everyone is clamoring for, as if it's a lost child? And is there a difference between the 25th Amendment and impeachment? Impeachment is political, I know, but that's what we'll talk about today in "Five Politics."
"No, tell me, Adamka, yes."
"Do you understand politics, boy?"
"I understand politics, I am the people."
"Peace, mercy, and blessings of God be upon you. From the second left, after the university bridge, on Abu Al-Nil Industrial Canal, the Forty Contents greet you, and a new episode of Five Politics. Primitive systems always focused on one question: How do we choose the ruler? But mature systems, which have experienced, learned, and been through a lot, have another question that is no less important than the first: How do we remove the ruler from power if they become unfit for it?
Last episode, we talked about legitimacy and how a ruler, as an individual, or the system governing, gains it and how they lose it. We recounted that the loss of legitimacy doesn't just happen overnight; it takes time and goes through stages. Legitimacy is eroded, not lost; it's chipped away, not broken. Often, if the ruler came to power through legitimate and stable means, the first thing to be eroded is the legitimacy of achievement. If they start failing to fulfill their promises and falter, the entire state becomes confused and enters crises, and the crises expand. And again, this is important: this whole situation can be real and sometimes illusory. Sometimes, the feeling of crisis and failure is fabricated and manufactured, but the result is the same in all cases: the erosion of the legitimacy of achievement.
And with this faltering, they start to mess up and enter the stage of legal legitimacy erosion as well, and they disrespect institutions. Because this failure is either bad luck on my part or stupidity from others, it cannot be a real failure. So they start to bypass them because they want to solve problems themselves, as they are stupid, or they commit clear violations of the law, and it might reach the point of abusing power. These steps are not sequential; one doesn't necessarily follow the other, and they don't necessarily all happen. But what they have in common is the commission of acts contrary to the law, and thus the ruler's legal legitimacy is eroded.
And this is what will lead us to the third stage: the loss of confidence in their competence. The people, their representatives, and the government itself now see that the ruler is unfit for their position. Everyone now wants to throw them under the bus. And at this stage, we bring out the toolbox for removing power from the ruler. This toolbox can contain many things; each country's constitution specifies them according to its own knowledge, but it relies on three pillars: a mover, a hanger, and a judge, followed by procedures for choosing a new ruler.
The mover says, "Enough is enough, you've gone too far." And of course, this mover must have credibility; they must be elected by the people, or be among those with expertise in evaluating the ruler's performance, or perhaps the ruler's own team, as these are the closest people to them, working with them daily, and they can express their opinion on whether the ruler is still fit to govern or not. And there must be a hanger to suspend authority with until the process is complete, so there is no power vacuum. But of course, the condition for this hanger is that it must be a temporary hanger that doesn't stick, so it doesn't take power and stick to it, as it will only be acting until we finish what we are doing. And we also need a judge who hears both sides, the ruler's side and the mover's side, and decides who is right.
In the United States of America, removing power from the president happens in one of two ways: impeachment or the 25th Amendment. And here comes the importance of detailing whether the ruler has lost competence due to ignorance and mistakes, or due to a problem beyond their control. If they are making mistakes and messing up, we will impeach them. If it's beyond their control, then it's the 25th Amendment. How? If there is suspicion of treason, bribery, or a felony or misdemeanor, Article II, Section 4 is immediately applied, and the House of Representatives brings the accused to the carpet. This article includes the president, vice president, and all civil officers. The House of Representatives has the exclusive power to initiate charges or impeachment, and this is what we called the mover of the case.
So who is the judge? The judge is the Senate. The Senate becomes a court presided over by the Chief Justice if the accused is the president. To prove guilt and remove the president, two-thirds of the Senate must agree. And the hanger in this case is the Vice President until the President returns, if they return. And note here, the court's judgment is a punitive judgment. The president did something wrong that a president shouldn't do, and therefore their punishment is the removal of power and impeachment.
The article for impeaching the president, which we are working with, is an original article in the U.S. Constitution itself. The text came out of the Philadelphia Convention in 1787 and began to be implemented with the establishment of the new federal government in 1789. So impeachment has existed since the founding of the American constitutional system and is not a new invention. Historically, specifically for presidents, the House of Representatives has formally impeached four times for three American presidents, because, blessedly, Trump has a record under his name of being impeached twice. The cases were as follows: Andrew Johnson in 1886, Bill Clinton in 1998, and Donald Trump in 2019 and Donald Trump again in 2021. And in all these cases, the Senate did not convict any American president, and therefore no American president has been removed from office through conviction in the Senate to date.
