President Trump is vehemently opposed to amending the federal constitution that would immediately suspend a President’s power immediately upon impeachment. The amendment is being called the Restoring Checks and Balances amendment and would require an impeachment of a President to automatically cause the Vice President to become acting President. In similar manner, all other impeached Executive Branch officials would also see their authority automatically suspended if the House of Representatives impeaches them. Only after the impeached official has been cleared through a trial can they resume their posting. In addition, the accused will only be tried if they demand such trial before the Senate within 180 days. If no trial is demanded by the impeached official, they are automatically removed from office.
Impeachment under the United States constitution has proven to be a highly ineffective mechanism for preserving checks and balances upon abuses of Executive power. Throughout American history only six Executive branch officials have ever been impeached, and none were convicted and only one resignation resulting. By contrast, Congress has used its constitutional powers against its own members with far greater 70% success rate. There have been a total of 42 instances of Congress using its expulsion power against its a sitting legislator, with 29 of those efforts resulting in the subject’s seat being vacated (21 compelled expulsions and 8 resignations in lieu of final expulsion).
The Restoring Checks and Balances amendment would create an American mechanism that closely replicates South Korea’s impeachment system, where President Yoon Suk Yeol has recently been impeached by the country’s National Assembly. Due to his impeachment, President Yoon is temporarily deposed in favor of the nation’s Prime Minister. Yoon is South Korea’s 13th President, its 3rd to face impeachment; one of the previously impeached Presidents was removed, and one was eventually cleared and reinstated to office.
The possibility of facing yet another impeachment after returning to the Oval Office seems to anger Donald Trump–but then again, what doesn’t? Trump has spent days calling Republican Governors across the country, telling them to vote against the amendment.
You heard that right.
Aides to the incoming President have largely let Trump be Trump on the matter. Instead of trying to lobby leading state legislators, Trump’s confidants tell me that they expect Democrats do their dirty work for them.
“Democrats don’t have the chutzpah to even bring the amendment forward in the first place,” one anonymous source tells me. “Yeah, it would be really effective and smart, and might be what the country needs. But that’s not the kind of thing that Democrats do. They’re too busy fundraising.”
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