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Time of India
29-04-2025
- Politics
- Time of India
From chaos to controversy: The most bizarre and impactful moves Donald Trump made in a whirlwind first 100 days that still baffle experts
During just the first 100 days, US president Donald Trump has done things like no other ever before, as per a report. #Pahalgam Terrorist Attack The groundwork before India mounts a strike at Pakistan India considers closing airspace to Pakistani carriers amid rising tensions Cold Start: India's answer to Pakistan's nuclear threats Donald Trump's First 100 Days: A Presidency Unlike Any Before Breaking every previous record, Trump has signed more than 100 executive orders in just over several weeks, a pace unmatched since the days of the 33rd and 24th president of the United States, Harry Truman, as per Politico. Yet the number of papers barely begins to address the larger upending that has characterized his tenure to date. From ripping up trade agreements and distancing himself from international alliances to bypassing Congress and defying court rulings, Trump has set out to remake the role and authority of the presidency, according to the report. He even renamed large bodies of water that don't entirely belong to the US and some mountains that do, as per Politico. Under his deportation program, he has detained and dispatched hundreds of people (some of them US citizens), including to prisons in the US and abroad, according to the report. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Famous Celebrities With Unexpected Degrees Learn More Tariffs: The Most Consequential Policy During a roundtable of POLITICO's newsroom experts, with White House reporter Megan Messerly, senior news editor Tessa Berenson Rogers, senior writer and author of the 'Rules of Law' column, Ankush Khardori, trade reporter in POLITICO's Brussels bureau Camille Gijs and deputy editor of POLITICO Playbook Zack Stanton, all of them unanimously said that Traiffs were the single most consequential action Trump has taken in these 100 days. Messerly also pointed out the establishment of DOGE, which has led to massive dismantling and overhaul of the federal government, according to Politico. Live Events While, Stanton mentioned that the shutting down of USAID and humanitarian aid is also consequential, as per the report. Rising Tensions With the EU and China Gijs highlighted that Trump's most dangerous move for him politically is "picking a new fight with the European Union just as he also escalates trade and political tensions with China," quoted Politico. Gijs explained that, "Domestically, it's also fueling the risk of creating price inflation for U.S. consumers. On the foreign policy front, it's also pushing the EU and China closer together, and it might risk isolating Washington further," as quoted in the report. FAQs Did Trump sign more executive orders than other presidents? Yes, in his first few weeks, he signed over 100, more than any president since Truman. What happened to USAID under Trump? He shut it down during his first 100 days, cutting off major humanitarian aid programs.
Yahoo
29-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
The Most Consequential, Damaging, Head-Scratching Things Trump Did in His First 100 Days
Let's face it. No one in politics today has lived through a first 100 days like the one Donald Trump just dropped on the country. You have to go back to the Truman administration to find a president who signed more than 100 executive orders in a year; Trump blew by that mark in just over three months. And even that doesn't quite capture the senses-numbing effect of a president bent on upending every facet of American government as it has been practiced over the past half century or more. Unraveling security alliances and ripping up trade agreements, disregarding congressional prerogatives and dismissing judicial oversight, renaming large bodies of water that don't entirely belong to us and mountains that do, not to mention an unapologetic deportation program that has detained and dispatched hundreds of people (some of them U.S. citizens), including to prisons here and abroad — Trump has made keeping up with the news hard and keeping things in perspective even harder. To help put all this unprecedentedness into context, we brought together a roundtable of POLITICO's newsroom experts. The discussion featured Megan Messerly, White House reporter; Tessa Berenson Rogers, senior news editor; Ankush Khardori, senior writer and author of the 'Rules of Law' column; Camille Gijs, a trade reporter in POLITICO's Brussels bureau; and Zack Stanton, deputy editor of POLITICO Playbook. We discussed some of the biggest surprises of Trump's new term, the actions that will truly have long-term impact, some things that his opponents secretly agree with and the big things that might be coming in the next 100 days. The conversation has been lightly edited for question might be the hardest of the bunch: What is the single most consequential action Trump has taken? Ankush Khardori: The tariffs. Megan Messerly: I have two answers here — I'd say either establishing DOGE, and the massive dismantling and overhaul of the federal government, or the massive reshaping of the global trade order that we're seeing