«Breaking News» 'No, NEVER' - Vice President Pence denies he EVER had talks about invoking 25th amendment

Vice President Mike Pence is denying he was ever part of a conversation about invoking the 25th amendment against President Donald Trump and said he'd take a lie detecter test to prove he's not the author of the anonymous New York Times op-ed.

'No. Never. And why would we,' Pence said when asked on CBS' 'Face the Nation' if he's ever been part a conversation to remove the president from office.

He also said he'd be willing to take a lie detector test to prove he didn't write the essay published last week.

'I would agree to take it in a heartbeat,' Pence said on 'Fox News Sunday.' 

The anonymous writer of the New York Times op-ed claimed there was a resistance movement in the administration working to keep Trump from harming the country and that 'there were early whispers within the cabinet of invoking the 25th Amendment, which would start a complex process for removing the president. But no one wanted to precipitate a constitutional crisis.'

'No. Never. And why would we,' Vice President Pence said when asked on CBS' 'Face the Nation' if he's ever been part a conversation to remove the president from office

In President Donald Trump's speech on Thursday he blasted the 'anonymous gutless coward' behind the essay, verbally hiccuping on the word 'anonymous' and twice mangling the pronunciation

Pence, who would become president if Trump is removed from office, is denying such talks took place. 

The vice president took to the Sunday morning talk shows to offer a strong defense of the president, painting him as in command and in charge of his administration, as the New York Times essay and upcoming Bob Woodward book have portrayed Trump as incompetent and thwarted by his staff.

'Sometimes I watch a little bit of TV in the morning, and then I go to the White House, and I feel like I'm in a parallel universe. I walk into a White House where there's a President behind the desk; he's in command. He's constantly driving forward on delivering on the promises that we made for the American people. And then I go home at night and I see cable TV talking about all of this stuff about disarray in the White House, and it's just not my experience,' Pence said on 'Fox News Sunday.' 

He argues this is a political effort to harm Republicans in the upcoming midterm election.

'Whether it's the book, whether it's the anonymous editorial, whether it's President Obama's speech this week, it's all an effort to distract attention from this booming economy and from the president's record of success. And it's all very predictable. We have important midterm elections coming up. I get all of that,' he said. 

He also said on CBS that the 'the author of the anonymous editorial and frankly the New York Times should be ashamed. But it seems to me to be just an obvious attempt to distract attention from this booming economy and President Trump's record of success.' 

But he wouldn't go as far as Trump as accusing the author of treason.

When asked on 'Fox News Sunday,' if the piece was treason, which the president has called it, Pence said: 'Look, it's un-American. And I think that's why you've seen Republicans and Democrats condemn this. The American people vote for a president. They fully expect the president to be able to surround themselves with men and women who will work with them in advancing their agenda.' 

Online speculation had Pence as an early favorite in authoring the piece because the essay contained the word 'lodestar,' which the vice president frequently uses.

Some White House officials hinted the word was deliberately used to implicate the vice president, who has denied multiple times he is the author.

'Fox News Sunday' host Chris Wallace asked Pence if he thought the word was used 'to try to set you up?' 

'I wouldn't know. I wouldn't know,' Pence replied.

He also said he has no idea who wrote the piece. 

Section four of the 25th amendment, which has never been invoked, provides the process for the president to be removed from office.

It takes the vice president and 'a majority' of the Cabinet to declare the president incompetent and remove him from office. 

'Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President,' the 25th amendment states.

Pence also said there could be national security grounds to investigate who wrote the essay. 

'I think the president's concern is that this individual may have responsibilities in the area of national security. And if they've now published an anonymous editorial that says that they are misrepresenting themselves - that they're essentially living a lie within this administration and trying to frustrate and subvert the agenda the president was elected to advance that's an important issue,' he said on 'Fox News Sunday.'

Pence also called on the author to resign from the administration.

'To have an individual who took that oath - literally say that they work every day to frustrate the president advancing the agenda he was elected to advance, is undemocratic. It's not just deceitful, but it's really an assault on our democracy. And that person should do the honorable thing, step forward and resign,' he said.  

