In 1776, a group of men put together a little thing called the Constitution of the United States—you may be familiar with it.
It was a time of war and of post-war; of rebuilding; and also a time of great American thinkers. One of those great thinkers was none other than Benjamin Franklin, who on the verge of the ratification of the Constitution, had a telling forethought:
In these sentiments, Sir, I agree to this Constitution with all its faults, if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of Government but what may be a blessing to the people if well administered, and believe farther that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other. I doubt too whether any other Convention we can obtain may be able to make a better Constitution.
And so it was, despite Benjamin Franklin’s reservations: The Constitution of the United States was ratified shortly thereafter, and as they say, the rest is history. Or is it?
Most experts would have you believe that there is no constitutional crisis despite what your own eyes are seeing, but Donald Trump and his second administration have moved quickly to shatter the balance of power between three supposed co-equal branches of our government: Impounding funds appropriated by Congress; shuttering or severely hampering congressionally established agencies and departments; installing Elon Musk to DOGE in spite of the Appointments Clause; daring the courts to do their Constitutional duty and threatening retribution for doing it; the economic fallout from the tariffs; the Alien Enemies Act in the dead of night—we are indeed on a slippery slope.
The Constitution is clear in the separations of the different branches of government, assigning different powers to each: The Legislative Branch makes the laws, sets trade and taxes, formally approves treaties, and declares wars. The Judicial in turn interprets the laws and ensures they are applied equally. The Executive is in charge of executing the laws and ensuring the day-to-day operations of the government.
At least, that’s how it is supposed to work in theory, but in practice, the United States has been straying from the Constitutional checks and balances for decades.
On Trade, War, and Taxes
The Constitution vests these powers in Congress, and only in Congress—and for good reason.
Despite this, the United States’ Congress has been flirting with delegation for decades by providing the Executive Branch with powers it rightfully should not possess; and in others by allowing the Executive to outright encroach on its powers. To pull from our list of Trump 2.0 examples, impoundment of funds by the Executive branch is directly counter to its Constitutional authority.
As you likely know, Congress controls “the purse” as they say, but it is important to understand how. When Congress authorizes spending, they do so by passing laws, commonly known as bills. Once these appropriations are approved and signed into law, the checks have, for all intents and purposes, been written.
When the Executive Branch—whose sole purpose is to execute the laws—impounds funds, it is not executing the laws; it is at best either attempting to rewrite the law, or at worst, choosing not to execute the law at all. It is not the Executive Branch’s power to double-check Congress’ appropriations work, for any reason, especially for frivolous ones such as “rooting out DEI and wokeism” because “the president said so” by Executive Order.
Another area where Congress has been sloppily delegating their power is on tariffs. Only Congress has the authority and power to regulate trade and taxes, therefore, only Congress has the authority and power to implement or lift tariffs. However, over the decades, Congress has passed several acts which have delegated some of this power to the Executive Branch.
Regardless of their intent, these delegations have resulted in giving the Trump 2.0 administration broad leeway in implementing universal tariffs on any country it chooses—hell, they even slapped tariffs on uninhabited islands and another island where the only resident is a U.S. military base—unilaterally and without any input from the only branch of government where this power Constitutionally exists: The Legislative Branch.
On Agency Dismantling and Appointments
In further derelict of their power, the Legislative appears to have allowed the Executive to encroach even more. Starting with Elon Musk’s appointment, there are so many things wrong it is hard to even know where to begin.
First, the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was created entirely on Executive Order by gutting another department, the United States Digital Service (USDS), and then allowing DOGE to step into its skin. Not only is this a bastardization of the original laws that established the USDS—whose sole purpose was to enhance digital government services for citizens, not the wholesale destruction of Congressionally established agencies—it is an affront to our Constitution.
Furthermore, considering the great power that DOGE is wielding, Elon Musk was required to go through Congressional approval due to the Appointment’s Clause.
What we got instead was an un-appointed radical billionaire tearing through our Government, dismantling agencies at will, with no regard for our country’s laws and regulations. To add insult to injury, DOGE was also somehow given the power to unilaterally cancel Congressional appropriations.