right now with the imposition of these reciprocal tariffs. Even though he's paused some of those tariffs for 90 days, I think we're still going to see a dramatic restructuring of U.S. trading relationships. And that speaks broadly to how the president is repositioning the U.S. with regard to its European allies and reshaping the global world order. Camille Gijs: Tariffs, for sure. It's sending shockwaves across the world and is triggering the European Union amongst others to look for new partnerships. It's also pushing those economies to retaliate and to move toward bloc-based trading spheres. Overall, this is rebuilding the global trade order: Economic institutions and countries are still trying to see what order can be brought into the current disorder. Khardori: I think it encapsulates many of the most important features of Trump 2.0's approach to the law. They found an obscure law to support their policy, devised supposed "emergencies" to invoke it, and then implemented (or attempted to implement) a global tariff regime that may be illegal (there are strong arguments on this), and that has roiled the global economy, angered the public and undermined the country's international standing. Tessa Berenson Rogers: I echo the answer about tariffs. He's changed economic policy in the most drastic way this country has seen in a century. And I would say overlaying any specific action, the fact that he's surrounded himself this term with staff in the White House and Cabinet officials who won't challenge his agenda. He's been wiser in his second term about how to remove the constraints that to whatever extent kept him hemmed in during the first term. Zack, you have another contender? Zack Stanton: I think there's a good case to be made for the tariffs. But in sheer number of lives, I'd argue the effective shuttering of USAID and much humanitarian aid is the most consequential. The Center for Global Development has estimated the number of lives saved by U.S. aid per year as being in the millions. I think there's some overlap in terms of tariffs and the aid cuts in their effect, though: Both speak to a major change in America's role in the world and a rebalancing of the global order. What will be the hardest thing for any subsequent administration to unwind? Tessa, you want to take the first crack at this? Rogers: Sure thing. Trump has long oriented his political identity around illegal immigration so I think it's useful to start there. Our colleague Myah Ward has a new story out that I think gets to the heart of this question. The Biden administration spent four years trying to unwind much of what Trump did in his first term on the issue, so this time Trump is figuring out how to make more permanent changes to the system. He and Stephen Miller have been looking at how to chip away at immigrant due process rights. A senior White House official told Myah 'most Americans' would be 'shocked' and 'appalled at just how much due process an alien can receive.' Depending on how the courts weigh in on some key questions, this Trump presidency could change the fabric of immigration due process in this country. Stanton: Some of the cuts that DOGE has made will be exceptionally difficult to unwind. By that, I'm not so much talking about funding itself — which is easy to ramp up — but instead, the vast architecture of projects that have been disassembled (both inside government and outside but reliant on federal funding) and jobs that have been lost. Restaffing the so-called 'administrative state' would be a gargantuan undertaking. Ankush, what action has Trump taken that most surprised you? Khardori: The most surprising thing to me has been Trump's targeting of large law firms with executive orders, which then led to a bunch of firms brokering deals (which may be illegal) and ongoing court fights with a handful of firms that objected. I don't think it's nearly as consequential as some of the other things that have been going on, but I did not see it coming Rogers: I totally agree. Frankly, some of the firms' responses and decisions to cut deals with him – not to mention the slow and relatively lackluster collective pushback from others – have been surprising as well. Our editor-in-chief John Harris dubbed it 'the great grovel.' Zack, what was the least surprising thing Trump did in your estimation? Stanton: Most of what he did has been unsurprising to anyone who paid attention to the 2024 campaign (a lot of this was litigated in the whole 'Project 2025' saga), but probably pardoning the Jan. 6 rioters — which he telegraphed from the beginning of the campaign and did at pretty much his earliest convenience once in office. What I have been surprised by is how durable his partnership with Elon Musk has been — if we can say that at a 100-day mark. I think some of it is, frankly, Trump loving the idea of the world's richest man working for him. Messerly: It's absolutely true. He also loves having a Kennedy working for or Tessa, do you have another "least surprising" thing? Messerly: Dismantling the Department of Education, for sure. Republicans have wanted to do this forever. So even though this is being billed as part of this DOGE-ification of the federal government — this one really is a longstanding conservative priority. Rogers: Using the