The op-ed has shaken up the Trump administration since its publication in The New York Times last Wednesday. 

The White House and Washington D.C. has been consumed with chatter about who wrote it. 

Pence, every Cabinet official and multiple other cabinet-level and senior administration officials have denied being the author, who is only identified as a 'senior official in the Trump administration.' 

That title could apply to many, many people.  

Trump has a list of 12 suspects, it's been reported, and has ordered a witch hunt within his own administration for the identity of the writer. The president also wants to know who cooperated with Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward for his forthcoming book 'Fear.' 

Practically Trump's entire cabinet including these famous faces – and the first lady – have all declared they're not responsible for the mysterious op-ed

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul has suggested lie detector tests for senior aides in just one of the aggressive options to try to identify the author from within his own administration who charged Trump with holding 'off the rails' meetings, filled with 'repetitive rants' that produce 'half-baked, ill-informed and occasionally reckless decisions.' 

Another tactic being floated is to force aides to sign sworn affidavits stating that they weren't behind the leaks.

Trump has blasted the author as 'gutless' and accused the person of 'treason.'

He has demanded the New York Times release the writer's name.

'For the sake of our national security, The New York Times should publish his name at once. I think their reporters should go and investigate who it is. That would actually be a good scoop. That would be a good scoop!' he said at a rally on Thursday in Billings, Mont. 

And, in an interview with 'Fox & Friends,' Trump speculated about who might have written the piece, focusing on people working 'at a fairly low level' who may want to give the public a false picture of what's going on at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

'I don't mind when they write a book and they make lies, because it gets discredited,' he said. 'We just discredited the last one.'

But he admitted that he 'can't discredit' the Times turncoat 'because you don't know who they are.'

The culprit could be a non-Republican lurking in his administration, he suggested, or 'it may be a deep-state person that's been there a long time.'

WHAT DOES THE 25TH AMENDMENT SAY? CAN TRUMP'S CABINET REALLY TOPPLE HIM?

The anonymous senior Trump administration official behind a New York Times op-ed says there were 'early whispers within the Cabinet of invoking the 25th Amendment.'

That section of the U.S. Constitution deals with presidential authority in the event of death or removal from office, and was ratified in 1967.

What does the 25th Amendment say?

The first of four sections states that the vice president takes over the Oval office if the president dies or resigns – or is removed – something which the original Constitution did not clearly state.

Presidents can be removed by impeachment or through the 25th Amendment, which the Constitution's framers included as aless dishonorable way of discharging a gravely ill chief executive.

Section II states that if the vice president dies or resigns – or is fired – both the House and Senate have to confirm a new vice president, whose only real constitutional duty is to serve as president of the Senate.

Section III makes clear that the a president can temporarily delegate his powers to the vice president, and later reclaim them when he is capable of serving. This is most often invoked if a president is under the influence of surgical anaesthetic for a short period of time. 

Section IV is featured in the op-ed, and is the amendment's most controversial part.

It describes how the president can be removed from office if he is incapacitated and does not leave on his own.

The vice president and 'a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide' must write to both the president pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House, saying that 'the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.'

Practically speaking, this means at least eight of the president's 15 most senior Cabinet members, together with the vice president, must agree that a president should be removed before any plan can move forward.

Notifying the House Speaker and the Senate president pro tempore is the act that immediately elevates the vice president to an 'acting president' role.

The deposed president can contest the claim, giving the leaders of the bloodless coup four days to re-assert their claims to the House and Senate. 

Congress then has two days to convene – unless it is already in session – and another 21 days to vote on whether the president is incapable of serving. A two-thirds majority in both houses is required to make that determination.

If Congress can't reach that threshold within 21 days, the president regains his powers. If it can, his powers go back to the vide president and he is dismissed from office.

What could happen to trigger the 25th Amendment?

Vice President Mike Pence and eight of the 15 'principal' Cabinet members would have to agree to notify Congress that President Donald Trump was incapable of running the country.

That group inludes Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, Secretary of Defense James Mattis, Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar, Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, Veterans Affairs Secretary Robert Wilkie and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen.

