Democrats, don't save Trump from himself

Washington Post

07-02-2025

So, here's a shocker: It turns out that, if you elect a felon as president of the United States, he will continue to break laws once he's in office.
Who knew?
Ultimately, it will be up to the courts to determine which of President Donald Trump's actions are illegal. But a case can be made — indeed, many cases already have been made in federal courts — that the new administration over the course of the last fortnight has violated each of the following laws. See if you can say them in one breath. In reverse chronological order of first enactment:
The Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act of 2024. The Administrative Leave Act of 2016. The Federal Information Security Modernization Act of 2014. The Affordable Care Act of 2010. The Foreign Affairs Reform and Restructuring Act of 1998. The Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993. The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986. The Inspector General Act of 1978. The Privacy Act of 1974. The Impoundment Control Act of 1974. The Rehabilitation Act of 1973. The Federal Advisory Committee Act of 1972. The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. The Administrative Procedure Act of 1946. The Public Health Service Act 1944. The Antideficiency Act of 1870.
That's a century and a half of statutes shredded in just over two weeks. And those don't include the ways in which Trump already appears to be in violation of the Constitution: The First Amendment's protections of free speech and association; the Fifth Amendment's guarantee of equal protection and due process; the Eighth Amendment's prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment; the 14th Amendment's promise of birthright citizenship; Article I's spending, presentment, appropriations and bicameralism clauses; Article II's take-care clause; and the separation of powers generally.
'The Trump administration so far has been the advent calendar of illegality,' says Norman Eisen, whose group, State Democracy Defenders Action, has been filing lawsuits against the administration. At least seven federal judges appointed by presidents of both political parties have already blocked Trump's moves to freeze federal funding, end birthright citizenship, extend a dubious buyout offer to government employees and deny treatment to transgender inmates.
Benjamin Wittes, who runs the popular Lawfare publication, predicts that, of the dozens of instances in which Trump is in conflict with existing law, he will ultimately lose 80 percent of the cases when they eventually arrive at the Supreme Court after 18 months or so of litigation. But that's a long time to wait while the president's lawlessness causes chaos and suffering. And even if the pro-Trump majority on the Supreme Court hands him a victory only 20 percent of the time, that could still fundamentally reshape the U.S. government, reducing Congress to irrelevance.
Republicans in Congress have for years asserted their Article I authority, and they howled about encroaching dictatorship when President Joe Biden did nothing more nefarious than forgive student-loan debt. (The Supreme Court struck that down.) So what are they doing about Trump usurping the powers of Congress? They're applauding.
Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican, acknowledged that what Trump and Elon Musk are doing to cut off congressionally mandated funding 'runs afoul of the Constitution in the strictest sense.' But, he told reporters this week, that's 'not uncommon' and 'nobody should bellyache about that.'
House Speaker Mike Johnson, at a news conference Wednesday, was asked by Fox News's Chad Pergram about the 'inconsistency' of Republicans who are now 'ceding Article I powers to the executive branch under Elon Musk.'
'I think there's a gross overreaction in the media,' Johnson replied, with a forced chuckle. He admitted that what Trump is doing 'looks radical,' but went on: 'This is not a usurpation of authority in any way. It's not a power grab. I think they're doing what we've all expected and hoped and asked that they would do.'
These are not the words of a constitutionally designated leader of the legislative branch. These are the words of a Donald Trump handmaiden. And it is time for Democrats to treat him as such.
Democrats have been negotiating in good faith on a deal to fund the government for the rest of fiscal year 2025; the government shuts down in five weeks if funding isn't extended. There's no doubt that Rep. Tom Cole (R-Oklahoma), chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, and Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), chairwoman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, are also negotiating in good faith.
But the whole thing is not on the level. Trump has shown that he will ignore the spending bills passed by Congress and fund only those programs he supports — the Constitution, and the law, be damned. And Johnson has made clear that this is 'what we've all expected and hoped and asked that they would do.'
In a letter to his Democratic colleagues this week, House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries said he told House GOP leaders that Trump's efforts to cut off programs funded by Congress 'must be choked off in the upcoming government funding bill, if not sooner.' But even if Democrats extracted from Republicans language in the spending bill that the programs must be funded as Congress specifies, Trump has already made clear that such a law wouldn't be worth the paper it's written on. And Johnson made it clear he has no intention of obliging Democrats with such a guarantee anyway; he said at his Wednesday news conference that Jeffries's letter 'laid out the foundation for a government shutdown.'
Clearly, there is no hope of good-faith negotiation with Trump, or with Johnson. Republicans control the House, Senate and White House. Let them pass a 2025 spending bill on their own. Let them raise the debt ceiling on their own. Let them enact Trump's entire agenda on their own. They have the votes. Democrats ought not give them a single one.
Good parenting uses the idea of 'natural consequences': If your child refuses to wear her coat, let her be cold for the day. Either way, the voters will provide the consequences: FAFO. Trump knows what this means: He posted a picture of himself next to a FAFO sign, to deliver the message to Colombia's president during their recent deportation standoff.
Democrats, by withholding their votes, will be giving Trump and Johnson some good parenting. Republicans can shut the government down. Or they can enact the sort of devastating cuts to popular programs that they like to talk about. Either way, the voters will provide the natural consequences.
