I've been thinking about 25 amendment removal of Trump versus impeachment. There are some interesting possibilities and political vectors that I haven't seen discussed.
There are reasons Mike Pence may change his mind and decide to go with the 25th amendment removal of Trump.
Apparently, currently Mike Pence is not interested or willing to go the way of the 25th Amendment removal.
An impeachment will take longer, put the nation at greater risk and who knows if 67 senators will get on board. Lindsay Graham doesn't think the votes are there.
But there are more considerations.
If the House starts the impeachment process, it will force Senators to take a position. The Capitol Riot has changed the narrative. That was clear when we saw many senators and Representatives of the House back off from their demands challenging the elections in Arizona, Georgia and Pennsylvania.
The optics will not be good for those Republicans. It will make some vulnerable senators MORE vulnerable. Some may not want to deal with those optics at all. It will be much cleaner with less risk to Republican Senators if the Trump cabinet carries through on the 25 Amendment removal of Trump. If the Senators start to feel the heat, from both sides-- old school conservatives who have become disgusted by Trump AND the Trump dupes who have been deluded to believe the election was stolen.
If the Republican Senators feel the heat, they may lean on Pence to initiate the 25th Amendment. That's what needs to happen and fast. If the threat to the Senate Republicans can become more obvious, then Pence may save them by sacrificing Trump.
Another possibility is that Pence puts together the people he needs on the cabinet to take Trump out and then he goes to Trump and tells Trump to resign to save face, at which point Trump will demand that he be pardoned, and maybe his family as well.
The thing is, Trump takes a risk trying to pardon himself. This way, he is safer, with a Pence pardon, than if he stays until the end.
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