If it wasn’t for the fact that Kamala Harris would replace him (and that the midterms are only six weeks away), the latest of President Biden’s serial displays of cognitive degeneration would have fueled yet another round of discussions surrounding Section 4 of the 25th Amendment.
A serious nation — a superpower — shouldn’t have someone with Biden’s manifest infirmities at the helm. A serious political establishment would acknowledge that Biden isn’t and hasn’t been up to the task of the presidency in 2022. Few rational and sober actors believe he’s in charge of his administration, initiating or deciding upon matters of policy and governance. Even the collection of mediocrities constituting his cabinet discerned his dysfunction from the outset but have kept their heads down, pending a green light from the party establishment. The more sober among them likely nodded, almost imperceptibly, to one another last January when Biden openly speculated about what the U.S. and NATO might do if Russia made a “minor incursion” into Ukraine. But no one’s seriously contemplating the 25th.
Biden’s approval ratings hover around 40 percent and he’s a suffocating weight on Democratic prospects in November. There are few elected Democrats who want or expect him to run for a second term. Indeed, since the very inception of the administration, the noises emanating from Washington suggest a plan to ease him to the side in 2024.
But Schumer, Pelosi, and the other political and financial heavyweights in the Democratic Party won’t urge Kamala Harris and cabinet members to declare Biden unable to discharge the powers and duties of the presidency. The political turmoil caused by such action, so close to the midterms, would be disastrous. And if done after the midterms, it would yield an acting President Harris, someone even less popular than President Biden, without noticeably greater mental acuity, and with little hope of keeping the presidency in 2024. Besides, even if politically feasible, the rancor within the Democratic Party and the impact on an already fragile polity would reverberate for decades. Biden may, and likely would, advise Congress that he’s able to perform the functions of the office, and then Congress would have to decide the matter, sparking mammoth internecine battles that Democrats (and probably many Republicans) would want to avoid.
Biden won’t be president in 2025. But, barring a cataclysm (do you really think Republicans would ever impeach him if they obtained congressional majorities?), we’re stuck with his manifold deficiencies until then.