The Latina President...and the Conspiracy to Destroy Her

by Joe Rothstein

  “You will talk with the Senate leadership tomorrow, before the vote, won’t you? Ken and I will stand by to be there with the evidence and help.”

  “I just don’t know,” said Kamrath. “I just don’t know. There’s nothing in the Supreme Court manual that tells me how to proceed. I guess I have to set my own precedent.”

  NSA Director Kenneth Kloss and Attorney General Robin Birch picked up the digital player and their papers. They had no idea what to do when they decided to consult the chief justice. After consulting him, they still didn’t. Obviously, neither did he.

  46

  Crowds assembled early. Many carried signs supporting the President. Others demonstrated noisily for her removal. Some brought babies and small children to witness history. A Mexican-American contingent numbering in the hundreds marched up Constitution Avenue from the White House wearing tee shirts emblazoned with the words, “Impeachment? Never!” By noon, thousands of demonstrators encircled both the White House and the Capitol. The line for seats in the visitors’ gallery formed the moment guards opened the Capitol doors. The few fortunate enough to be ushered into the gallery found many seats already occupied by members of the House, congressional and Senate spouses, staff and others who jumped the lines of priority.

  There would be a delay, the chief justice announced. The climactic Senate session would not begin at noon. He was said to be meeting privately with the speaker of the House and the president of the Senate, presumably about transitional issues should the vote for removal pass.

  Delay increased anxiety. In the White House Carmie and Fish joked and shared stories with the President, thin veneer to blanket the tension of the moment.

  The vice president went through the motions of an ordinary business day, but it was not an ordinary day and he was not his usual genial self.

  The one hundred senators waiting to cast historic votes were themselves on edge. For months, each had been pressured by mail, email, phone calls and visits. Aggressive media buys had flooded their local stations, raising the stakes no matter how they choose to vote. The senators wanted it done. Over. Behind them.

  Those in the galleries, some who had been waiting for three hours, grew increasingly restless, constrained from demonstrating impatience by an enhanced crew of gallery guards.

  Delay provided time and space for arguments and fist fights among opposing sides mobilized on the Capitol lawn.

  Cable TV filled its space with pointless interviews and repetitious review of the events that brought matters to this decisive moment.

  Shortly after 1 p.m. the chief justice and the congressional leaders emerged. Events then moved quickly. The clerk called the roll. All 100 senators answered. There was only one item of business on the agenda and Chief Justice Kamrath went right to it.

  Head counts, for and against, had been reported in the media for weeks, as one senator after another declared where he or she stood on conviction. Now those votes were being cast. Ninety-six votes accurately followed the script. Only four senators who entered the chamber that day were officially undecided. The time for decision expired when their names were called.

  The final tally was announced:

  67 to remove President Tennyson. 33 against.

  With announcement of the final tally, Carmie and Fish walked to the wheel chair where the president was seated and embraced her. Long, hard embraces. Her White House years, the last months of impeachment turmoil, Federico’s death, her own miraculous survival, all seemed now to blend into exhaustion. She had just become the first president in the history of the United States to be removed from office by the United States Senate. At this moment of loss she felt little else but relief that the ordeal had ended.

  “I suppose I should go on TV and announce my resignation,” she said.

  “I’m announcing mine, too,” said Carmie. She sat next to her friend, arm around her shoulder. “We go together. We’re still alive with plenty of life in us. This may be over,” she said, sweeping her arm around the room, “but this,” pulling both their heads together until their cheeks met, “is just beginning a whole new chapter.”

  Deacon entered, as respectful as if he were confronting death.

  “Madame President, the chief justice just called. He asked that in the interest of orderly transition, you not submit your resignation until arrangements are made.”

  “Do they know when?”

  “Apparently not. He just ask that you do nothing until he calls back.”

  “I imagine there’s a thousand cameras downstairs waiting for me to say something.”

  “He asked that you do nothing, not even talk to the press.”

  “Well, there’s something the chief justice can’t object to. Have the staff pack my bags. I’ll be ready to leave when it’s time.”

  Contingency arrangements for Tenny already had been made. A helicopter was standing by to take her and Carmie to Andrews Air Force Base. From there, Air Force Two, the vice president’s plane, would fly them to Los Angeles. A friend’s seaside estate in Malibu would be a halfway house for her return to a new life. Whatever that might be.

  

  By pre-arrangement, Vice President Rusher presented himself in the Chief Justice’s chambers an hour after the vote. A small group would witness the swearing in. Mrs. Rusher, the attorney general, the president pro tem of the Senate and the Speaker of the House. It would be closed to the press and public, a decision that provoked an uproar from the media, which was hardly appeased by the fact that a reenactment would be scheduled afterward in the cavernous House rotunda. Only one person was present who was not on the previous list of transition witnesses, NSA Director Kenneth Kloss.

  Rusher, in his finest navy blue Brooks Brothers wool suit and brick red tie, entered to mild applause from staffers lining the halls. The door closed behind him.

  “Mr. Vice President,” said Kamrath, looking every bit the chief justice he was, smartly robed and as an erect as a statue, “I realize you are here to be sworn in, but before we do, Director Kloss has something you should hear.”

