Abuse Of Executive Power Counts No Matter Whose Team The "Executive" Is On
You're not against abuse of executive power if you're only against it when the other "team's" executive is doing it.
Remember that system of checks and balances from civics class?
There's a reason they don't call "blank checks."
Those bleeding-heart lefties over at The American Conservative get it right (not that tariff tootsie Trump's a conservative by any stretch of the imagination). The headline:
Trump's Alarming Abuse of Executive Power
The only 'national emergency' is a president who violates the Constitution to get his way.
A bit from the piece by Bruce Fein:
There may be worse executive power abuses than President Donald Trump's declaration of a national emergency to build a wall on the Mexican border that Congress has steadfastly refused to fund. But if there are, they don't readily come to mind.Trump's national emergency declaration is worse than the 59 others declared by presidents since 1976 because it was employed to usurp the express power of the purse--the most important congressional check on executive abuses.
Only two of the prior national emergency declarations involved the expenditure of funds not appropriated by Congress: one by George H.W. Bush in 1990 during the run-up to the Persian Gulf War, and the other by George W. Bush in 2001 after the 9/11 attacks.
In both cases, the funds were transferred among military accounts in response to immediate (not protracted) developments for a military purpose. In neither case, had Congress repeatedly rejected the President's proposed expenditure of funds, rather Congress acquiesced in the expenditures. In Trump's case, he is expending funds for a purpose that Congress has consistently and steadfastly denied over long months. Trump is defying Congress, not working in collaboration with it, over a power Congress has a right to exercise.
Law prof Ilya Somin has more at Reason, with the subhead saying it: "The US role in the ongoing war in Yemen violates the War Powers Act."
Last month, President Donald Trump vetoed a congressional resolution that would have terminated US military aid to Saudi Arabia and its allies in the Yemen conflict; the resolution was backed by virtually all congressional Democrats, as well as seven Republican senators and sixteen GOP members of the House.But Trump's veto of the resolution is not enough to make the US role in this conflict legal. It is still in violation of the 1973 War Powers Resolution (also known as the War Powers Act). That legislation forbids the "introduction" of US forces into "into hostilities or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances," for a period of more than 90 days without congressional authorization (an initial 60 day period, followed by an additional 30 day extension). Significantly, the WPR defines "introduction" into hostilities to include "the assignment of member[s] of [the US] armed forces to command, coordinate, participate in the movement of, or accompany the regular or irregular military forces of any foreign country or government when such military forces are engaged, or there exists an imminent threat that such forces will become engaged, in hostilities."
While US forces are not directly engaged in combat in Yemen, the Trump Administration itself admits that they have provided intelligence, logistical support, and--at times--even in-flight refueling of Saudi aircraft. As Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee (a co-sponsor of the Yemen resolution), puts it, "We're literally telling the Saudis what to bomb, what to hit, and what and who to take out." That pretty clearly amounts to US involvement in the command, coordination, and "movement" of Saudi forces--exactly the sort of thing that the WPR forbids, absent congressional authorization.
US involvement in the Yemen War dates back to the Obama administration, and has long since passed the 90 day WPR deadline. Congress has never voted to authorize that involvement. Thus, it is illegal.
More executive overreach from the other side of the aisle:
The Obama administration ... started an illegal military intervention in Libya, which violated both the War Powers Act and the Constitution (which reserves the power to initiate war to Congress). Obama also started--and Trump continued--the war against ISIS without proper congressional authorization. But the fact that illegal US involvement in the Yemen conflict is not a unique case doesn't make it right. To the contrary, the ongoing nature of the problem makes it all the more important for Congress to reassert its control over the initiation of war. The Yemen resolution was a step in the right direction. But Congress can and should do much more.
Somin:
We should be able to agree that the US should not initiate war without proper legislative authorization.
We need to start getting a little more agitated about Presidents and others ("Ignore the subpoena, kid!) thumbing their nose at the rules.
Oh, and again, we need to stand against this whether the President's name is Donald -- or Kamala.
I seem to remember Instapundit telling everyone that the reason to elect Trump was because checks and balances would suddenly be important again, and congress might actually attempt to claw back some of their power in this area.
