Photo: Patrick Semansky/AP

Dear Mr. Vice President, It’s time. We can’t wait any longer. You need to invoke Section 4 of the 25th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. You know what it says: “Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.” The truth of the matter is that President Donald Trump does not have the mental capability to “discharge the powers and duties of his office.” Amid an unprecedented political, economic, and public health crisis, the commander-in-chief is unwell — and unfit.

You know this. On Friday, you were standing next to the president in the White House briefing room when NBC correspondent Peter Alexander asked him what he had to say to Americans who “are scared right now” because of the coronavirus pandemic. Trump responded with inexplicable rage, denouncing Alexander as a “terrible reporter” for asking a “nasty” question, and then mocking the owners of NBC — telecom giant Comcast — as “Con-cast.” It was an insane response to the simplest of simple questions, but don’t take my word for it. “These are psychiatric symptoms, not simply boorish behaviors,” tweeted John Talmadge, clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center. “Trump is mentally ill, cognitively compromised, brain impaired. He can’t even recognize a softball tossed his way.” But you can, Mr. Vice President. You later went up to the podium and answered Alexander’s question: “I would say, ‘Do not be afraid to be vigilant.’” You seem to be able to do the job of president that Trump is manifestly unable to do. You have won praise for your handling of the crisis from senior Democrats like Washington Gov. Jay Inslee — in stark contrast to your boss, who lashed out at Inslee and called him a “snake.” As the New York Times has also reported, some of your former critics at the state level “have changed their mind about Mr. Pence, who has given near-daily briefings and, they said, has become a reassuring presence even as Mr. Trump has intermittently tried to retake the stage.” Don’t get me wrong: I’m no fan of you or your far-right politics. I am well aware of your long history of challenging the science on everything from climate change to evolution to cancer. But, this time round, you recognize the scale of the problem, the scope of the crisis, the severity of the threat posed by Covid-19. The president, bizarrely, inexcusably, outrageously, does not. He is off in his own demented, fact-free, navel-gazing, alternative universe. Again, don’t take my word for it. Listen to Bandy X. Lee, clinical professor of psychiatry at the Yale School of Medicine. Trump “dangerously lacks mental capacity,” she told me, “which he exhibits through his inability to take in information and advice, to process critical information, or to consider consequences before making impulsive, unstable, and irrational decisions that are not based in reality but fight reality.” At press conferences, she added, he pushes “delusional-level distortion and misinformation” because he is “disconnected from reality.” His leadership, she concluded, is “more harmful than if we had no president.” This is a president who rambles, rants, and raves; who spent weeks downplaying the spread of the novel coronavirus and ignoring warnings from his own intelligence agencies; who claimed to be unaware that Americans who need tests are unable to get them; who uses press briefings not to inform the public but to regularly attack the press; who went golfing while health professionals begged for resources and equipment; who has repeatedly contradicted his own top scientists by pushing unproven drugs as a treatment for Covid-19; who tried to buy a vaccine from Germany but only for “exclusive” use in the United States; who took a break from crisis management to go on Twitter and complain about Hillary Clinton’s emails and Benghazi. How is this behavior not utterly unhinged? How does it not justify you invoking the 25th Amendment on behalf of the American people, who are being infected by Covid-19 in rapidly increasing numbers?