  Kloss hit play on his recorder.

  The vice president’s words tumbled into the room.

  “What have you done? I didn’t sign up for this.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Murder, not impeachment, that’s what I mean. The bomb. The bomb. You didn’t have to kill her.”

  “Kill her? Why should we kill her? Nothing’s changed since we spoke. The plan’s working. It’s all working just as I told you it would. I know nothing of a bomb.”

  “Then who?”

  “Wait, where are you calling from?”

  “My residence. My cell phone. It’s secure.”

  “Secure!? There are no secure lines, you damn fool.”

  Each word hit Rusher’s body like a dagger.

  No one spoke to interrupt the moment. Justice Kamrath had met earlier in the day with Speaker Willard and Senator Alcantra and had played these tapes for them. They agreed then that if the removal vote failed, the president would handle the next moves personally. If it succeeded, they would be here, now, like this.

  The vice president moved quickly through triumph at the expectation of becoming president to shock at hearing his own compromised voice, to anger that now he was the center of a what appeared to be a conspiracy to deny him this office. But Rusher was an old pro, not easily deterred.

  “Thank you, Justice Kamrath, may we now move on to my taking the oath.”

  “Not yet said Kamrath. The attorney general has something to say.”

  “Mr. Vice President, you are under arrest for treason, for threatening the president of the United States, for lying under oath to the Congress of the United States, for violation of your oath to uphold the Constitution and for entrapment of the president to do criminal harm. Each charge is a felony. You have the right to remain silent...”

  That was too much for Rusher. He interrupted the reading of his rights.

  “What is this
nonsense,” he angrily exploded. “The Senate has voted, President Tennyson no longer is the president and I am in the next in line. I demand to be sworn in.”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Vice President,” said Justice Kamrath, “I cannot swear in as president someone who is charged with treason and other felonious acts. President Tennyson is president until she resigns and the resignation is accepted by the Congress. Neither action has occurred.”

  “This is outrageous.” Rusher’s eyes darted to the others in the room. Ominously, no one else appeared surprised by this drama except for Mrs. Rusher, who gripped Kamrath’s desk, until someone helped her to a seat.

  “Yes, it is,” said Kamrath. “It’s outrageous that you would plot to overthrow the elected president in concert with foreign nationals who have organized a monstrous set of lies against her.”

  Attorney General Birch spoke up.

  “Mr. Vice President, we have two choices here. I can take you from this room in handcuffs and you can fight these charges through the courts, or you can resign as vice president and all charges will be dropped. You can say you were an innocent victim of a scheme for which you were unaware, but on learning of it you did the right thing by exposing it and resigning.”

  “You’re blackmailing me. The attorney general of the United States is blackmailing me. The chief justice of the United States is blackmailing me. This is patently unconstitutional,” roared Rusher. “There’s absolutely nothing in the Constitution that supports any of this.”

  Kamrath reached into his inside jacket pocket and dramatically pulled out what appeared to be a tally sheet.

  “Let’s see here. I’ve got at least five votes that say it is constitutional,” said the chief justice. I couldn’t reach Justices Padillo and Arlen this morning. But I did speak with Justices Dillingham, Steele, Chang and Redwood a few hours ago. Their votes and mine add up to five. How many votes do you have?”

  Rusher was stunned. He was being railroaded by the chief law enforcement officer of the United States and the chief justice of the Supreme Court.

  “But the Senate has impeached the president. It’s done. It’s over,” he pleaded.

  “Not exactly said Senate pro tem Alcantra. Before this meeting I spoke with two senators who voted for impeachment who now have decided to change their vote. Since the Senate makes its own rules on this matter we can certainly vote for reconsideration. Once this story becomes public, I imagine just about everyone will want to change their vote.”

  “Mr. Vice President. Your choice?” asked Justice Kamrath. “Jail? Or pats on the back all around that you wound up on the right side after all?”

  Epilogue

  The forecast was grim, but typical for an Iowa January. Ten degrees and chin deep snow. Stowed on Air Force One was their heaviest winter clothing. The passenger list included the traveling staff, members of the campaign media, Ben Sage and President Tennyson. Weather or not, Iowa would be voting in four weeks. The events of recent months denied Tenny a proper start for her re-election campaign. If she survived impeachment, she had said, she would run. But it would have been presumptuous to actually begin campaigning for a new term while the Senate was considering whether to end her current one.

  As a sitting president, her primary election victory most certainly would be assured. But not if she took voters for granted, not if she failed to show up at the town hall meetings and familiar road stops where she was expected. Louis Gorland, Arizona’s governor, and Arnold Ledbetter, a digital age billionaire, both had been in the field since summer, counting on Tenny to be damaged goods, maybe an ex-president, possibly being so fed up with the whole business that she would say to hell with it and not run, even if she could. In politics, there are few free passes to power. If she wanted a second term, Tenny would have to work for it.