Our Constitution prohibits all of this, and yet the people we sent to Washington to ensure these Executive abuses do not happen are all but complicit, gleefully cheering on the destruction of our checks and balances and of their own power—nay, of our power.
Even if you could argue that the Government needs to become more efficient, which you certainly could argue quite succinctly in fact, DOGE is not the way to accomplish this; not even close. The methods being used here are not only flagrantly illegal, they fly in the face of our Constitutional order of Government.
On Immigration and Personal Liberty
We are a country of due process; of laws not men; we value personal liberty and decry unlawful searches and seizures; where our Government cannot capriciously target your personal liberty and freedoms; where you are free to speak your mind; where we champion these bedrock principles for all, and which were paid for in blood.
At least we used to be.
Today, you can be picked up off the street by masked agents wearing no identification. You can be thrown onto a plane and deported to a maximum security concentration camp without having even committed a single crime, or getting your day in a court of law. You can be deprived of your freedom simply for writing words or having an opinion—or just by visiting our country.
While it might seem easy to dismiss these abuses of power based on simplistic reasoning like you not being a part of the targeted class of people, the erosion of fundamental rights for one class can quickly lead to erosions in others.
This isn’t hyperbole or theoretical; it’s happening. The Trump 2.0 administration is publicly floating the idea that they can send “the homegrowns” to El Salvador. Stephen Miller was on national TV having a wet dream about suspending habeas corpus, which is the right to challenge your detention before a judge to ensure it is legal. That means American citizens rotting in foreign prisons with no hope of due process, and no recourse on returning to the United States.
ICE can now enter the home of any American citizen to search for anybody, without a warrant issued by a judge, because the DOJ said so. If you truly see nothing wrong with that, then are you even American? Because our Founding Fathers are turning over in their graves right now.
The Bill of Rights is not the Bill of Privileges—but that is exactly what it is becoming: Optional protections only for those that are worthy of this administration’s adulations.
So ask yourself this: If it were you, would you be OK with the Government treating you this way and violating your most basic human rights? Is it OK for the Government to unilaterally kick down your neighbors’ door without cause or warrant and throw them in a dungeon so long as they just don’t do it to you?
What guarantees do you even have that it wont be you at some point?
On Lawfare
An infinite train of irony and hypocrisy is an adequate facsimile for the absurd attacks on this nation’s largest law firms, universities, and Trump’s other political and ideological enemies.
For the right-wing ideologues, lawfare has become a rallying cry of sorts, whereby they erroneously claimed that the power of the Government was being weaponized against them and other conservatives. Of course, what was really happening was that the Government was pursuing those that violated the law.
But now that Trump 2.0 is back in power, he has capriciously, illegally, and unconstitutionally engaged in actual lawfare against his political and ideological enemies: He personally ordered the Government to target Chris Krebs extrajudicially (!) for the crime of not buying into the big lie regarding the 2020 election. He has ordered that ActBlue, the Democratic grassroots funding platform, be investigated for nothing other than he doesn’t like them and he wants his political opponents monetarily crippled.
The Trump 2.0 administration has also targeted law firms that represented his literal political enemies, like Hillary Clinton, with seriously unconstitutional Executive Orders. That isn’t embellishment either; multiple judges have already ruled them as such because the only intent of the orders were to cripple his opponents, or those that had represented them in court.
Laughably and pathetically, the right-wing ideologues who were crying a few short months ago are now silent, with nary a peep about the out of control lawfare emanating from the Trump 2.0 administration.
In reality, nobody should be condoning this, regardless of what your political beliefs or affiliations are, because ultimately, the pendulum eventually swings the other direction.
A Self-Fulfilling Prophecy?
Look, I could do this all day, but ultimately, the Government is a reflection of us and of who we send to Washington. There’s still time to turn around from going down this road. But if we don’t start taking our civic responsibilities seriously, we could very well end up right where Benjamin Franklin predicted.
It’s time for us to send real adults to Washington. It’s time for the Government to actually work for us once again. Because as it stands right now, the only thing that is happening is Americans are being left behind.