office to try to enrich himself and his allies. From the various memecoins and cryptocurrencies members of his family have launched to promoting Tesla at the White House to Amazon reportedly paying tens of millions of dollars for a documentary on Melania Trump – and other reporting that there has been a push for something similar for Don Jr. – it remains amazing how much he has normalized this kind of behavior, but it should no longer be surprising. This is a lightning round question. Everyone jump in, please. What action was the most over-hyped by the media? Rogers: His musings about seeking a third term in office. (Most recently, cheekily selling 'Trump 2028' hats.) I don't buy it. But I say this with all awareness that I could be very, very wrong. Stanton: 'Gulf of America.' Khardori: I had a different answer in my head, but I think Tessa is right (on both counts)! Messerly: Seconding Zack — renaming the Gulf of Mexico. It took up so much oxygen and had no actual policy impact — other than getting the AP kicked out of the pool. (Which obviously was very important and consequential for a whole separate host of reasons.) Stanton: Cosign. Camille, does anyone in Europe care about what we call that body of water west of Florida? Gijs: Haha! Absolutely, it's the most immediate thing that jumps to my mind as this next question is for you. What has Trump done that will be most dangerous for him politically? Gijs: Seen from Europe, I'd say it's picking a new fight with the European Union just as he also escalates trade and political tensions with China. Domestically, it's also fueling the risk of creating price inflation for U.S. consumers. On the foreign policy front, it's also pushing the EU and China closer together, and it might risk isolating Washington further. This is going to lead the EU to seek to deepen their ties with Beijing in some sectors to counterbalance Trump's unpredictable trade policies. We have seen movements in that direction already, with a summit between China and the EU set to take place in July. Stanton: The most politically dangerous thing for him is the inflationary effects of tariffs, which are incredibly regressive. To me, there's a real risk of misreading his mandate: He won huge swaths of support from working-class voters because they were upset about the high cost of living. Unless he gets that under control, it'll block out the sun, as it did for Joe Biden. What action of Trump's do Democrats secretly like the most? Either because it's a policy they actually favor or because it's a winner for them politically. Megan? Messerly: Theoretically, Democrats should be supportive of the president's moves on reshoring. If it happens now over a slower timeframe, and is more methodical, there's technically no good reason Democrats shouldn't get behind it, given that it will help their working-class voters in the long term. (If they are still their working-class voters, that is…) How Democrats respond to these tariff moves in the long term, I think, says a lot about the direction the party is headed in. Stanton: I think that's right, Megan. I was struck by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer even explicitly saying recently that she agrees with the president on reshoring jobs. I admittedly come at this from the perspective of a Macomb County native, so that issue, combined with tariffs on China, I think has a lot of industrial Midwestern Dems quietly, or not so quietly, in agreement. On the other end of the Democratic coalition, steering from the working class to highly educated liberals in the Elizabeth Warren mold, I think there is surprised cheer about some of the continuing antitrust enforcement. Rogers: On the political win side, making Elon Musk such a visible governing partner at the start of his term. Even if voters broadly agree with DOGE's goals, we've seen in Wisconsin and some polling so far Elon himself is a liability and a political gift to Democrats. Another lightning round. What's the most memorable thing Trump has said? Jump in here, everyone. Stanton: So many contenders — 'Liberation Day' … 'Riviera of the Middle East' — but I'm going to have to go with 'He who saves his Country does not violate any Law.' Rogers: I love his fixation on the word 'groceries.' If you haven't seen the clips of him saying it's an 'old-fashioned word' that means 'a bag with different things in it,' I recommend a watch. Gijs: For the EU, it's without a doubt when he said in February that Europe was created to "screw' the United States — because it goes against history, it's factually wrong. Just look at the Marshall Plan after the Second World War: One of the conditions to access aid was actually to accelerate European integration and lower trade barriers between European markets. Although it didn't come as a huge surprise, I do feel it triggered alarm bells here on his perception of the bloc. Messerly: This just feels so apt, not only on tariffs, which he was referring to here, but pretty much everything when it comes to Trump: "A lot of times, it's not a negotiation until it is.' Khardori: For me, it was Trump's comments blaming the DCA helicopter crash on DEI. This should have been his "very fine people on both sides" moment, but the press largely moved on after a day of coverage. In fact, this