Tuesday, December 22, 2020

The 25th Amendment Option

I don't think it is widely understood that the 25th amendment option is, as the kids say, complicated, but we are a few days away from it being not complicated at all!
[ETA: I just realized that we’re almost at the point at which Pence and a majority of the cabinet could put an end to this all by themselves. Section 4 requires Congress to assemble within 21 days to decide the dispute when the vice president has become Acting President and the president wants his job back. But: the vice president has four days after the president disputes the transfer of power (which is immediate upon transmission of the vice president’s letter to Congress, and remains in place during the period when the president is disputing it) to reply, which means in practice that the vice president can remain Acting President for 25 days without Congress’s ultimate assent, if just one house of Congress blocks by simple majority vote the legally required vote on the transfer for the 21 days that are permitted by the amendment]