B X Lee -- ‘Urgent Warning to Congressional Leaders: Trump is Psychologically Unstable and Dangerous’
‘Urgent Warning to Congressional Leaders: Trump is Psychologically Unstable and Dangerous’
Also, Rep. Jamie Raskin’s New Bill for a Commission on Presidential Capacity
Common Dreams has published our letter to Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, Speaker Mike Johnson, and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries with the above title. The initial purpose of the letter was the urgency that, from a medical standpoint, what is important is that we contain the dangers and protect society. This was articulated in my urgent appeal to the four living former presidents. This was also emphasized in our most recent Statement of Medical Concerns to the U.S. Senate. Congressional leaders will have the political process to do so, and therefore we have recommended that Congress:
immediately retake its constitutional authority over war….
create a circuit breaker capable of preventing … the potential use of nuclear weapons….
initiate consultation … regarding the President’s fitness for office under Section 4 of the Twenty-Fifth Amendment.
On the same day, April 14, 2026, Rep. Jamie Raskin introduced a new bill to Congress, “To establish the Commission on Presidential Capacity to Discharge the Powers and Duties of the Office, and for other purposes.” It states:
the Commission shall carry out a medical examination of the President to determine whether the President is mentally or physically unable to discharge the powers and duties of the office … if the Commission finds that the President is temporarily or permanently impaired by any of the following conditions to the extent that the person lacks sufficient understanding or capacity to execute the powers and duties of the office of President:
(1) Physical illness or disability.
(2) Mental illness or deficiency.
(3) Alcohol or drug use.
Of the bipartisan-appointed, independent, 17-member Commission, half of the members (8 or 9) would be physicians and half of those (4 or 5) psychiatrists. The chair may be a physician or a former high-ranking official. His original bill (H.R. 1987), introduced in 2017 with twenty cosponsors, was an 11-member Commission with all but two or three being physicians (8 or 9) and half of those being psychiatrists (4 or 5).
While the nation is still taking long to catch up, I cannot commend enough Raskin’s foresight in giving this issue focus and in emphasizing physician involvement.*
*Our nation lacks a system of expert panels to advise government, as many other nations have, and it takes inordinately long to wait for politicians to choose to consult with experts, often only for their chosen areas for their chosen purposes. Such a system becomes driven by politics, not by facts or actual need—when in fact we now have enough research studies, that we could run a government entirely by data, without need for ideology, that would show what is the most optimal approach for solving just about any problem. Raskin’s proposal is a step in the right direction. During the time when his 2017 bill was rapidly advancing in the House, more than tripling in support overnight, we had collected names of the most qualified candidates from the National Academy of Medicine, so that the selections would be guided by qualification, not politics or personal ambition. It is more than tragic that the American Psychiatric Association, without clarifying that it is a private guild despite the name, and one of several psychiatric bodies, asserted its “authority” to shut down all serious discourse, falsely conflating official consultations with its insignificant, “Goldwater rule.”
In 2017, when Raskin’s original bill was fast gaining support, I was in close contact with the original drafter of the Twenty-Fifth Amendment. He invited me to his clinic at Fordham Law School, which published further clarifications and recommendations on the Amendment that would make it more usable, such as:
that the White House add a mental health professional to the unit of doctors and nurses who care for the President.
[T]he Report addresses the absence of procedures for vice presidential inabilities and “dual inabilities” of the President and Vice President…. The Twenty-Fifth Amendment’s inability provisions are unusable when the Vice President is incapacitated.
[It] considers how Congress would carry out its responsibility to resolve a dispute over whether the President is unable…. The Clinic recommends the creation of a joint committee of both Houses of Congress. This Part also anticipates legal disputes that may arise in such a scenario.
[It focuses] on succession and inability issues during presidential campaigns. Some candidates have been less than forthcoming with the public about their health histories. To encourage more transparency, the Clinic recommends that a commission develop guidelines for … candidates.
Instead of taking these recommendations into consideration, public discourse was steered wildly in the direction of the Twenty-Fifth Amendment, especially Section 4, never being workable—just as disinformation was spread regarding, “the Goldwater rule,” so as to silence all psychiatric public discourse. Here, I would say, where there is no political will, nothing will be workable.
It should rather be a straightforward matter of fact that a president, whom the people entrusted to serve a function be removed if he is found unable to fulfill that function (and that the people know about it). Likewise, it should be equally uncontroversial that psychiatrists, whose professional responsibilities extend beyond individual patients to society, as outlined in their ethical code, should be able to speak when a public servant poses a danger to society for psychiatric reasons (and that the people be informed of it).
The last recommendation with respect to presidential ability could include that the parties require presidential candidates to undergo mental fitness evaluations, much like corporate boards now require candidates for high-level executive positions do. I have long argued that, in the Nuclear Age, “No president should assume office without a ‘fitness for duty’ exam.”
It is often said that the Constitution sets only two requirements for a president: (a) be at least thirty-five years old; and (b) be a natural-born citizen of the United States. Surely, the Framers did not mean, “anything goes,” outside of these requirements! It may surprise people to know how routine fitness for duty exams are, that they can be tailored to any job, including president, and that they are a requirement for every other position that involves life-or-death decisions—before one assumes the position. With this knowledge, would they tolerate a “president” who does not even meet the basic requirements for every other consequential position? And if age were a requirement for a reason, would it not be in their legitimate interest to know if the “president” they are hiring is not of the mental age of thirty-five, or without rational thinking capacity altogether? Raskin’s Commission gives us a context to begin to answer these questions.
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Discussion about this post
https://bandyxlee.substack.com/p/urgent-warning-to-congressional-leaders
Let's hope you will find support...Jamie Raskin is a very capable person, but he will need more persons to assist him a getting this serious message through
Well done. Thank you for measured consideration.