The third week of the Trump presidency has been just as chaotic as the first two. Trump, who won the 2024 election promising to end wars and to put 'America First,' now proposes to take over Gaza and to spend American taxpayer dollars to dismantle bombs and make it a 'Riviera' on the Mediterranean. (He later clarified that Israel would handle the forced resettlement of the 2 million Palestinians there — 'people like Chuck Schumer' — and then cede the Palestinian land to the United States.) The Trump-appointed chairman of the Federal Communications Commission is using his agency to assist Trump in his personal vendetta against CBS News, forcing the network to hand over unedited tapes of an interview with Kamala Harris that are the subject of a lawsuit Trump filed against CBS. Funding was shut off to some Head Start programs for preschoolers. And the administration, though it isn't deporting any more migrants than the Obama administration did, stepped up efforts to humiliate them and is now sending deportees to Guantánamo Bay.
Meantime, the world's wealthiest man runs amok through the federal bureaucracy, and he appears to have access to private records of all Americans and highly classified information such as the identities of CIA operatives. He is reportedly doing this with a group of unvetted men in their early 20s — as well as a 19-year-old heir to a popcorn fortune who recently worked as a camp counselor. Musk, though he seems to be running much of the country, has exempted himself from all government disclosure and ethics requirements. But fear not: If Musk, whose companies get billions of dollars in federal contracts, 'comes across a conflict of interest,' said White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, he will — Scout's honor — recuse himself. The administration's attempt to induce federal employees to take a legally dubious buyout came in the form of an email with the same subject line — 'fork in the road' — that Musk used to drive Twitter employees to quit. The South Africa-born Musk, fresh from his encouragement of far-right extremists in Germany, replied 'yes' this week to a post on X that said 'we should allow more immigration of White South Africans.'
Musk moved to dismiss staff and shut down the U.S. Agency for International Development, which Musk calls 'evil.' Maybe that's because USAID's inspector general was investigating the activities of Musk's Starlink in Ukraine. But the administration and its allies rushed to justify the decision — by fabricating propaganda. At the White House, Leavitt told reporters that she was 'made aware that USAID has funded media outlets like Politico. I can confirm that more than $8 million … has gone to subsidizing subscriptions.' Trump inflated the fiction further, to suggest 'BILLIONS' went to 'THE FAKE NEWS MEDIA AS A 'PAYOFF' FOR CREATING GOOD STORIES ABOUT THE DEMOCRATS.' In reality, $44,000 of USAID money went to Politico over several years — not from 'payoffs' or 'subsidies' but from officials subscribing to Politico Pro, as they did throughout the government (hence the $8 million). On Capitol Hill, Johnson provided a different fabrication, crediting Trump and Musk for stopping USAID from funding 'transgender operas in Colombia,' 'drag shows in Ecuador' and 'expanding atheism in Nepal.' But it appears USAID did not fund any of those things.
The willy-nilly cancellation of all foreign aid would end lifesaving programs and various counterterrorism and counternarcotics efforts, dealing a lethal blow to U.S. soft power and driving countries into the arms of China and Russia, while hurting American farmers in the bargain. But it's not just USAID. Trump and Musk, with their reckless and unfocused attack on federal workers, are raising the likelihood of any number of crises, at home and abroad. Their hollowing-out of the FBI and the Justice Department (with the notable exception of activities targeting Trump critics and migrants) raises the likelihood of a terrorist attack and foreign infiltration, not to mention more crime domestically. Their attempt to drive workers to quit at the CIA and NSA jeopardizes national security. Depleting the ranks of food-safety inspectors and bank regulators poses obvious dangers, as would Trump's idea of abolishing FEMA. The administration tried to reduce personnel at the FAA — but last week's plane crash in D.C. suddenly made it discover we need more air traffic controllers.
Yet Republican leaders on Capitol Hill either salute Trump or look the other way. They're on their way to confirming all of Trump's nominees, including vaccines opponent Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to run the federal government's health programs; Tulsi Gabbard, who has a bizarre fondness for Russia, to oversee intelligence; and Kash Patel, Trump's agent of vengeance, to run the FBI.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota) said the sort of thing Trump and Musk are doing to USAID is 'probably true of any administration when they come in.' Handmaiden Johnson even welcomed the proposed U.S. takeover of Gaza, saying, contrary to reality, that it was 'cheered by, I think, people all around the world.'
A few Republicans are raising objections. Collins doesn't think Musk's upending of USAID 'satisfies the requirements of the law,' and she pronounces herself 'very concerned.' But what's the senator from Maine going to do about it? Apparently, nothing.
That will have to be up to Democrats. The out-of-power party has been bashed in the news media and by progressives for doing too little to stand up to Trump. Then, when Democratic lawmakers protested outside USAID headquarters, they were criticized for doing too much. 'You don't fight every fight,' Rahm Emanuel told Politico.
In truth, Democrats have almost no ability to stop Trump, but they do have the power, and the obligation, to stand in lockstep opposition to what the president is doing. Some of them might argue that the only way to protect certain programs, and the vulnerable people who need them, is to cut a deal with Trump and Republicans. But Trump has demonstrated abundantly that he will try to use unconstitutional means to kill off those programs regardless of what Congress does.
But if Democrats can't stop a reckless president from creating unnecessary crises and harming millions of Americans, they certainly don't need to give a bipartisan veneer to the atrocity. Let Republicans own the consequences of breaking government. Don't save Trump from himself.