President Trump late Thursday tweeted an apparent response to remarks from former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, who told “60 Minutes” that top law enforcement officials had discussed invoking the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office.
Trump quoted Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz, who told Fox News host Tucker Carlson on Thursday that McCabe’s comments represented an assault on the Constitution.
{mosads}”‘Trying to use the 25th Amendment to try and circumvent the Election is a despicable act of unconstitutional power grabbing…which happens in third world countries. You have to obey the law. This is an attack on our system & Constitution,’ ” Trump tweeted, quoting the professor.
The comments followed Dershowitz’s remarks to Carlson earlier in the night in which he described efforts to remove the president as “power-grabbing.”
“Any Justice Department official who even mentioned the 25th amendment in the context of President Trump has committed a grievous offense against the Constitution,” Dershowitz, who is also an opinion contributor for The Hill, said Thursday. “The framers had in mind something very specific, and trying to use the 25th Amendment to circumvent impeachment provisions or to circumvent an election is a despicable act of unconstitutional power-grabbing.”
The White House was put on the defensive Thursday after clips from McCabe’s interview revealed the former FBI official giving new details about discussions at the Justice Department following the firing of former FBI Director James Comey.
McCabe said that there were discussions concerning if Trump was fit to be president and whether the Cabinet should organize efforts to remove him via the 25th Amendment.
The president and White House officials both slammed McCabe on Thursday after the former FBI official’s comments.
“His selfish and destructive agenda drove him to open a completely baseless investigation into the president,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Thursday. “Andrew McCabe has no credibility and is an embarrassment to the men and women of the FBI and our great country.”