Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has also called for the amendment to be invoked.
Meghan McCain wants President Donald Trump out of office. During Thursday's episode of The View, an impassioned McCain called for the 25th Amendment to be invoked following Wednesday's violent riots at the Capitol by Trump supporters.
The 25th Amendment allows the vice president, with the support of the majority of the president's cabinet, to declare the president unfit for office, a move that could lead to the president's early removal. In that case, the vice president would become the acting president.
Many Democrats, including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, as well as Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger, have called for the amendment to be invoked as well.
"This is one of the great national tragedies of my lifetime. This is one of America's darkest days. I have been absolutely despondent watching this," McCain began. "... I think that this is a good time to take a very hard look at where we are as a country, and take a very hard look at where we are with President Trump."
"The bedrock of our democracy, and the bedrock of who we are as Americans, is the peaceful transition of power. He is clearly a president who has turned into a mad king," she continued. "And, at this point, I'm calling on all Republicans and conservatives who still have clout, we have to invoke the 25th Amendment. We cannot withstand this. Our country cannot go on like this. And we cannot possibly risk the idea that we could have more violence between now and President Biden getting inaugurated."
McCain went on to call the rioters "bastards," and slammed them for "using the American flag as symbols as they are attacking our own republic."
"You are not patriots. You do not represent America," she said. "You are scum of the Earth, who are using and abusing and bastardizing all that I love and have grown up with for your own sick agenda."
McCain turned her focus to Trump and his allies next, stating that the rioters' agenda has been "directly -- directly! -- set by President Trump."
"He didn't disavow it. He didn't send in the National Guard. And then he called them 'special' and said we 'love' them," she said. "Ivanka Trump called these people 'patriots.' I am a patriot. I come from a patriotic family. I come from a family of service, as does everyone on this show."
"You are hurting our country. You are becoming a national embarrassment," she continued of Trump. "And we have to get him out immediately because this cannot stand. The final words I want to say on this show this morning, in the words of Oliver Cromwell, 'In the name of God, go!' Go! We cannot take this anymore."
Whoopi Goldberg referred to the rioters as "domestic terrorists... who had the audacity to call themselves patriots," before, like McCain, slamming the president and his allies.
"The FBI is asking for help identifying those responsible, so let's start with you-know-who, 'cause this all stems from his fingers," she said, referring to the president. "You-know-who, his son [Donald Trump Jr.], his faux-lawyer Rudy Giuliani, and everybody else who was onstage at yesterday's rally."
"They sent all those people to the Capitol building, where they knew there were not enough officers there to protect anybody that was in there, including the Vice President of the United States [Mike Pence], the newly-elected Vice President of the United States [Kamala Harris], and all the other folks that were sitting in there," she continued. "If you want to look for somebody, there are three people right there whose fingers are the dirtiest, because they knew what they were doing and they did it anyway."
Joy Behar likened Wednesday's events to "a pimple popping" that allowed "a lot of people to see the reality of the situation that I've been b**ching about for four years."
"I remember with Watergate, it took the Republicans five minutes to get rid of Nixon," she said, referring to the 1972 scandal that led to President Richard Nixon's resignation. "This has taken the Republican Party four years and a violent outbreak to come to their senses."
Behar went on to celebrate that Democrats will soon have control over the White House, Congress and Senate, before turning her attention to the riots themselves, and how the police response to them was widely different than the police response to Black Lives Matter protests last year.
"The whole ugly demonstration showed you that the police are capable of restraining themselves. They know how to do it. You saw it!" she said. "Not only that, many of them enabled these insurrectionists to go into the Capitol and endanger the lives of people... I mean, it's outrageous."
Behar also noted that she does not forgive Sen. Lindsay Graham, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Sen. Josh Hawley, Sen. Ted Cruz or Rudy Giuliani, all of whom peddled lies that the presidential election was rigged and fraudulent, despite having no evidence to back up their claims.
"I don't forgive Lindsay Graham. He can go on the floor of the Capitol and cry his eyes out. He is part and parcel of this problem and so is Mitch McConnell and this idiot Josh Hawley," Behar said. "He needs to be stripped of all committee things he's been doing. Ted Cruz, Rudy Giuliani, go back to the landscaping business. You're done."
Like Behar, Sunny Hostin largely spoke about the differences in the police response to yesterday's riots and past Black Lives Matter protests.
"I was thinking, 'Where's the National Guard? Where are the rubber bullets? Where is the tear gas? Where is the show of force protecting federal property?'" Hostin said. "I was thinking about Christopher David. Remember that Navy veteran that was beaten by the federal police during the Black Lives Matter protest, who was standing in unity with his Black brothers and sisters, valiantly, I believe, protesting police brutality."
"Meghan was talking about the fact that she was struck by the American flag being waved by the rioters and the seditionists in our Capitol. I was struck by the Confederate flag being waved in our nation's Capitol," she added, before once again turning her attention to the police response.
"I thought the type of police restraint that we saw, is the type of police restraint that I wish had been shown during the Black Lives Matter protests and the protests against police brutality, the protests against the murder of George Floyd, the protests against the [shooting] of Jacob Blake, the protests against the murder of Breonna Taylor. Where was that police restraint? It was nowhere," she said. "And I also thought, 'Where are the arrests?' We had at least 438 arrests when there were Black Lives Matter rallies and protests. There were about 50 arrests yesterday."
Hostin called the riots "jarring" and went on to criticize Republicans who are only now speaking out.
"When you do see some Republicans standing up and saying 'enough is enough,' some of our senators and some of our congressmen, I don't think that, at this point, they get credit," she said. "Because they have poured gasoline on this flame for four years! The chickens have come home to roost for them! They do not get credit now!"
Sara Haines said she was "still probably shaken" from the riots, which left her with a feeling similar to one she felt on 9/11.
"It honestly reminded me for the first time of 9/11, when we were watching the TVs and the towers. Because I remember standing, I was a page at NBC, and looking around and waiting for an adult to come in the room and tell me everything would be OK," she recalled. "And I sat here yesterday watching this, feeling the same way. I was waiting for someone to say this was all going to be fine."
While Haines noted that she believes "the vast majority of Trump voters "would not approve" of the riots by "domestic terrorists," she called out GOP leaders for their inaction to speak up prior to Wednesday's events.
"Along the way, so many people, a lot of the GOP leaders, turned their cheek in the name of the platform. You know, there were a lot of people that were trying to hold onto the old conservative ideals and kept giving [Trump] a pass. And that's what emboldened this," she said. "... We saw this coming."
"So finally last night, Sen. Graham, Mitch McConnell, said enough is enough. It's too late," she continued. "I'm glad they did it... and I understand there are platform and party interests and things that still remain true in this country, but when your man becomes the outside guy that comes in to shake everything up, you have to ask yourself, 'How shaken are we OK with? When is enough, enough?' And that's what we saw yesterday."
Watch the video below to see how other celebrities responded to the riots.
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