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Bills
| 3.23.22

Should a Congressional Commission Examine the President’s Physical & Mental Fitness Under the 25th Amendment? (H.R. 1987)

Do you support or oppose this bill?

What is H.R. 1987?

(Updated April 18, 2021)

This bill would establish an Oversight Commission on Presidential Capacity that would be used to carry out section four of the 25th Amendment, which allows the vice president to take over for the president when he’s “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.” The commission would carry out a medical exam of the president and make a determination whether the president is temporarily or permanently impaired by physical illness or disability, mental illness, mental deficiency, or alcohol or drug use to the extent that the person lacks sufficient understanding or capacity to execute their duties. The vice president would have to concur with the commission’s finding that the president is incapacitated.

Congress would be able to trigger such an exam by 72 hours by passing a concurrent resolution through both the House and Senate, and within 72 hours of the exam’s the commission would notify Congress of its findings. If the president refuses to undergo such an exam, it would be taken into consideration by the commission when they make their report for Congress.

The commission would consist of 11 members appointed by the majority and minority leaders of the House and Senate, including four psychiatrists, four physicians, and three political members (former presidents, vice presidents, certain members of the Cabinet). Members would need to be approved by Congress and the commission’s chair would be appointed by its members. All members of the commission would be physicians, and at least one of the two appointees chosen by congressional leadership would need to specialize in psychiatry.

Under Section 4 of the 25th Amendment the vice president has the authority to remove the president with the support of the majority of the Cabinet or “such other body as Congress” if the president can’t “discharge the powers and duties of the office.” What that other body was wasn’t clarified further by Congress.

Argument in favor

There needs to be a process for replacing a president who lacks the mental or physical capacity to lead the nation, and this bill would bring structure to the 25th Amendment’s vague instructions. Congress should’ve set up this commission 50 years ago, but there is no better time than the present to do this.

Argument opposed

Given that positions on this commission would be filled through political appointments, it’s possible that it could make a decision on political rather than medical grounds. That could turn the commission into a tool that each party alternates using to undermine a president they don’t like by questioning their capacity.

Impact

Members of the commission; Congress; the Vice President and the President.

Cost of H.R. 1987

A CBO cost estimate is unavailable.

Additional Info

In-Depth: Sponsoring Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) introduced this bill in response to comments made by President Donald Trump during the campaign and since his inauguration that led Raskin to question Trump's mental capacity to serve as president:

“This is a president who has insisted that Ted Cruz’s father was involved in the assassination of John F. Kennedy and that Barack Obama was born in Indonesia, and he has uttered blatant lies and never retracted them. And that is a sign of a serious mental disturbance…This is a president who seems increasingly at odds with everyone and everything around him...It certainly doesn’t feel like the ship is on an even course right now. We are careening all over the place.”

A White House spokesperson declined to “dignify this with an official response.” Former Democratic congressman and presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich called it “a political statement, not a medical statement” that is “destroying the [Democratic] party as an effective opposition.” Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD), Raskin’s fellow member of the Maryland congressional delegation who is an anesthesiologist, said of the bill:

“To properly evaluate someone’s mental and physical health requires years of schooling, and it is an insult to the entire medical profession to assume that unqualified, agenda-pushing, partisan politicians would be able to make such a critical professional judgment. This legislation is a thinly veiled attempt by Democrats to undermine a legislative agenda they disagree with.”

This legislation has the support of 21 Democratic cosponsors in the House.


Of Note: The 25th Amendment was ratified in 1967 in response to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. It has been invoked six times since then, three of which were related to vacancies in the office of the president and vice president during the Nixon administration. The latter three resulted in the vice president becoming the acting president while the sitting president underwent medical procedures requiring anesthesia:

  • During President Ronald Reagan’s colonoscopy in 1986, he transferred power to Vice President George H.W. Bush, although he took steps to show he didn’t want to create a binding precedent for successors.

  • In 2002 President George W. Bush underwent a colonoscopy and transferred power to Vice President Dick Cheney for two hours, and did so again for a colonoscopy in 2007.


Media:

Summary by Eric Revell

(Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore via Flickr / Creative Commons)