(Power that was ceded to the executive to avoid accountability at the ballot box)
Guess Glenn was right, as usual.
Isab at May 17, 2019 4:02 AM
Again, too few people care -- or predict the worst, unless it's the other team's guy in the seat.
Amy Alkon at May 17, 2019 5:19 AM
Again, too few people care -- or predict the worst, unless it's the other team's guy in the seat.
Amy Alkon at May 17, 2019 5:19 AM
The people that need to care are the ones in Congress. When they don’t because the political benefits of avoiding accountability are much greater than the so called *abuses* of executive power, this situation will continue.
Obama’s executive overreach and weaponizing of the CIA and the justice department got us spying on American citizens including a opposition political candidate/ elected president, and a soft coup attempting to overturn the results of a free election.
This bothers me more, than anything that the Trump administration has done,
The Republican Party used to be really good at following the rules while the Democrats ignored them with impunity. What that got us, was a one way ratchet towards socialism. I’m glad the pendulum is starting to swing the other way.
I can’t personally think of a better use of executive power than to secure the borders of the US, and deport illegal aliens.
Let’s by all means solve this problem, but do it in a way that doesn’t cement in a political advantage of the people already willing to flaunt the rules, who will be protected from political and legal consequences at all costs.
When Brennan, Comey, Clapper are convicted felons, and Hillary and Obama are ruined, I might start to believe that justice and the rule of law aren’t just a club to beat Republicans with.
Isab at May 17, 2019 5:52 AM
The left have only themselves to blame here. When Soros and the UN organized the caravans through Mexico to deliberately overwhelm the ability of our immigration police to do their job, they turned the situation into an immediate emergency.
Forget Trump -- Why isn't Soros in jail for treason yet? It's not as though he didn't do this on purpose.
jdgalt at May 17, 2019 6:02 AM
The war powers act has been a dead letter for a very long time. It isn't only Trump and Obama who violated it. If there are no consequences for breaking the law is it really the law?
Also, please point out the section in the constitution Trump is violating. I'll accept abusing executive power. But protecting border is a constitutional mandate.
Article IV, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution "The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence."
Trump is abusing executive authority to obey the constitution. Odd but still how it is. And like Isab I have no objection to congress actually fulfilling it's role and taking back it's power. But then they would have to take the responsibility that goes with it. Something congress is very unwilling to do. But you can't have it both ways.
Ben at May 17, 2019 7:28 AM
Without reading or considering it, Nancy Pelosi has declared Trump's most recent immigration reform proposal "dead on arrival." How is a president supposed to work with a Congress in which at least one house will not even discuss his proposals?
Obama himself acted unilaterally on immigration when he felt the Republican-controlled Congress was not giving his proposals a fair shake.
We, the voters, have created a political world in which the two parties cannot work together. We won't re-elect a politician who compromises with the opposition party.
We, the voters, have created a political world in which the results of elections must be permanently contested - e.g., Stacey Abrams has yet to admit she lost the Georgia gubernatorial election in 2018. And, yet, Georgia Democrats felt she would be their ideal candidate for the US Senate in 2020.
Late and found ballots have decided far too many elections of late and we, the voters, go ahead and re-elect the beneficiaries of those suspicious elections without questioning why no one was fired or disciplined in the wake of such careless ballot handling.
It's time for we, the voters, to hold our politicians to a higher standard. If we want a better government, liberal or conservative, it's time we elect one.
"In a democracy, people get the leaders they deserve." ~ Joseph de Maistre.
Conan the Grammarian at May 17, 2019 7:42 AM
From Amy: "Again, too few people care -- or predict the worst, unless it's the other team's guy in the seat."
Ben touches on the root of the problem: "The war powers act has been a dead letter for a very long time."
Both precedents have been established for a long time. Obama and Trump didn't kill the War Powers Act; Truman and Eisenhower did. I'm not sure how long the national-emergency trick goes back, but it goes back to Nixon at least.
