House Republicans blocked quick consideration of a bill calling on Vice President Mike Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove President Trump from office amid fallout from last week’s Capitol riot.
Democrats asked for consideration of a bill calling on Pence to mobilize the 25th Amendment, but Rep. Alex Mooney, R-W.V., objected Monday.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said she would bring the bill to the floor if the unanimous consent request was blocked.
“The President represents an imminent threat to our Constitution, our Country and the American people, and he must be removed from office immediately,” Pelosi said in a statement Monday, noting that House Republicans rejected the legislation, and claimed they were “enabling the President’s unhinged, unstable and deranged acts of sedition to continue.”
“Their complicity endangers America, erodes our Democracy, and it must end,” she said.
Pelosi announced that the House would take up the legislation, and said House Democrats are “further calling on the Vice President to respond within 24 hours after passage.”
The calls for Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment come from top Democrats in both chambers of Congress.
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Last week, Schumer and other Democrats urged Pence to “immediately” invoke the 25th Amendment, calling it the “quickest and most effective way” to remove Trump from office.
Schumer, though, warned that if Pence and the Cabinet did not take that path, Congress could “reconvene to impeach the president.”
The 25th Amendment includes a section allowing the vice president and a majority of Cabinet members to declare a president “unable” to perform the job.
Vice President Mike Pence officiates as a joint session of the House and Senate reconvenes to confirm the Electoral College votes at the Capitol, Wednesday, Jan 6, 2021. (Erin Schaff/The New York Times via AP, Pool)
A senior Trump administration official told Fox News that Pence has not been involved in any 25th Amendment conversations.
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The calls for Trump’s removal come after the president spoke at a rally Wednesday, telling supporters that he would “never concede,” and repeated unsubstantiated claims that the election was “stolen” from him and that he won in a “landslide.”
During his remarks, he renewed pressure on Pence, claiming that he should decertify the results of the presidential election and send it “back to the states,” claiming that if he did that, Trump would be president for another four years.
Trump’s remarks came ahead of a joint session of Congress to certify the results of the presidential election. As members of the House and Senate raised objections to certain electoral votes, both chambers called for a recess and left their chambers as pro-Trump protesters breached the Capitol building.
Washington, D.C., police said the security breach at the Capitol resulted in four deaths – including a woman who had been shot inside the building – and at least 70 arrests.
Congress later returned and certified the Electoral College vote early Thursday, formally giving Joe Biden his presidential victory.
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White House deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino posted a statement from the president on Twitter early Thursday morning, saying: “Even though I totally disagree with the outcome of the election, and the facts bear me out, nevertheless there will be an orderly transition on January 20th.”
“I have always said we would continue our fight to ensure that only legal votes were counted,” Trump said. “While this represents the end of the greatest first term in presidential history, it’s only the beginning of our fight to Make America Great Again!”
Meanwhile, Democratic Reps. Ted Lieu, David Cicilline and Jamie Raskin drafted an article of impeachment, “Incitement to Insurrection,” which they introduced Monday.
“In his conduct while President of the United States—and in violation of his constitutional oath faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States, and to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, Donald John Trump engaged in high Crimes and Misdemeanors by inciting violence against the Government of the United States,” the article reads.
The article alleges that before Jan. 6, the joint session of Congress to certify the presidential election results, Trump “repeatedly issued false statements asserting that the presidential election results were the product of widespread fraud and should not be accepted by the American people or certified by State or Federal officials.”
“As our next step, we will move forward with bringing impeachment legislation to the Floor,” Pelosi said. “The President’s threat to America is urgent, and so too will be our action.”
The House already voted to impeach Trump once, in December 2019, but the Senate acquitted him on both articles of impeachment – abuse of power and obstruction of Congress – in February 2020.
The House impeachment inquiry began after the president, during a phone call in July 2019, pressed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, to look into Biden’s role pressing for the ouster of a Ukrainian prosecutor who had been investigating the founder of Burisma Holdings – a Ukrainian natural gas firm where his son, Hunter, sat on the board.
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Trump’s pressure campaign against Ukraine prompted a whistleblower complaint, and, in turn, the impeachment inquiry.
The president’s request came after millions in U.S. military aid to Ukraine had been frozen, which Democrats cited as a quid pro quo arrangement.
Fox News’ Chad Pergram contributed to this report.
