A group of 350 mental health experts are expected to issue a warning to Congress amid the current impeachment inquiry, arguing that lawmakers should pay close attention to signs of President Donald Trump ‘s “deteriorating” mental health, according to a report Thursday from The Independent .
“We are speaking out at this time because we are convinced that, as the time of possible impeachment approaches, Donald Trump has the real potential to become ever more dangerous, a threat to the safety of our nation,” Yale psychiatrist Dr. Brandy Lee and former CIA profiler Jerrold Post wrote in a statement alongside the petition to Congress.
Specifically, the authors of the petition, which include some 350 psychiatrists and mental health professionals, said they were compelled to speak out against the president amid the impeachment inquiry, arguing that failing to monitor the “psychological effects” of impeachment on Trump could result in what they deemed “catastrophic consequences.”
The authors of the letter also said that three psychiatrists were prepared to offer testimony before Congress about the president’s mental health amid the inquiry.
They argued they were compelled to speak out after noting the president’s “brittle sense of self-worth,” writing they believed the president exhibited narcissistic tendencies — “rage” — when faced with any criticism and said the president views any such criticism as “humiliation and degradation.”
The Thursday letter was not the first time the president’s mental health has been called into question. As recently as yesterday, there have been claims that Trump’s mental state is fragile amid the current impeachment inquiry. Lance Dodes, a retired Harvard University Medical School psychiatrist, argued that in making recent attacks against House Intelligence Committee Chair Rep. Adam Schiff, in which the president called the lawmaker “deranged” and “sick,” the president was actually projecting and was describing himself.
This news comes the same day that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced the next phase of the impeachment inquiry, calling for the committees involved in the process to take up articles of impeachment against the 45th president, stating that she found there was “no choice but to act” following the previous phases of the inquiry, which included closed-door testimony by witnesses, public testimony by witnesses, and finally, testimony by constitutional experts on Wednesday.
While the White House has said it looks forward to a “fair trial” in the Senate, the president himself took a different approach on Twitter on Thursday.
“This will mean that the beyond important and seldom used act of Impeachment will be used routinely to attack future Presidents,” Trump tweeted Thursday morning. “That is not what our Founders had in mind. The good thing is that the Republicans have NEVER been more united. We will win!”