I do agree that these semi-usurped powers need to be gotten rid of. The problem is, when you tell someone, "What you want to do was OK for all these other people, but it's not OK for you", that doesn't cut much ice with anyone. Everyone will see their use of it as simply corercting all the abuses that the last guy did, ad infinitum. I think the only possible way of getting any agreement would be to enact a provision (be it Constitutional amendment or whatever) that doesn't take effect until sometime far enough in the future that the political situation then is hard to guess now, say twenty years. Then, you might get some agreement because no one feels like they have high stakes in it.
Of course, this is all assuming that the three branches of government will have the wherewithal to actually follow the new way when it goes into effect. The Framers unfortunately did not envision that the three branches of government would collaborate to expand their collective powers, effective becoming a mostly-unelected ruling elite. Twenty years from now, if the new Constitutional provisions go into effect, but then Congress passes laws that contradict it, the President make statements about his pen and phone, and the SCOTUS finds some clever rhetorical trick to ignore it, there doesn't appear to be any course of action available to the citizenry that doesn't involve guns.
Cousin Dave at May 17, 2019 9:08 AM
Blame Congress. They've been slacking, and for several decades and allowing many presidents to have free reign.
I R A Darth Aggie at May 17, 2019 9:09 AM
The War Powers Act was passed in 1973 - in response to the both the Korean War (Truman w/o a declaration of war) and Vietnam War (Kennedy w/o a declaration of war). Wikipedia gives a nice summary:
Presidents argued that the US needed to be able to respond quickly to world events. Congress argued that declaring war and committing the US to do violence to other nations was solely its purview. Both were right and both were wrong - in theory at least.
The War Powers Act was Congress' attempt to make up for giving Johnson (and, subsequently, Nixon) broad powers in the Vietnam conflict and yet still allow a president flexibility in responding to world crises.
Many presidents have ignored the War Powers Act to commit US troops since 1973:
Some probably thought they'd be finished by the WPR deadline. Others just didn't care.
According to NBC, the US military dropped 26,171 bombs on Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen, Somalia and Pakistan in 2016 (Obama's final year as president); that's 72 bombs every day or 3 every hour. To what end did we inflict this violence on sovereign nations? What national interest was served by this?
With the bombs falling elsewhere and only 7% of the US population having military experience, we've become far too complacent with presidents deploying the US military (read: other people) without consulting Congress. That a president can (and should be able to) deploy the US military to defend US interests does not mean we should all stand by as he does. We need Congress to ask relevant questions.
In 1941, Congresswoman Jeanette Rankin voted against going to war with Japan, arguing that a democracy should not go to war unanimously. Nor should it go to war with silent acquiescence.
"Qui tacet consentire videtur."
Conan the Grammarian at May 17, 2019 10:30 AM
"The Framers unfortunately did not envision that the three branches of government would collaborate to expand their collective powers, effective becoming a mostly-unelected ruling elite."
No, they were aware of the issue. That is the heart of the second amendment. They just didn't have a good solution to the problem. Jefferson opined about how "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." Of course he changed his views when he became president.
Ben at May 17, 2019 10:40 AM
According to this article, Truman was the first US president to send troops (advisors) to Vietnam in July 1950. I can't find whether he had Congressional approval to do so.
The US Army War College Quarterly (Winter 1996-1997) had this to say about the US involvement in Vietnam:
I think the US did attain a "conclusive military decision" in Vietnam; just not the one it wanted.
Conan the Grammarian at May 17, 2019 10:51 AM
I'm actually fine with the court challenges to his declaration, since the rulings can determine which pots of money that he uses are actually legal for him to use. If none of them turn out to be legal, it's back to the drawing board.
FD: I agree with the SOE in sentiment, but the courts can actually do some good for once by providing clarification.
mpetrie98 at May 17, 2019 5:44 PM
"Trump's national emergency declaration is worse than the 59 others declared by presidents since 1976 because it was employed to usurp the express power of the purse--the most important congressional check on executive abuses."
Does this mean that youse guys here will finally get that the House has 100% of the spending power?
By the way - if you conspire to ignore and directly subvert the law, what business do you have protesting a President using other means to enforce the same thing?
Worried about opiods? Where's it coming from? Yes, protecting the border would fight that, too.
Radwaste at May 17, 2019 8:20 PM
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