Under the U.S. Constitution, it is the responsibility of the vice president, with the concurrence of a majority of the Cabinet, to invoke the 25th Amendment should the president become incapacitated.
This provision was not lightly added to the Constitution. It came after President Dwight Eisenhower suffered a heart attack and subsequent surgery which left him temporarily incapacitated. The point was driven home after President John F. Kennedy’s assassination, when there was question as to whether Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson had also been injured. The gap in leadership was recognized to be a major vulnerability, particularly in the nuclear age.
According to polling from July, most voters had lost confidence in President Joe Biden’s mental capabilities. His disastrous performance in his debate versus former President Donald Trump left no doubt as to that, emboldening former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other Democratic Party leaders who forced him to relinquish the nomination because they realized that his decline would be a drag on down-ballot races.
Biden is now on semi-permanent vacation while his cabinet officers run the country in his stead, as was done after President Woodrow Wilson suffered a debilitating stroke in the last year of his term.
Perhaps the country can muddle through, rudderless, for the remainder of Biden’s term, but what if a crisis arises, one on which the cabinet is divided as to how to act? Should that happen, the president will be called upon to make a fateful decision. Given his mental incompetence, Biden is no longer fit to discharge this duty, and this is no time to be relying on government by committee with an addled commander in chief.
Vice President Kamala Harris has failed the country by not asking the Cabinet to join her in invoking the 25th Amendment. This is her solemn constitutional duty, which she has refused to fulfill, and in doing so she has imperiled our national security. Doubtless Biden’s supporters would claim that he is just fine and dismiss claims to the contrary as conspiracy theories and disinformation. Fine, then let the process play out. Section 4 stipulates that the president shall be returned to duty if he declares that he is he is no longer incapacitated — unless two thirds of both the House and Senate vote not to accept that declaration. The president, for example, could take —and pass — a cognitive exam and the whole thing could be put to rest in a matter of days.
But Vice President Harris will never take the initial step.
This is unsurprising, given the political intrigues that rule Washington. Vice President Harris has never won a single primary vote, either in 2020 or in 2024. Her grip on power rests entirely on the backing of the Democratic Party’s political elite and she dare not offend them or go against their wishes. This deference to the party brahmins was amply on display in her recent interview on Fox News, where she made it clear that she has no voice of her own.
It is clear what the vice president ought to do, but she doesn’t have the courage to put country first over party.
Craig W. Stanfill is a computer scientist, software entrepreneur and the author of the AI Dystopia science fiction series. His X handle is @craigwstanfill, and website is www.craigwstanfill.com.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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