  And she wanted a second term. She really wanted it. Her wave of weariness ended within moments of Chief Justice Kamrath’s call informing her of the remarkable turn of events that would preserve her presidency. Her wounded leg felt so much better. Even her head wounds looked like they would heal a lot faster. Winning is its own tonic. Within twenty-four hours, Ben Sage and Lee Searer were in her office with instructions to pull the re-election team together, set up a travel schedule, get polls in the field, develop a strategy. Three weeks later, they were on the road.

  “Before you shake the first hand,” said Ben, “Tell me you’re doing this for the right reasons. Not just to settle scores, or restore your own image or because you can’t think of anything else to do with your life. Not being able to answer the simple question why you want to be president has brought down more than one candidate. It shows. It’s deadly. This may sound like a silly question after all you’ve been through. But you have to answer it and answer it convincingly. Why do you want to be president?”

  Ben and Tenny were sitting together in the president’s private area of Air Force One, separated from the 120 reporters covering this, her first actual campaign swing, and from her own traveling staff. They were reviewing the schedule, the speeches, the names of key people who would meet them on the ground.

  From her window seat, Tenny looked down 30,000 feet to the snow covered checkerboard of the Midwest landscape. Farms and farm homes clearly visible in the sun’s bright reflection. Life down there. Real life. But made impersonal through distance.

  “There was a time when I couldn’t answer that question. I was at a crossroads in my my life and went to Carmie Sandoval for advice. She said I’d been seeing the world from 30,000 feet. I had to get on the ground, where real people live to find the answer. She sent me to Hal and to the barrios of L.A. Within days, hours maybe, I knew what I wanted to do.

  “Now here we are, at 30,000 feet. Ironic that you’re asking me this question. And you should. This time I know the answer. I’m going to finish what I started. Twice now I’ve underestimated the power I was trying to change. That won’t happen again. Frankly, Ben, I had stars in my eyes when I was elected president. I felt I could do anything. Queen Isabella could write a check or whatever they did in those days and send Columbus on his way. If she had a problem, she could cut off heads or send the Spanish Armada out to fix it. I guess somewhere in my genetic makeup, those ideas haven’t died with time. I thought if I said do this, it would happen. I thought if I had a challenge, I would overcome it. Anything. Everything.

  “I gave them plenty of openings to bring me down. I wasn’t on guard. I was careless. I didn’t have enough allies. I went after them like the Light Brigade, charging at top speed into the valley of death.

  “But, I came out alive. Thanks to you, and Kamrath and others and incredible good fortune to still be alive. They corrupted my family. They murdered by brother, my dear, sweet, brother. And with all their money and power they’re still the most destructive force on earth. We’ve wounded them with all this exposure, with all they did to try to impeach me. They’re weaker than they were yesterday. One more term, four more years, I’ll have more protective armor, more weapons to fight them, more allies. We’re going to get them, Ben. We’re going to get them.

  “We’re going to rewrite my America’s Future plan to include a much tougher fight against the corrupt and greedy bastards. By the end of my second term they will be on the ground, my foot on their back.

  Hearing her own words, she suddenly paused, reminded of something. Her head tilted back on the cushioned seat rest. Her thoughts drifted to another place, another time.

  “Ben, have I ever told you about the Mayan warrior princess Ix Wak Chan Ajaw?

  The Latina President’s Main Characters

  U.S. President Isabel Aragon Tennyson

  (“Tenny”; “Senora Aragon Tennyson,” “Senora Tennyson”; “Bell”)

  Sid Farnham

  Secret Service control officer on night of bombing

  Lincoln Howard

  Washingtonia Grand chief of security

  Roderick Theodore Rusher

  Vice President of the United States

>   Carmen (“Carmie)

  Isabel’s best friend

  Queen Isabella of Spain

  Duke of Aragon (Ferdinand)

  Miguel Aragon

  Isabel’s grandfather (“Papa” “Papa Miguel” “Don Miguel”)

  Maria Rosa

  Isabel’s mother

  Malcolm Tennyson

  Isabel’s father

  Federico

  Isabel’s brother

  Andres Navarro

  Isabel’s husband

  Rafael Celeste

  Mexican soap opera actor

  Javier Carmona

  Top executive at Groupo Aragon

  Hal Thompson

  Isabel’s mentor

  Ben Sage

  Political strategist

  Lee Searer

  Ben Sage’s business partner

  Bert Wilmont

  Los Angeles city councilman

  Sheila Fishburne

  (“Fish”) Congressperson from Alaska

  Reed Guess

  Democratic Senate majority leader

  Henry Deacon

  President Tennyson’s chief of staff

  L. Irving Pounds

  Media mogul, Hal Thompson’s father in law

  Sally Pounds

  Hal Thompson’s wife

  Susan Cipriani

  Reed Guess’s campaign manager

  Jack Hurley

  CEO of Blue Bancorp, U.S. financial giant

  Pete Garner

  CEO of Texas Global Oil

  Gabriel Montes

  Peruvian banker

  Congressman Larry Anderson

  Ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee

  Congressman Zachary “Zach” Bowman

  House Judiciary Committee chairman

  Bo Willard

  Speaker of the House

  Bob Reynolds

  Jesuit priest

  U.S. Senator Stuart Alcantra