Andrew Johnson was impeached by the House of Representatives in 1868 in a huge conflict after the Civil War, based on the accusation that Andrew violated the Tenure of Office Act by removing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton without returning to the House of Representatives. The House of Representatives told him, "Listen, we appointed him, and he must return to us. You can't dismiss him without returning to us." But in the Senate, Andrew was acquitted by one vote, so he remained in office. Bill Clinton was impeached by the House of Representatives in 1998 on charges related to perjury and obstruction of justice in the Monica Lewinsky case, but the Senate acquitted him, and he remained in office until the end of his term.
Trump in 2019, the first impeachment of Trump was due to the Ukraine file under the title of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. The Senate also acquitted him. And the last time Trump was impeached was in 2021. The second impeachment came after the events of January 6th and the storming of Congress on charges of incitement to insurrection. And again, the Senate acquitted him. Generally, the House of Representatives has used the impeachment article more than 60 times in American history against various officials, but most cases were against judges and federal officials, not presidents. And to date, only eight people have been convicted and removed from their positions, and all of them were federal judges. No president has ever been impeached under this article.
So, if we assume that the mess was due to something beyond the president's control, here we come to the 25th Amendment, which consists of four sections. Each section deals with a different case of the president's inability to perform their duties. The first section: if the president dies, resigns, or a disaster befalls them, and they are no longer in their position, then the Vice President immediately takes their place and becomes president without any fuss. This was activated in 1974 when Richard Nixon resigned after his scandal, and Gerald Ford became president until the end of Nixon's term.
The second section deals with another problem: the absence of a Vice President. In this case, the president nominates a new Vice President, and this new Vice President is presented to Congress in both houses, and they must receive a majority vote from both houses. This has been applied twice, including the case of Gerald Ford, which we mentioned earlier. When he became president, the position of Vice President became vacant, so he brought Nelson Rockefeller as his Vice President. And the third section, which is the most used, is for temporary absence of the president. In this case, the Vice President acts as acting president until the president returns for the short period of their absence. This has happened only four times in history, and unfortunately, each time it was said that the president was undergoing a colonoscopy: Reagan once, Bush twice, and Biden once.
And finally, the fourth section, which is what concerns us here. This allows the Vice President, along with a majority of the cabinet secretaries, to officially declare that the president is unable to discharge the powers and duties of their office, and power is immediately transferred to the Vice President as acting president. However, the president can immediately object and say, "No, I am still healthy and very strong." Then they would return to power. Then the Vice President and the majority of the cabinet secretaries, the same cabinet, would come within four days and reconfirm the president's incapacity. Then the decision goes to Congress, and then two-thirds of both houses, the House and the Senate, must agree within 21 days to prevent the president from regaining power, and the Vice President will remain acting president until the president recovers or the presidential term ends. And during all this time, the Vice President remains acting president, not the original president. And this section specifically is the only section of this amendment that has never been fully activated, although it appears from time to time in public discussions whenever a president starts to ramble.
Why is the 25th Amendment considered very dangerous, even more dangerous than impeachment itself, if it is actually activated? Because impeachment happens by political opponents, so it's a natural situation where we get into a fight with enemies, and may the strongest win. But the 25th Amendment is an internal explosion. The Vice President and the cabinet secretaries turn against the president. So, as soon as it is activated, even if Congress doesn't approve, the government is in trouble, and the ruling party is also in trouble. Impeachment is a fight between the legislative and executive branches. The 25th Amendment is an internal explosion within the executive branch. Therefore, Section 4 of the 25th Amendment is almost impossible to activate because the scene would be as if the politicians in the executive branch who initiated this action are rebelling against the head of the authority that brought them there and their benefactor. So, whether they fail or succeed, it will be the end of their political future because they are traitors and ungrateful. And they will likely fail, especially in Trump's case now, because Congress has so far supported Trump.
So, let's conclude the episode with a comparison like those in old educational programs on Egyptian television. Impeachment asks about the president's performance. The 25th Amendment asks about the president himself. Impeachment is a trial, an inquiry, and punishment. The 25th Amendment is about health, awareness, and capability. Impeachment begins in parliament. The 25th Amendment begins with the government, with the executive branch. Impeachment is political opposition. The 25th Amendment is a collapse of trust within the system itself.
So, we have answered the question of what can be done if legitimacy is lost from the ruler. Even if these articles are not actually used extensively, their mere existence confirms that legitimacy is not a blank check, that the position is ultimately bigger than the person, and that the state and the system may, at a certain point, need tools to defend themselves against the head of the system itself. And in the end, thank you very much for your continued viewership, and we will see you tomorrow, God willing. Our brothers in Lebanon, the news is still coming in now, and the situation is clearly terrifying. God protect us.