The GQP always have dates just around the corner. Will he appoint JFK as his VP?
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Impeachment trials take as long as time is calendared for them. But ultimately, they’re just two votes. We’re talking about a group of people who are likely going to have state legislators intentionally ignore voters wills and direct assign delegates… a group of people who tried very seriously to disappear Mike Pence so that the votes couldn’t be counted and the election went to the delegation of the states on the floor. You think they’ll behave properly here?
This is no more a fever dream than Trump getting elected was, and ignoring what they’re flat out telling us they’ll do, after they flat out told us what they were going to do and DID IT comes at our peril.
We should listen to what they’re saying they’re going to do instead of pretending like they’d never or they couldn’t. We should be pushing anyone we know who’s disillusioned by this to vote so it doesn’t become a self fulfilling prophecy. Ultimately, though, we should stop pretending like we’re dealing with rational actors who will follow the rules when they will have the ability to completely change the rules TO THEIR WILLS if they win the house and senate.
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Why so glum about the election? I think the Dems have more than a solid choice of holding onto both chambers, AND adding a seat or two in the senate. I’m so tired of the pessimism.
As for this story, sure… if - and I think it’s a BIG fucking “if” - they win, they’ll investigate the fuck out of every little thing Biden does because that’s all the GOP can manage. We know that from Obama’s two terms, and the SIX (or more, I can’t remember now) different investigations they ran on Benghazi, all to keep it in the news so they could jack Hillary’s run at the Presidency. Six times! And they found ZERO actual problems, let alone crimes committed, but they damn sure are happy to make up falsehoods, prosecute them as if they are real, and know that their voters will only remember the reason for the investigation but never the results.
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Yes, it very much is. Trump isn’t even running for the House, and probably doesn’t qualify. He can’t be Speaker if he isn’t even a representative
If we’re making shit up out of thin air, then I declare myself King of Londonium, wear a shiny hat, and declare the use of ketchup on hotdogs a capital crime.
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The speaker of the house doesn’t have to be a member of the house.
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I think you’re misreading the word “incumbent.” They must be members or members-elect.
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Nope. The speaker of the house has always been a member of the house, but the house historian and the house clerk have both stated that the Constitution says that the House has the right to choose whomever they want as speaker.
This comes up every time there’s questions about who a party’s going to pick for speaker.
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Ok, you may be correct but a plain reading of the text of the 25th amendment seems to indicate that confirmation is required. It doesn’t say anything about an “acting” Vice President. Is there another relevant portion of the constitution that spells that out?
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Still a MAGA fever dream. That was simply the most ludicrous of the listed imaginations of idiocy. They will screw something up, like make him Postmaster General first. Actually, that would be a way for Dems to block him: appoint him to a meaningless federal position. Can’t be Speaker if you already hold office.
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Because embracing defeatism is much easier than doing the hard work that needs to be done.
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The very next section:
whenever the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, and until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary, such powers and duties shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President
So in this extremely unlikely scenario, the Pres and VP in power would simply have to stay ahead of removal by impeachment by writing memos faster than the House can impeach and the Senate convict.
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As demonstrated by Trump’s second impeachment, which took place just a week after the insurrection he was being impeached for. Congress can move pretty fast when it wants to.
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But not faster than I can write a memo.
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I would interpret this section to mean that the existing Vice President becomes acting President in this scenario but it doesn’t say what happens if no Vice President currently exists. I suppose it would take a legal challenge and Supreme Court decision to definitively settle it, but your interpretation has terrible connotations. Imagine the scenario where we successfully impeached both Trump and Pence for serious crimes, but they just kept appointing a series of ever-worse “acting” presidents that were never elected by anyone but still held the full power of the presidency.
But the existing VP becomes Acting Pres with all powers and duties. So if the try to impeach Biden( and somehow, magically, have the 67 votes to convict), Biden writes a memo making Harris Acting Pres. If they are also impeaching Harris simultaneously, Harris writes a memo making Nancy Pelosi Acting Pres. Nancy has a memo in her pocket making Chuck Schumer Acting Pres. Chuck has a memo in his pocket making Pete Buttigieg Acting Pres. Wash, rinse, repeat.
They [the impeachers] can’t just make the Speaker president unless the administration is caught off guard.
Yes, it’s the nuclear option. What we’re really talking about is a constitutional crisis. But, somewhere along the way, right and wrong actually matters. Before it gets that far, either calmer heads will prevail or the overwhelming majority of right-minded people in this country will force it to stop. We are still the majority, and by a large margin.
Agreed.
Disagree, since if the Republicans were in charge of the House Pelosi wouldn’t automatically be next in line in this scenario. Harris could nominate her (or anyone) but that would require congressional approval. The “powers and duties” of the President don’t include “writing memos” about who gets to replace them.
Edit to add: the VP nomination process in 1974 is instructive. The office remained vacant until after Rockefeller was confirmed. He wasn’t an “acting VP” in the interim.
Actually, that’s exactly what the 25A says they do. At least if they voluntarly hand off the reigns.
I only used Pelosi as a placeholder. She would actually be better off in the House. Probably they would just roll through the cabinet. It has nothing to do with the formal transfer of power of the executive but more to do with who is already in a position to take over with minimal transition prep. And ultimately, it’s more about the detente of having a nearly inextinguishable counter-move for purely partisan, bad-faith impeachment and removal.
That describes the process on how they hand off control to whoever is holding the office of the Vice Presidency. On that much we agree. We disagree on whether it’s possible for someone to hold that office without first being confirmed. But we’re not getting anywhere so I’ll leave it at that.
I don’t generally agree with the tone-policing types who see any admission of or expression of frustration with the uphill battle we face or the horrible world we live in as defeatism, but… seriously, come on. I’m worried the Republicans will win too, but just taking it for granted and diving straight into gloom and doom over Biden’s impeachment? That actually is defeatism. We live in extremely weird, turbulent, unpredictable times, and calling any election before the votes are in (and based on what, polls?) seems ridiculous to me.
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Which was my real point above: that we’re speculating about steps that are already past the point of abandonment of democracy and the rule of law. None of that will come to pass except as pointless chess moves is the collapse of the USA. So what’s the point, except as some kind of fictional political snuff porn? Not my kind of thing, thanks.
