But Will He Leave?

Posted on by under Election 2020, Law and justice, Political commentary

I’ve been doing a bit of thinking, my friends.  While today, it looks unlikely that the Senate will vote to convict Donald Trump of ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’ and boot him out of office, I suspect that as the impeachment investigations turn up more and more skeletons, some republican senators may begin to have second thoughts about throwing their lot in with Trump.  The end result, by somewhere around mid-February of next year, may well be that he is not only impeached, but tried and convicted in the Senate, and removed from office.  Granted, this isn’t a likelihood, but is nonetheless a possibility.

But … what if he digs in and says, “Hell no, I won’t go!”?  What then?  This is uncharted territory, friends … we’ve never before had a president who alluded to staying in office longer than his two terms … Trump has made that statement more than once.  We’ve never before had a president who was so paranoid that he couldn’t handle even the slightest criticism.  We’ve never before had such a bully, such a manipulator, in the Oval Office.

And the concern goes beyond the threat of impeachment and conviction.  What happens when he loses the election next November?  Does he, as every other president in the history of this nation has done, quietly pack up and move out of the White House on 20 January 2021?  I can’t picture it.  There are 77 days between the election on November 3rd and the inauguration of (hopefully) a new president the following January 20th.  How do you think Trump will spend those 77 days?  Protocol would demand that he spend the time briefing the incoming president, wrapping up loose ends, aiding in the transition, but I don’t think anybody with half a brain believes that Trump would spend his time following that protocol.

I am not alone in this line of thinking.

An article in yesterday’s Foreign Policy, titled The Tyrannical Mr. Trump, posits that even if Trump is impeached by the House and convicted by the Senate, he may well reject such a verdict as illegitimate.  A snippet from the article …

What were once only hints of anti-democratic tendencies have become clearer in recent weeks as news surfaced of Trump’s efforts to find dirt on Biden—allegedly holding Ukraine’s military aid hostage to this effort (and including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on the call, as we’ve now learned). Trump appears to have ordered his administration—including, most recently, Pompeo—to defy congressional perquisites and subpoenas. He has insisted that he can do as he pleases and has abused any coherent interpretation of the Constitution, telling a crowd of young people in a July speech: “I have an Article II, where I have the right to do whatever I want as president.”

Most political analysts cringed last week when Trump tweeted …

“As I learn more and more each day, I am coming to the conclusion that what is taking place is not an impeachment, it is a COUP, intended to take away the Power of the People, their VOTE, their Freedoms, their Second Amendment, Religion, Military, Border Wall, and their God-given rights as a Citizen of The United States of America!”

In 2016, Donald Trump waffled over whether he would accept the election results if he lost. Since then, Trump has repeatedly joked about staying in office beyond the two terms the Constitution allows. Jerry Falwell Jr., Trump’s most prominent evangelical supporter, has suggested Trump should get two years tacked on to his first term as “pay back” for the Mueller investigation. The president’s own former lawyer, Michael Cohen, has warned that “there will never be a peaceful transition of power” should Trump fail in his reelection bid.

Some have argued that the fears are ludicrous, noting there are too many forces working against a sitting president simply clinging to power — including history, law and political pressure.  Ordinarily, I would agree.  Up until 3 years ago, I would have agreed wholeheartedly.  But, there is nothing ‘ordinary’ about these times or this ‘president’, and almost all of the norms have been shredded already.  The Constitution has been trampled many times over by Trump, with Congress and the Courts being only partly able to rein him in.

At a recent rally in Pennsylvania, Trump said …

“We ran one time and we’re 1-and-0. But it was for the big one. Now we’re going to have a second time. And we’re going to have another one. And then we’ll drive them crazy. And maybe if we really like it a lot — and if things keep going like they’re going — we’ll go and we’ll do what we have to do. We’ll do a three and a four and a five.”

The stuff that nightmares are made of.  So, what happens if Trump is put out of office, either by impeachment or the vote in 2020?  What happens if he refuses to go?  One political scientist argues that the courts would evict him … okay, sure, but how would they physically remove him from office?  Who’s going to do that?  Will the FBI bring a swat team and physically drag him from the White House?  Will D.C.’s Metro Police?  Or, will the military be the ones who physically remove him?  And, perhaps the bigger question is, once he is removed, what does this fiasco do to an already polarized nation?

