Senators Carl Levin and Debbie Stabenow may be doing that.. They should be.
New Jersey is one of the eighteen states that have specific provisions within their constitutions that allow for the recall of their respective US Senators.
Article I Section 2b of the New Jersey Constitution reads as follows:
The people reserve unto themselves the power to recall, after at least one year of service, any elected official in this State or representing this State in the United States Congress. The Legislature shall enact laws to provide for such recall elections.
There are some who are going to attempt to remove Senator Bob Menendez… And they are dead serious.
The 18 states allowing for recall of senators are as follows: Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, New Jersey, North Dakota, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington and Wisconsin.
Michigan is one of them.
There are critics who cite a supreme court decision as a blockade to such an action. The committee to recall Menendez points out:
Times editorial mentioned “a 1995 U.S. Supreme Court opinion written by Justice John Paul Stevens” that said that the recall statute “couldn’t be applied to federal officeholders.” What opinion that might be was far from clear. The case of US Term Limits v. Thornton said that no State may “alter or add to the qualifications” for Congressional office–but said nothing materially about interrupting the term of office of a Member of Congress. Though no State has yet recalled a Senator, the Constitution is in fact silent on the issue, and no provision in it says that a Senator is anything other than an agent for the State that sends him.
An interesting series.. worth the read.
I have commented on the Michigan constitutional provision that allows recall before. I have further wondered what the language should be to make it as clear to the recall voter how utterly incompetent Michigan’s two sitting US Senators are.
Perhaps “For failure to understand the United States Constitution, and enacting laws which run contrary to it, and against the best interests of the citizens of Michigan and the Nation..”
Yeah.. Something like that.
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