California Gov. Gavin Newsom ignited an online firestorm on Thursday evening when, in response to President Donald Trumps election integrity speech, he suggested that it was time to invoke the 25th Amendment and remove the president for displaying what he described as cognitive impairment.
“The only thing missing in Donald Trumps speech was tin foil. This was a legitimate 25th Amendment moment â the rambling of a mad king,” Newsom said.
Newsoms call to use the 25th Amendment plays into preexisting calls from Democrats to examine Trumps cognitive performance, but also sparked controversy online about how Democrats could seriously question Trumps mental state when they dismissed similar concerns about now-former President Joe Biden.
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The 25th Amendment, ratified in 1967, allows the Cabinet to deem the president unfit for duty or allows Congress to establish an independent body to make that call.
To some critics, that case was much stronger under the last administration.
“You literally propped up a vegetable and lied to the American people about his cognitive decline for four years and never mentioned the 25th amendment once,” the official Republican National Committee X account wrote in response, referring to Republican doubts that Biden had the mental acuity to run the country at age 82.
“Given Newsom’s defense to this day of President Biden, calling him one of the greatest presidents ever, there’s a saying around sitting this one out that applies here…” Fox News contributor Joe Concha wrote on X.
“Gavin Newsome wants to remove [Trump] from office for disclosing California could have tens of thousands of aliens illegally registered to vote and that China attacked 220 million voters,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said.
Trump addressed the country on Thursday evening, informing the public that his administration had discovered a series of weaknesses in election integrity.
In particular, Trump said newly declassified documents would reveal foreign data theft carried out by China, that members of the U.S. government had known about election vulnerabilities for years, that Americans had been misled about those weaknesses and new evidence of “election fraud.”
Fox News Digital could not independently verify the content of the documents that were released by the White House.
Like many Democrats, Newsom cast doubt on the motives behind Trumps speech, which came just four months ahead of the November midterms.
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