The House passed a resolution formally calling on Vice President Mike Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment, allowing the majority of a cabinet to remove a president from office if they deem him unfit. The resolution requires Pence to respond within 24 hours, or the House will proceed with impeachment proceedings against the president.
Before Parliament voted on the resolution, Pence said in a letter to speaker Nancy Pelosi that he would not invoke the 25th amendment. The vice president said he “did not believe such a course of action is in the best interests of our nation or in accordance with our constitution.”
But some Republicans in Congress are starting to break with the president after a deadly attack on the Capitol by a violent mob of Trump supporters last week. Five Republicans, including Congressman Liz Cheney, the third Republican in the House, have said they will vote to impeach Mr. Trump.
“There has never been greater betrayal by a president of the United States of his office and his oath to the constitution,” Cheney said in a statement on Tuesday accusing the president of inciting violence among his supporters. In a speech at a rally hours before rioters invaded the Capitol, Trump repeatedly refused to give in, urged Republican lawmakers to try to reverse the election, and encourage his supporters to “fight like hell” .
The House is expected to continue with a vote on impeachment on Wednesday. An article on impeachment introduced in the House on Monday and backed by more than 200 Democrats accuses Mr. Trump of “inciting insurrection” and says he has “seriously endangered the security of the United States and its governmental institutions “.
A report released Tuesday night by House Judiciary Committee Democrats said the president “committed a serious crime and crime against the nation by instigating an uprising in the Capitol in an attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. to do”.
Some Republicans have denounced the president but refused to go so far as to impeach him. A group of six House Republicans filed a resolution on Tuesday condemning Mr. Trump for “ trying to unlawfully reverse the 2020 presidential election and violate his oath of office on January 6. ” Unlike impeachment, censure would have no practical consequences, but simply be a formal conviction.
The president refuses to take any responsibility for the deadly attack that left five dead. Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Trump claimed his speech to supporters before storming the Capitol was “completely justified.”