presaged much of Trump's governing program and tone — using DEI and other cultural issues to prop up unpopular policies and indefensible results. What will have the biggest unintended consequence? Tessa, do you see a huge risk ahead? Rogers: I don't think we yet know all of the consequences that could come in the science and medical realms from the DOGE firings at Health and Human Services and other agencies (for example, firing HHS staff in charge of bird flu response) and stripping university research funding. Ankush, do you see any unintended consequences from the administration's aggression toward judges — in court and out? Khardori: Yes, I think it's pretty clear that Trump risks antagonizing — and maybe even already has antagonized — conservative justices on the Supreme Court who he will need. The administration's contempt for the lower court judges is not something that other judges will ignore. Stanton: In terms of the biggest unintended consequence, I'd just echo what Camille said earlier about the EU and how the tariffs are leading to it deepening its ties to China. This is an arena where I feel there's a real potential for Trump to have miscalculated: He obviously wants to beat China in this brewing Cold War we have, but between the tariffs and the withering of foreign aid, he is, I'm afraid, going to push much of the world to develop closer ties to China. Gijs: Yes, and then there's also a silver lining for the EU: In a way, Trump's first 100 days have been pushing the EU to get its act together on both trade and defense policy. It can't quite rely on Washington anymore to stand with Ukraine, and it's been boosting its own capabilities and investments in defense to reach NATO's 2 percent of GDP target. "Never waste a good crisis" is something EU officials here in Brussels have told me countless to stay on that idea for a moment, how does it feel in Europe to watch an 80-year security alliance begin to unravel? Gijs: It's definitely unsettling. Watching signs of it weaken creates a real sense of uncertainty — because it's not just about defense, but about broader cooperation on global stability, trade, cyber security, etc. In a way, the EU now feels a bit stuck between trying to stick with Ukraine and the values it stands for in its fight against Russia, while at the same time not alienating the U.S. too much. There's this growing realization in Europe that it has to take more responsibility for its own security in ways it hasn't fully done before. OK, everyone, give me one of Trump's biggest successes. Khardori: The law firm deals. Stanton: From his perspective, the tariffs. Bringing the entire world to heel by forcing them to make deals with him. Gijs: Yes, to Zack's point, I don't think the EU would label those tariffs as a "success." Who's going to mention the drop in border crossings? I'm getting a thumbs up from Zack. Messerly: You hear this one a lot in Trump world: picking Susie Wiles as chief of staff. She really has kept the White House chaos at a minimum. Even with Signalgate and everything going on at the Pentagon, the fact that no heads have rolled among the Cabinet or top staff at the White House is a testament to the tight ship she's been running over there. And so different from Trump 1.0. Rogers: Going back to what I mentioned at the start of this discussion, running across all of these smart examples is Trump's success of putting the loyal people he wanted in place around government so that he can execute on a lot of his bigger, bolder, more risky plans. What has been his biggest blunder? I suspect there's a lot of agreement on tariffs here. Anyone want to take a contrarian view? Tessa? Rogers: Tariffs aside, as Megan just mentioned, Signalgate and the continued fallout from that has been a dominant storyline in recent weeks. So we may need to mention nominating Pete Hegseth as Defense secretary and using a lot of political capital to get him confirmed. Hegseth is still in place but what has become clear are real problems with his lack of experience and management style at a massive agency with an enormously important and sensitive mandate. Ankush, what has been the most under-reported thing he has done? Khardori: From a legal perspective, I'd point to the many steps that the administration has already taken to curtail white-collar criminal enforcement. This is not surprising given what we saw during the first term, but it's not good for Americans and will have very negative repercussions. Just last week, the FBI issued an annual report showing — yet again — that internet crime/fraud is rising at a disturbing rate: 33 percent increase in reported losses. This has been a steady trend for nearly 25 years, and it's only going to get worse. Anyone else see a gap in the media's coverage? Perhaps Trump family memecoin ventures promoted from the White House? Stanton: Yeah, that's a fair one. I think one of his successes — again, from his perspective — is how much he's moved the Overton Window in what gets coverage or even gets people riled up. There's an Onion article I think of from time to time that's a fake op-ed from President Jimmy Carter back in the first Trump administration: 'You People Made Me Sell My Peanut Farm.' Last question! Everyone grab your torpedo bats and swing for the fences: What's the biggest thing coming in the NEXT 100 days? Messerly: Reconciliation. It's been on the back burner the last few weeks as tariffs have taken center stage. But Trump needs to get an extension of his tax cuts passed, or it's going to be a huge political problem for Republicans. I hear this constantly talking to folks in Trump world. There's a lot of anxiety about getting this done. Khardori: I have to imagine we are headed toward some sort of major Supreme Court decision dealing with Trump's executive power, but exactly when and on what topic remains unclear. There are a bunch of important cases working their way through the courts, and the administration has been aggressively trying to get them to the court as quickly as possible. Rogers: I second Megan! After a flurry of executive orders, a huge legislative challenge ahead. Gijs: More counter-tariffs to the existing tariffs? The EU is still working on its next batch of retaliation — if the talks don't yield any concrete outcome during the 90-day pause. What's not helping is the poor to non-existent relationship between Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, and Trump. He also doesn't believe in the EU as an institution and prefers to deal with countries bilaterally, as we have seen with the recent visits of the French, Irish or Italian leaders, and this is not conducive to any prospect of a deal with Washington and Brussels. Stanton: So, that's the big question. In his first administration, he fired James Comey in the second hundred days and then had the Charlottesville 'very fine people' debacle just after Day 200. Who knows what's in store this time around?
Politico
29-04-2025
- Business
- Politico
The Most Consequential, Damaging, Head-Scratching Things Trump Did in His First 100 Days
Let's face it. No one in politics today has lived through a first 100 days like the one Donald Trump just dropped on the country. You have to go back to the Truman administration to find a president who signed more than 100 executive orders in a year ; Trump blew by that mark in just over three months. And even that doesn't quite capture the senses-numbing effect of a president bent on upending every facet of American government as it has been practiced over the past half century or more. Unraveling security alliances and ripping up trade agreements, disregarding congressional prerogatives and dismissing judicial oversight, renaming large bodies of water that don't entirely belong to us and mountains that do, not to mention an unapologetic deportation program that has detained and dispatched hundreds of people ( some of them U.S. citizens ), including to prisons here and abroad — Trump has made keeping up with the news hard and keeping things in perspective even harder. To help put all this unprecedentedness into context, we brought together a roundtable of POLITICO's newsroom experts. The discussion featured Megan Messerly, White House reporter; Tessa Berenson Rogers, senior news editor; Ankush Khardori, senior writer and author of the 'Rules of Law' column; Camille Gijs, a trade reporter in POLITICO's Brussels bureau; and Zack Stanton, deputy editor of POLITICO Playbook. We discussed some of the biggest surprises of Trump's new term, the actions that will truly have long-term impact, some things that his opponents secretly agree with and the big things that might be coming in the next 100 days. The conversation has been lightly edited for clarity. This question might be the hardest of the bunch: What is the single most consequential action Trump has taken? Ankush Khardori: The tariffs. Megan Messerly: I have two answers here — I'd say either establishing DOGE, and the massive dismantling and overhaul of the federal government, or the massive reshaping of the global trade order that we're seeing right now with the imposition of these reciprocal tariffs. Even though he's paused some of those tariffs for 90 days, I think we're still going to see a dramatic restructuring of U.S. trading relationships. And that speaks broadly to how the president is repositioning the U.S. with regard to its European allies and reshaping the global world order. Camille Gijs : Tariffs, for sure. It's sending shockwaves across the world and is triggering the European Union amongst others to look for new partnerships. It's also pushing those economies to retaliate and to move toward bloc-based trading spheres. Overall, this is rebuilding the global trade order: Economic institutions and countries are still trying to see what order can be brought into the current disorder. Khardori: I think it encapsulates many of the most important features of Trump 2.0's approach to the law. They found an obscure law to support their policy, devised supposed 'emergencies' to invoke it, and then implemented (or attempted to implement) a global tariff regime that may be illegal (there are strong arguments on this), and that has roiled the global economy, angered the public and undermined the country's international standing. Tessa Berenson Rogers: I echo the answer about tariffs. He's changed economic policy in the most drastic way this country has seen in a century. And I would say overlaying any specific action, the fact that he's surrounded himself this term with staff in the White House and Cabinet