If Donald Trump had any integrity, any loyalty to the nation, he would have already stepped down, as did Richard Nixon in 1974.  But, he has already shown us time and time again that he has neither integrity nor loyalty to country, that he is completely self-serving, that he believes himself to be a supreme leader, above the law.  It is my hope that if there are any sane heads left in our intelligence services and military, and I believe there are, they are already quietly making plans for dealing with this eventuality.  Meanwhile, life goes on here inside the Trump circus.

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26 thoughts on “But Will He Leave?”

    • Yes, there is that possibility. Sigh. What happens? I don’t think anybody knows … we are in uncharted waters here … this entire situation is without precedent. Sigh. It is not going to be a fun 13 months.

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  3. Jill, as John Oliver said Trump will have to be dragged out kicking and screaming. Also, Obama had teams of people lined up (as required) to pass the baton and share knowledge with the incoming team. In almost every instance these transition briefings did not take place as Trump did not have his team in place. My guess is Trump won’t prepare to pass the baton.

    If Trump is allowed to not transition that will effectively end our democracy. That cannot be tolerated by any party. Keith

    Liked by 1 person

    • No, Trump won’t go quietly for sure. One analyst said he would likely go through the courts to have the election overturned if he lost. Sigh. Such a megalomaniac! And some 40% of people still support him!

      I agree with you wholeheartedly … if he is allowed to not transition, we will have lost everything … we will live under a dictatorship. This simply cannot be allowed!

      Liked by 1 person

  4. If that were to happen (Trump refusing to leave the White House), my best guess is that he would be charged for trespassing and escorted off of the property sternly. After all, he wouldn’t be a sitting president, and could therefore be charged.

    Liked by 1 person

  6. Excellent piece Jill. I’ve wondered the same thing. Yes, even Nixon left when the jig was up. But Nixon, for all of his many faults, understood democracy and was actually very intelligent. Trump doesn’t, and isn’t.

    I’ll say though that Nixon did make an ominous statement when being interviewed by David Frost a few years after he resigned. Remember? “If the president does it, it’s legal.” That famous statement shocked many. And now we have a president who is abiding by Nixon’s troubling proclamation. I don’t even want to think what the next year will bring us. It won’t be pretty.

    Liked by 1 person

    • Nixon was intelligent, and during his tenure he did a number of very good things, especially in the area of foreign relations, particularly as relates to U.S.-China relations. And, I believe he had a conscience and cared for the nation and the people. Trump, on the other hand shares only one common trait with Nixon … greed and power-hungry … okay, so that’s two. But he’s dumber than a deflated balloon, has done nothing good for this nation, in my book, and puts his self-interest far ahead of ours. I don’t want to think about it either … I keep asking myself … what if he wins. What if I’m sitting here in the wee hours of the morning on November 4th of next year and watch the electoral votes tallying up in his favour? What will I do? Do you know where I could buy a cyanide capsule before then?

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  9. Quite a few people must have spoken about this situation and wondered the same thing, who evicts him?My money is on the army, good solid boots with a good grip on the floor when he tries to dig his heels in. I’m ratgher hoping that Mike

    Liked by 2 people

    • ……..rather hoping that Mike Pence has read 1EarthUnited that he starts the process for 25th amendment and just need the backing of 14 of the Cabinet. I imagine he’d get that no problem and anyone can tolerate Pence up to Jan 2021 and if not you have his admission that he played a part in Trump’s Ukraine fiasco so he can always be Impeached.
      Cwtch

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      • I’m going to have to address the 25th Amendment issue again, I think. While I respect what 1Earth says, it just isn’t going to happen. At least 5 people have asked me about it in the last week, but … it’s a pipe dream. No way half of his cabinet plus Pence will go for it, and frankly the grounds may or may not be there … it’s not that clear cut. Impeachment is the best option (outside of the other one that you and I have discussed before), and especially if at least 20 republican senators can be convinced that they aren’t helping their careers any by holding him up. And if that fails, then it’s November 3rd 2020. If that one fails, we are doomed.
        Cwtch

