[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 21 Introduced in House (IH)]
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117th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. RES. 21
Calling on Vice President Michael R. Pence to convene and mobilize the
principal officers of the executive departments of the Cabinet to
activate section 4 of the 25th Amendment to declare President Donald J.
Trump incapable of executing the duties of his office and to
immediately exercise powers as acting President.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
January 11, 2021
Mr. Raskin submitted the following resolution; which was referred to
the Committee on the Judiciary
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Calling on Vice President Michael R. Pence to convene and mobilize the
principal officers of the executive departments of the Cabinet to
activate section 4 of the 25th Amendment to declare President Donald J.
Trump incapable of executing the duties of his office and to
immediately exercise powers as acting President.
Whereas on Wednesday, January 6, 2021, the day fixed by the Constitution for the
counting of electoral votes, Congress experienced a massive violent
invasion of the United States Capitol and its complex by a dangerous
insurrectionary mob which smashed windows and used violent physical
force and weapons to overpower and outmaneuver the United States Capitol
Police and facilitated the illegal entry into the Capitol of hundreds,
if not thousands, of unauthorized persons (all of whom entered the
Capitol complex without going through metal detectors and other security
screening devices);
Whereas, the insurrectionary mob threatened the safety and lives of the Vice
President, the Speaker of the House, and the President pro tempore of
the Senate, the first three individuals in the line of succession to the
presidency, as the rioters were recorded chanting ``Hang Mike Pence''
and ``Where's Nancy'' when President Donald J. Trump tweeted to his
supporters that ``Mike Pence didn't have the courage to do what should
have been done to protect our country'' after the Capitol had been
overrun and the Vice President was in hiding;
Whereas the insurrectionary mob attacked law enforcement officers, unleashed
chaos and terror among Members and staffers and their families, occupied
the Senate Chamber and Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office along with other
leadership offices, vandalized and pilfered government property, and
succeeded in interfering with the counting of electoral votes in the
joint session of Congress;
Whereas the insurrectionary mob's violent attacks on law enforcement and
invasion of the Capitol complex caused the unprecedented disruption of
the Electoral College count process for a 4-hour period in both the
House and the Senate, a dangerous and destabilizing impairment of the
peaceful transfer of power that these insurrectionary riots were
explicitly designed to cause;
Whereas 5 Americans have died as a result of injuries or traumas suffered during
this violent attack on Congress and the Capitol, including Capitol
Police Officer Brian D. Sicknick and Ashli Babbitt, Rosanne Boyland,
Kevin Greeson, and Benjamin Phillips, and more than 50 police officers
were seriously injured, including 15 officers who had to be
hospitalized, by violent assaults, and there could easily have been
dozens or hundreds more wounded and killed, a sentiment captured by
Senator Lindsey Graham, who observed that ``the mob could have blown the
building up. They could have killed us all'';
Whereas these insurrectionary protests were widely advertised and broadly
encouraged by President Donald J. Trump, who repeatedly urged his
millions of followers on Twitter and other social media outlets to come
to Washington on January 6 to ``Stop the Steal'' of the 2020
Presidential election and promised his activist followers that the
protest on the Electoral College counting day would be ``wild'';
Whereas President-elect Joseph R. Biden won the 2020 Presidential election with
more than 81 million votes and defeated President Trump 306-232 in the
Electoral College, a margin pronounced to be a ``landslide'' by
President Trump when he won by the same Electoral College numbers in
2016, but President Trump never accepted these election results as
legitimate and waged a protracted campaign of propaganda and coercive
pressure in the Federal and State courts, in the state legislatures,
with Secretaries of State, and in Congress to nullify and overturn these
results and replace them with fraudulent and fabricated numbers;
Whereas President Trump made at least 3 attempts to intervene in the lawful vote
counting and certification process in Georgia and to coerce officials
there into fraudulently declaring him the winner of the State's
electoral votes, including calls to Georgia Governor Brian Kemp and a
State elections investigator, and an hour-long conversation with
Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger badgering him to ``find 11,780
votes'' and warning of a ``big risk'' to Raffensperger if he did not
intervene favorably to guarantee the reelection of President Trump;
Whereas President Trump appeared with members of his staff and family at a
celebratory kickoff rally to encourage and charge up the rioters and
insurrectionists to ``walk down to the Capitol'' and ``if you don't
fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore'' on
Wednesday, January 6, 2021;
Whereas while violent insurrectionists occupied parts of the Capitol, President
Trump ignored or rejected repeated real-time entreaties from Speaker
Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to appeal to his
followers to exit the Capitol, and also ignored a tweet from Alyssa
Farah, his former communications director, saying: ``Condemn this now,
@realDonaldTrump--you are the only one they will listen to. For our
country!'';
Whereas photographs, cell phone videos, social media posts, and on-the-ground
reporting show that numerous violent insurrectionists who invaded the
Capitol were armed, were carrying police grade flex cuffs to detain and
handcuff people, used mace, pepper spray, and bear spray against United
States Capitol Police officers, erected a gallows on Capitol grounds to
hang ``traitors,'' vehemently chanted ``Hang Mike Pence!'' while
surrounding and roving the Capitol, emphasized that storming the Capitol
was ``a revolution,'' brandished the Confederate battle flag inside the
Capitol, and were found to be in possession of Napalm B, while still
unidentified culprits planted multiple pipe bombs at buildings near the
Capitol complex, another lethally dangerous criminal action that
succeeded in diverting law enforcement from the Capitol; and
Whereas Donald Trump has demonstrated repeatedly, continuously, and
spectacularly his absolute inability to discharge the most basic and
fundamental powers and duties of his office, including most recently the
duty to respect the legitimate results of the Presidential election, the
duty to respect the peaceful transfer of democratic power under the
Constitution, the duty to participate in legally defined transition
activities, the duty to protect and uphold the Constitution of the
United States, including the counting of Electoral College votes by
Congress, the duty to protect the people of the United States and their
elected representatives against domestic insurrection, mob rule, and
seditious violence, and generally the duty to take care that the laws be
faithfully executed: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That the House of Representatives calls upon Vice
President Michael R. Pence--
(1) to immediately use his powers under section 4 of the
25th Amendment to convene and mobilize the principal officers
of the executive departments in the Cabinet to declare what is
obvious to a horrified Nation: That the President is unable to
successfully discharge the duties and powers of his office; and
(2) to transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate
and the Speaker of the House of Representatives notice that he
will be immediately assuming the powers and duties of the
office as Acting President.
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