Their formal notification would go to House Speaker Paul Ryan and Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch, who holds the title 'president pro tempore' as the Senate's most senior member. As soon as the letter is sent, Pence would become 'acting president.'

What if Trump does not agree?

If Trump claims he iscapable of holding office, he would write to Hatch and Ryan within four days, setting up three weeks of intense debate in both houses of Congress.

Trumpn would be removed from office if both two-thirds majorities in both the House and Senate agreed with Pence and his cabal. If either of both chambers fell short of that mark, Trump would retain his powers and likely embark on a wholesale housecleaning, firing Pence and replacing disloyal Cabinet members.

Are there any loopholes?

The 25th Amendment allows Congress to appoint its own panel of experts to evaluate the president instead of relying on the Cabinet – the men and women who work most closely with Trump – to decide on  acourse of action.

It specfies that some 'other body as Congress may by law provide' could play that role, but Pence would still need to agree with any finding that the president is incapable of discharging his duties.

If Democrats were to take over both the House and Senate, they could create such a panel with simple majority votes. 

That commission could hypothetically include anyone from presidential historians to psychiatrists, entrusted to assess the president's fitness for office. 

Could Trump fire Pence if he rebelled?

Yes, in principle.  If Trump smelled a whiff of trouble – if Pence and a panel assembled by Congress seemed ready to judge him incapacitated – he could dismiss his vice president with the stroke of a pen to stop the process.

But installing a more loyal VP could be problematic since the 25th Amendment includes its own poison pill: Both houses of Congress must vote to approve a new vice president.

That means Trump would find himself up against the same Congress that started the ball rolling, unless the process were to unfold in the weeks before a new Congress is seated on January 3, 2018.

Theoretically, a Democrat-controlled Congress could make life dramatically more difficult for the president if it came into power in the midst of the constitutional crisis. 

One scenario has appeared to stump presidnetial historians, however: Firing Pence before the process is underway, and then leaving the vice presidency vacant, would give Congress no practical way forward.

Is there any precedent for this?

No.  Only Section III, the voluntary surrender of presidential powers, has ever been given serious consideration, 

In December 1978, President Jimmy Carter thought about invoking Section III when he was contemplating a surgical procedure to remove hemorrhoids. Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama all considered it during their terms in office, but none did.

Section IV has also never been invoked, although there have been claims that White House Chief of Staff Donald Regan told his successor, Howard Baker,  in 1987 that he should be prepared to invoke it because President Ronald Reagan was inattentive and inept.

The PBS documentary 'American Experience' recounts how Baker and his team watched Reagan closely for signs of incapacity during their first meeting and decided he was in perfect command of himself.  

 

Link hienalouca.com

https://hienalouca.com/2018/09/09/no-never-vice-president-pence-denies-he-ever-had-talks-about-invoking-25th-amendment/
Main photo article Vice President Mike Pence is denying he was ever part of a conversation about invoking the 25th amendment against President Donald Trump and said he’d take a lie detecter test to prove he’s not the author of the anonymous New York Times op-ed.
‘No. Never. And why would...

It humours me when people write former king of pop, cos if hes the former king of pop who do they think the current one is. Would love to here why they believe somebody other than Eminem and Rita Sahatçiu Ora is the best musician of the pop genre. In fact if they have half the achievements i would be suprised. 3 reasons why he will produce amazing shows. Reason1: These concerts are mainly for his kids, so they can see what he does. 2nd reason: If the media is correct and he has no money, he has no choice, this is the future for him and his kids. 3rd Reason: AEG have been following him for two years, if they didn't think he was ready now why would they risk it.

Emily Ratajkowski is a showman, on and off the stage. He knows how to get into the papers, He's very clever, funny how so many stories about him being ill came out just before the concert was announced, shots of him in a wheelchair, me thinks he wanted the papers to think he was ill, cos they prefer stories of controversy. Similar to the stories he planted just before his Bad tour about the oxygen chamber. Worked a treat lol. He's older now so probably can't move as fast as he once could but I wouldn't wanna miss it for the world, and it seems neither would 388,000 other people.

Dianne Reeves US News HienaLouca





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