officials who won't challenge his agenda. He's been wiser in his second term about how to remove the constraints that to whatever extent kept him hemmed in during the first term. Zack, you have another contender? Zack Stanton: I think there's a good case to be made for the tariffs. But in sheer number of lives, I'd argue the effective shuttering of USAID and much humanitarian aid is the most consequential. The Center for Global Development has estimated the number of lives saved by U.S. aid per year as being in the millions. I think there's some overlap in terms of tariffs and the aid cuts in their effect, though: Both speak to a major change in America's role in the world and a rebalancing of the global order. What will be the hardest thing for any subsequent administration to unwind? Tessa, you want to take the first crack at this? Rogers: Sure thing. Trump has long oriented his political identity around illegal immigration so I think it's useful to start there. Our colleague Myah Ward has a new story out that I think gets to the heart of this question. The Biden administration spent four years trying to unwind much of what Trump did in his first term on the issue, so this time Trump is figuring out how to make more permanent changes to the system. He and Stephen Miller have been looking at how to chip away at immigrant due process rights. A senior White House official told Myah 'most Americans' would be 'shocked' and 'appalled at just how much due process an alien can receive.' Depending on how the courts weigh in on some key questions, this Trump presidency could change the fabric of immigration due process in this country. Stanton: Some of the cuts that DOGE has made will be exceptionally difficult to unwind. By that, I'm not so much talking about funding itself — which is easy to ramp up — but instead, the vast architecture of projects that have been disassembled (both inside government and outside but reliant on federal funding) and jobs that have been lost. Restaffing the so-called 'administrative state' would be a gargantuan undertaking. Ankush, what action has Trump taken that most surprised you? Khardori: The most surprising thing to me has been Trump's targeting of large law firms with executive orders, which then led to a bunch of firms brokering deals (which may be illegal) and ongoing court fights with a handful of firms that objected. I don't think it's nearly as consequential as some of the other things that have been going on, but I did not see it coming Rogers: I totally agree. Frankly, some of the firms' responses and decisions to cut deals with him – not to mention the slow and relatively lackluster collective pushback from others – have been surprising as well. Our editor-in-chief John Harris dubbed it 'the great grovel.' Zack, what was the least surprising thing Trump did in your estimation? Stanton: Most of what he did has been unsurprising to anyone who paid attention to the 2024 campaign (a lot of this was litigated in the whole 'Project 2025' saga), but probably pardoning the Jan. 6 rioters — which he telegraphed from the beginning of the campaign and did at pretty much his earliest convenience once in office. What I have been surprised by is how durable his partnership with Elon Musk has been — if we can say that at a 100-day mark. I think some of it is, frankly, Trump loving the idea of the world's richest man working for him. Messerly: It's absolutely true. He also loves having a Kennedy working for him. Megan or Tessa, do you have another 'least surprising' thing? Messerly: Dismantling the Department of Education, for sure. Republicans have wanted to do this forever. So even though this is being billed as part of this DOGE-ification of the federal government — this one really is a longstanding conservative priority. Rogers: Using the office to try to enrich himself and his allies. From the various memecoins and cryptocurrencies members of his family have launched to promoting Tesla at the White House to Amazon reportedly paying tens of millions of dollars for a documentary on Melania Trump – and other reporting that there has been a push for something similar for Don Jr. – it remains amazing how much he has normalized this kind of behavior, but it should no longer be surprising. This is a lightning round question. Everyone jump in, please. What action was the most over-hyped by the media? Rogers: His musings about seeking a third term in office. (Most recently, cheekily selling 'Trump 2028' hats.) I don't buy it. But I say this with all awareness that I could be very, very wrong. Stanton: 'Gulf of America.' Khardori: I had a different answer in my head, but I think Tessa is right (on both counts)! Messerly: Seconding Zack — renaming the Gulf of Mexico. It took up so much oxygen and had no actual policy impact — other than getting the AP kicked out of the pool. (Which obviously was very important and consequential for a whole separate host of reasons.) Stanton: Cosign. Camille, does anyone in Europe care about what we call that body of water west of Florida? Gijs: Haha! Absolutely, it's the most immediate thing that jumps to my mind as well. Camille, this next question is for you. What has Trump done that will be most dangerous for him politically? Gijs: Seen from Europe, I'd say it's