Removal of the President

Inspiration

(note from Peter)

The inspiration for the story that unfolds in Removal of the President, originated from the question of what a powerful group of people would do who found that the US president was on a path leading to a new Cold War, or worse. The question presented itself when President Trump took measures that led to the invasion of the Capitol. I decided to develop the theme of needing to remove the president from office in the form of a third novel featuring Sam Stanton. The events portrayed take place twenty-five years after Leona gave birth to a son (in the final chapter of the second book) which they name Sam-Junior, but who is usually called Junior. He now takes the lead in what unfolds. He has been educated and trained to follow in his father’s footsteps.

Junior’s first task is to free Jocelyn, the president’s daughter, who has been confined to the White House without means of communicating with the outside world after she discovered her father’s devious method to gain the support of Congress for his evil plans. Junior and Jocelyn fall in love during their escape from the White House. The Stanton family then decide to inform the Washington Post of what the president is guilty of, in the hope that the publicity of the president’s illicit deeds will lead to his impeachment and his subsequent removal from office. I decided that if the president was serious enough to embark on a policy of gaining dominion over other countries, he would attempt to cover up what he had ordered in obtaining sufficient votes in Congress to be able to put his plans into effect. This is what he does by having the director of the CIA form a rogue group of special agents. They murder the investigative Washington Post reporter that Junior and Jocelyn had found prepared to research the matter. Their continued involvement with the Washington Post finally leads to the impeachment of the president and the vice president by the House of Representatives, but the following trial in the Senate, intended to remove them from office, does not lead to the required two-thirds majority.

Sam and Junior then abduct the president, the vice president and their spouses from their bedrooms during the night and take them to Prime-Even, where they are subjected to an intensive correctional program, designed to let them see the errors they have made. Jocelyn has meanwhile left Junior after having seen him kill three of their assailants, now believing that he is a vigilante. When she is captured by the White House Chief of Staff for possibly having played a role in the abduction of her father, Junior comes to her rescue. His rescue plan fails and he is taken prisoner and confined to a high security penitentiary in Florida, where he is told that he would never stand trial or be released for having carried out acts of terror similar to those of the thirty-two terrorist inmates that he is imprisoned with.