The 25th Amendment to the Constitution is a way to quickly replace a president who cannot or will not do his job. Vice President Pence could become Acting President tomorrow if a majority of the Cabinet agreed. 

Hoping for courage from Pence or members of the Cabinet is probably a waste of time, but, according to CNN, “some Cabinet members are holding preliminary discussions about invoking the 25th Amendment”. 

A law professor at the University of Michigan wrote a book about the amendment and has been discussing it on Twitter. Here’s how it would work. Pence would initiate the process. He would need 8 of the 14 members of the Cabinet to agree that Txxxx should be removed. At that point, “the president is stripped of his powers and the Vice President becomes Acting President”. 

If the president agrees he’s unfit, Pence has the job until Joe Biden takes over on January 20th. 

Assuming the president doesn’t agree to relinquish his job (a safe assumption in this case), Pence and the cabinet have four days to respond. If Pence became Acting President on January 7th, therefore, he and the Cabinet wouldn’t have to do anything until January 11th. At that point, they’d either have to reinstate Txxxx or declare again that he’s unfit.

Saying again that Txxxx is unfit would immediately turn the matter over to Congress. Congress would then have at least 21 days to debate the issue, while Pence would still be Acting President.

Fortunately, Joe Biden would be president after 10 days, so Congress could let the clock run out on the worst presidency in history without taking a vote.

Reporters are quoting anonymous sources in the administration who say the president is delusional or out of his mind. Of course he is. Pence is already on the maniac’s enemies list for doing his job earlier today as Congress began adding up the electoral votes. After watching this president incite right-wing insurrection, maybe he and a group of his associates will finally agree with a majority of Americans that we can’t wait for this president to go.

Note: Here’s the 25th Amendment flowchart Prof. Brian Kalt included in his book.