        Liked by 1 person

    • Hello David, in the US the chain of command starts with the President as commander-in-chief. That means he’s head of the armed forces. So unless there’s a revolution where a military coup takes place like in some banana republic, it is highly unlikely that some General will go against the Prez and seize power.
      Also Trump was smart enough to “buy” our military support by increasing the military budget by billions every year since taking office. Our military is getting as fat and bloated as our supreme leader lol. Our whole democratic system has been mired in bureaucracy, incompetence, waste and confusion ever since Dumpty took over.
      I have no faith in VP Pence abilities as he has shown to be a sycophantic lame-ass, his biggest ambition to promote his evangelical agenda, making US a theocracy like Vatican City.
      When it comes to dictators, assassination is always a possibility. 😉

      Liked by 1 person

    • I’m sure they have, for it’s been weighing on my mind for a while now, and I found numerous articles on the subject when I went in search of. I’m inclined to agree that it may take the army, but that’s likely dependent on whether he has enough of his boot-lickers in high-level positions in the Pentagon, too.
      Cwtch

      Liked by 1 person

  10. “I have an Article II, where I have the right to do whatever I want as president.”
    WHAT AN IDIOT!

    He should be more concerned about 25th Amendment, Section IV – A legal loophole to legally remove the president.
    Under the amendment’s fourth stipulation, it would only take 14 people to depose the president — Vice President Mike Pence and 13 of Trump’s 24 Cabinet members.

    John D. Feerick, former dean of Fordham Law School, is one of the chief architects of the 25th Amendment who shepherded it through Congress in the early 1960s.

    He told Business Insider in March 2017 that the senators who signed the provision into law specified that declaring the president unfit must rely on “reliable facts regarding the president’s physical or mental faculties,” not personal prejudice.

    “If you read the debates, it’s also clear that policy and political differences are not included, unpopularity is not included, poor judgment, incompetence, laziness, or impeachable conduct — none of that, you’ll find in the debates in the congressional record, is intended to be covered by Section IV,” Feerick said.

    Section IV goes on to say that if two-thirds of both houses of Congress don’t vote to uphold the decision and keep the vice president in charge within 21 days, then the powers and duties automatically transfer back to the president. So if the president doesn’t want to give up his office, Feerick explained, he doesn’t have to if Congress agrees he shouldn’t.

    Akhil Reed Amar, a leading constitutional scholar at Yale University, said in a podcast for the National Constitution Center on the topic that the president’s own running mate is the one who triggers a “palace coup,” in order to maintain political stability.

    “Here’s the key point: The vice president is the pivot in the whole process,” Amar said. “Unless the vice president puts himself — maybe one day, herself — forward, no one else can really basically, at least within the 25th Amendment framework, proclaim an unwilling president ‘disabled.'”

    The idea is that the Cabinet and VP are the president’s closest advisers, Feerick said, so they would be the ones with the best sense of his mental faculties. They, and Congress, could also consult doctors to evaluate the president’s physical and mental health in order to determine if he or she is fit for the job, though they don’t have to.

    The 25th Amendment is a separate process from impeachment, which allows Congress to remove a sitting president if a majority of the House of Representatives votes that he has committed treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors, and a trial in the Senate convicts him.

    In either case, legal scholars argue, the goal is to make the process as objective as possible.

    “In a time like this of unusual crisis, one had to count on leaders in the executive branch and Congress to really be patriots, not partisans,” Joel K. Goldstein, a constitutional expert at St. Louis University, said at a symposium that Fordham Law School hosted in September.

    https://www.businessinsider.com/25th-amendment-how-can-you-remove-president-from-office-2017-3

    Liked by 1 person

  11. I’ve been telling my state’s senators for almost three years that Trump is a dictator in the making and by their hanging their political lives upon this creature’s back were throwing away their ethics, their morals and their country. I do not see Trump leaving. ever. He is a dictator just waiting for someone to try to get rid of him. when he says there is a “coup”..believe him. He is speaking about himself.

    Liked by 3 people

    • Sigh. Yeah, I know. I do believe he will be ousted, eventually, one way or another, but it’s going to cause an even bigger rift in this country than we already have. I really wish he’d just choke on his Big Mac, or that Melania would get tired of his bullying and hold a pillow over his face some night. It would make things so much simpler.

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