Chris Traux, a conservative appellate lawyer and former GOP campaign official, warned on Friday that Trump’s “deteriorating” health was serious enough to be considered an “emergency,” and pitched what he called a "politically achievable” path forward to addressing it.
“President Trump appears to be deteriorating by the day. He is confabulating. He is demonstrating poor judgment,” Traux wrote in an op-ed published Friday in The Hill.
“Even before he began threatening to commit genocide against Iran and posted a picture of himself as Jesus, he had been exhibiting poor impulse control. He has also begun speaking like a six-year-old. He talks about ‘nuclear dust’ and says things like, ‘They’ve dropped a couple of water mines. … We’ve defeated all of their water boats, too.’”
Commentary on Trump’s allegedly declining health is not new, and many critics have suggested invoking the 25th Amendment to have the president forcibly removed from office on the grounds that he no longer had the mental capacity to serve as commander-in-chief.
Traux dismissed invoking the 25th Amendment as a realistic path forward, and instead offered an alternative plan.
“We need to put aside fantasies about impeachment and the 25th Amendment and focus on fixes we can actually implement,” Traux wrote.
“So let’s have Congress pass a bill that gives the Gang of Eight immediate and unredacted access to all of Trump’s medical records. Unlike calls to invoke the 25th Amendment, this reform is politically achievable. It doesn’t require Republicans to choose sides, either. You can both support Trump and believe presidents and their closest loyal aides should not be able to cover up presidential infirmity.”
Traux likened this approach to the Epstein Files Transparency Act (EFTA), and argued that such a proposal would be easier for Republicans to support, much as they had with the EFTA. More than anything, however, Traux urged lawmakers to act swiftly before it’s too late.
“No one knows what the future may bring,” Traux wrote. “But even if you genuinely believe that Trump is fine now, at almost 80 years of age, his mental fitness is not going to improve over the next two years, eight months and 27 days. Something must be done.”