Hmmmm... wouldn't an amendment to the Constitution might take a bit too long? If by your design Congress is seated on June 6, there's also the alternative of passing an emergency bill to hold a Presidential Election (with the winner to assume as soon as possible), or, alternatively, create a line of succession so the future Speaker or PPT becomes acting President.
Hmmmm... wouldn't an amendment to the Constitution might take a bit too long? If by your design Congress is seated on June 6, there's also the alternative of passing an emergency bill to hold a Presidential Election (with the winner to assume as soon as possible), or, alternatively, create a line of succession so the future Speaker or PPT becomes acting President.
Agreed. I would recommend organizing Senatorial elections ASAP, shuttling through a bill in re succession, and then making the Speaker of the House de facto Acting President for a short while. That seems like the least time-consuming way to get a President in.
It's really not that simple.
First of all, I think given the emergency nature of the situation, the Senate could crank out an add-on amendment in just a couple of days, push it for ratification, and have it ratified before we reach the precipice. As I understand it, all three of the options listed above would require some either some constitutional amending or waiting until we cross the threshold, since anything statute-wise passed right now would be wiped at the moment of transition.
Here's the first issue with waiting: I see nothing in the Constitution that specifies whether bills pass or not if the President doesn't act on them, or what time-frame would result in a default approval (like what we have with either the 7-day or 10-day window at present). This means that the Senate (and the House) can pass legislation and without a President/further clarification on how these situations are handled, it will just sit there. I mean, if we can just make up or assume the best in a bad situation like that, then I might as well assume that I'll still be President based on intent.
Secondly: The precise methods for how the two chambers are even going to pass legislation are not in stone yet - they'll have to be hammered out by the separate chambers once they are fully seated - which means formal legislation and rules regarding these measures could take weeks to set in stone, and that's before you get to passing anything (whether statute or not). Rules have to be established for leadership positions (Speaker, Majority Leader, and whatever else). It's not going to be a simple case of just jumping in and passing something once this resets: there are
multiple bottlenecks that will have to be handled once we cross the event horizon.
Based on the logistics I'm seeing and if we follow the actual laws (and lack thereof), waiting until we cross this threshold means not having a President arguably until the regularly-scheduled inauguration in July.