Shannon Bream of Fox News reported on her show, “Fox News Sunday,” that no Democratic lawmakers or allies of President Joe Biden were willing to defend his decision to remain in the presidential race publicly. According to Bream, her team spent days attempting to find Democrats who would speak on record, but all were “unable or unwilling” to do so. She noted that dozens of lawmakers and Biden campaign allies declined invitations to appear on her program to discuss the matter.
“Now, before we get to our guests, I want you, the viewers at home, to know something. Our team has spent days reaching out to dozens of lawmakers and Biden advocates and allies,” Bream said. “We’ve had numerous interactions with the Biden/Harris campaign, but not a single potential guest was either able or willing to join us on today’s show to defend the president and his decision to stay on the ticket.” She added: “We will be having a conversation without that voice, which we have been working around the clock to avoid.”
WATCH:
SHANNON BREAM: Our team spent days reaching out to dozens of lawmakers, Biden advocates, and allies, but not a single guest was willing or able to come on to defend Joe Biden. pic.twitter.com/qKxBpV0NsL
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) July 7, 2024
Some Democrats concerned about how rapidly Trump is rising in the polls following Biden’s horrendous debate are offering up what they call “Plan C,” and some people are already shouting about constitutional concerns. According to political insider Paul Bedard at the Washington Examiner, Plan C involves replacing Vice President Kamala Harris with former President Barack Obama.
“A Biden-Obama ticket would have a much better chance of beating Trump,” said legal scholar John Banzhaf, a professor at George Washington University Law School. “Barack Obama is probably one of the few persons whom a majority of Americans would want and trust as president, so Plan C might be the least objectionable of a number of very unpopular and dubious options now open to Biden and the Democratic Party,” he added on Thursday.
Banzhaf cited analyses by constitutional scholars who pooh-poohed concerns that the 12th and 22nd Amendments bar a former two-term president from the vice presidency. “The 22nd Amendment, which is most frequently cited as a bar to Barack Obama ever serving as president again, doesn’t — according to its carefully crafted and very narrow exclusionary language,” Banzhaf said.
The critical sentence in the amendment says, “No person shall be elected to the office of the president more than twice, and no person who has held the office of the president, or acted as president, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected president shall be elected to the office of the president more than once.” Banzhaf added that “while this amendment may bar Obama from ‘being elected’ to the office of president again, it obviously and by its clear language doesn’t prohibit him from being elected as vice president, and subsequently becoming president by succession without ever being elected to the office again.”
He further broke down the language of the 12th Amendment. “According to the overly precise language deliberately carefully chosen by the drafters, Obama cannot ‘be elected to the office of the president,’ but there’s nothing to say that he cannot be elected to the office of the vice president, and then succeed to the presidency if Biden becomes unable to perform his presidential duties or simply resigns. In other words, Obama is not now ‘ineligible to the office of president’ and therefore ineligible to run for vice-president; rather he is only ineligible to be ‘elected’ to the office of the president, not ineligible to attain the office by succession,” he wrote in an email.
“Rather than simply offering the public the opportunity to have a second-term Biden president supported and backstopped by a very popular and clearly very capable former president Obama, and having someone with experience and a proven record as commander in chief should Biden not be able to continue to serve at anytime during a second four-year term, Biden might even consider announcing before the election that, if elected president, he would resign shortly after his inauguration so that Obama can then become president,” Banzhaf wrote.
However, others argue that the 12th Amendment actually does prevent Obama from even becoming vice president. While the concept is interesting, the final section of the 12th Amendment states: “But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.” How this interacts with the 22nd Amendment, which limits presidents to two elected terms, is uncertain, but on the face of it, Obama wouldn’t be permitted now to become vice president.
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