Donald Trump has been President of the United States for less than 100 days, but already there are suggestions he faces pressure from an unlikely challenger
Donald Trump could lose power as US President if one thing happens, according to a political expert.
And the challenge to his presidency could come from an unlikely source. That’s according to Sky News pundit Adam Boulton, who has suggested that Trump may be his own worse enemy.
Trump’s wild shifts in policy could unsettle even his staunchest backers, Boulton says, especially if the US finds itself in an unnecessarily difficult position thanks to the president’s decisions. In less than 100 days since Trump assumed office, he has issued a litany of executive orders.
During this time, Trump and his de-facto Prime Minister Elon Musk have overseen an assault on international trade with tariffs on allies like Canada and Mexico. Trump’s administration has renamed the Gulf of Mexico, halted aid to Ukraine temporarily, and initiated the deportation of numerous supposed Venezuelans to El Salvador.
Boulton suggests that such unpredictability may strain Trump’s ties with his confidants in the Oval Office. They in turn may look to his Vice President, JD Vance, to take over from the 78-year-old president.
Vance, who once dubbed Trump “America’s Hitler”, now occupies the second most powerful position in US politics. And he is in a unique place to depose Trump from the White House, according to Boulton.
Writing in The i, Boulton said: “Should Trump become more of a unpredictable liability – tanking the economy with tariffs, say or pushing America into an armed confrontation with an ally – then Republicans, including cabinet members, may decide that his comparatively squeaky-clean family-oriented VP is a better bet to keep them in power.”
The question of whether JD Vance would be a better choice for America remains unanswered – especially as he has shown a capacity to switch ideological loyalties. The uncertainty comes during a period where an increasing numbers of experts warn that the US is edging towards authoritarianism.
What might have once seemed unlikely, maybe even impossible, during Trump’s initial presidency, appears to be morphing into reality. It’s a trend that could persist under Vance’s leadership.
In a report discussing the decline of democracies globally, V-Dem’s lead political scientist Staffan Lindberg wrote: “The USA now seems to be heading towards a transition away from democracy under President Trump. In my view, the reverberations of this are and will be enormous across the world.”
This sentiment is echoed by American figures such as ex-Republican communications director Tara Setmayer. Setmayer told the Guardian: “We are approaching Defcon 1 for our democracy and a lot of people in the media and the opposition leadership don’t seem to be communicating that to the American people.
“That is the biggest danger of the moment we’re in now: the normalisation of it.” Some of the administration’s moves have brought this into sharper focus, such as an incident earlier this month.
A French scientist was reportedly barred from entering the USA after their phone revealed texts critical of the Trump administration. France’s minister of higher education and research disclosed that the scientist was denied entry “because the researcher’s phone contained exchanges with colleagues and friends in which he expressed a personal opinion on the Trump administration’s research policy”.
Commentators are concerned that even if Vance were to become President, instead of easing tensions, he might just pick up where Trump left off.
How could Trump be removed as President?
The US has a number of mechanisms to remove a sitting President from office. The most common includes impeachment, which Trump faced and defeated twice during his first term.
Another method would be for Vance and a majority of Trump’s cabinet to use the 25th Amendment of the US Constitution. They would have to declare Trump “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office”.
Trump would then have a right to respond if he disagrees, at which point Congress would have to step in. A two-thirds vote in both the House and Senate is required to permanently remove the President from office.
While this was considered by Trump’s political allies in the aftermath of the January 6 insurrection, it was not pursued. Other means of removing the President include political pressure and resulting resignation, which forced Richard Nixon to stand down in the wake of the Watergate scandal.
