25th Amendment explained and how it could remove Donald Trump from office
Topics: Donald Trump, Greenland, US News, World News, Politics, JD Vance
Callum Jones
Featured Image Credit: Getty Images/Tom Brenner
Topics: Donald Trump, Greenland, US News, World News, Politics, JD Vance
With Donald Trump adamant on his intentions to annexe Greenland, some Democrats have posed the possibility of the 25th Amendment being invoked.
The president has spoke about taking over the Danish territory since he returned to office this time last year, claiming the US 'needs' to own Greenland 'now' for the sake of national security.
The move has been condemned by many European leaders, leading to Trump threatening to impose a ten percent tariff in eight European countries, starting February.
Come June, this is set to rise to 25 percent should a deal for the 'complete and total purchase of Greenland' fail to be reached.
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People are worried World War Three could break out if Trump attempts to take military action on Greenland, with some of the president's critics calling for the 25th Amendment to be invoked to get Trump out of the White House.
The amendment was proposed by federal lawmakers following the assassination of John F Kennedy in 1963.
Section 4 of the 25th Amendment permits the transfer of authority to the vice president without actually removing the president in situ.
Most likely the president, Trump in this case, would block such a move - though Congress does have the power to mandate the transfer of power through a two-thirds vote in the Senate and the House of Representatives.
Under the provision of section four, the vice president, JD Vance, and a majority of the 15-member Cabinet must jointly declare the president unfit to perform their duties.
The 25th Amendment has never been used to remove a sitting president, though it has been invoked for two VP's in the past.
California Democrat Maxine Waters called for aggressive steps to ensure that Trump could be removed from office last year.
The representative said: “He wants to control the Fed. He wants to be able to determine interest rates. He wants to be able to have the people on the governing board that will do exactly as they are told. This is extraordinarily dangerous. This is the makings of a dictator who is trying to control the entire economy.”
The politician argued that Trump and his administration could ‘upend the entire economy’ and called for the implementation of Article 25.
Fellow Democrat Ed Markey, recently took to X and simply wrote: "Invoke the 25th Amendment," amid a New York Times report that Trump has pushed on with his plan to annexe Greenland after failing to win the Nobel Peace Prize.
In a letter to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre, Trump made a concerning threat about no longer thinking 'purely of peace', even stating that he is going after an allied nation because 'your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 wars PLUS'.