picking a new fight with the European Union just as he also escalates trade and political tensions with China. Domestically, it's also fueling the risk of creating price inflation for U.S. consumers. On the foreign policy front, it's also pushing the EU and China closer together, and it might risk isolating Washington further. This is going to lead the EU to seek to deepen their ties with Beijing in some sectors to counterbalance Trump's unpredictable trade policies. We have seen movements in that direction already, with a summit between China and the EU set to take place in July. Stanton: The most politically dangerous thing for him is the inflationary effects of tariffs, which are incredibly regressive. To me, there's a real risk of misreading his mandate: He won huge swaths of support from working-class voters because they were upset about the high cost of living. Unless he gets that under control, it'll block out the sun, as it did for Joe Biden. What action of Trump's do Democrats secretly like the most? Either because it's a policy they actually favor or because it's a winner for them politically. Megan? Messerly: Theoretically, Democrats should be supportive of the president's moves on reshoring. If it happens now over a slower timeframe, and is more methodical, there's technically no good reason Democrats shouldn't get behind it, given that it will help their working-class voters in the long term. (If they are still their working-class voters, that is…) How Democrats respond to these tariff moves in the long term, I think, says a lot about the direction the party is headed in. Stanton: I think that's right, Megan. I was struck by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer even explicitly saying recently that she agrees with the president on reshoring jobs. I admittedly come at this from the perspective of a Macomb County native, so that issue, combined with tariffs on China, I think has a lot of industrial Midwestern Dems quietly, or not so quietly, in agreement. On the other end of the Democratic coalition, steering from the working class to highly educated liberals in the Elizabeth Warren mold, I think there is surprised cheer about some of the continuing antitrust enforcement. Rogers: On the political win side, making Elon Musk such a visible governing partner at the start of his term. Even if voters broadly agree with DOGE's goals, we've seen in Wisconsin and some polling so far Elon himself is a liability and a political gift to Democrats. Another lightning round. What's the most memorable thing Trump has said? Jump in here, everyone. Stanton: So many contenders — 'Liberation Day' … 'Riviera of the Middle East' — but I'm going to have to go with 'He who saves his Country does not violate any Law.' Rogers: I love his fixation on the word 'groceries.' If you haven't seen the clips of him saying it's an 'old-fashioned word' that means 'a bag with different things in it,' I recommend a watch. Gijs: For the EU, it's without a doubt when he said in February that Europe was created to 'screw' the United States — because it goes against history, it's factually wrong. Just look at the Marshall Plan after the Second World War: One of the conditions to access aid was actually to accelerate European integration and lower trade barriers between European markets. Although it didn't come as a huge surprise, I do feel it triggered alarm bells here on his perception of the bloc. Messerly: This just feels so apt, not only on tariffs, which he was referring to here, but pretty much everything when it comes to Trump: 'A lot of times, it's not a negotiation until it is.' Khardori: For me, it was Trump's comments blaming the DCA helicopter crash on DEI . This should have been his 'very fine people on both sides' moment, but the press largely moved on after a day of coverage. In fact, this presaged much of Trump's governing program and tone — using DEI and other cultural issues to prop up unpopular policies and indefensible results. What will have the biggest unintended consequence? Tessa, do you see a huge risk ahead? Rogers: I don't think we yet know all of the consequences that could come in the science and medical realms from the DOGE firings at Health and Human Services and other agencies (for example, firing HHS staff in charge of bird flu response) and stripping university research funding. Ankush, do you see any unintended consequences from the administration's aggression toward judges — in court and out? Khardori: Yes, I think it's pretty clear that Trump risks antagonizing — and maybe even already has antagonized — conservative justices on the Supreme Court who he will need. The administration's contempt for the lower court judges is not something that other judges will ignore. Stanton: In terms of the biggest unintended consequence, I'd just echo what Camille said earlier about the EU and how the tariffs are leading to it deepening its ties to China. This is an arena where I feel there's a real potential for Trump to have miscalculated: He obviously wants to beat China in this brewing Cold War we have, but between the tariffs and the withering of foreign aid, he is, I'm afraid, going to push much of the world to develop closer ties to China. Gijs: Yes, and then there's also a silver lining for the EU: In a way, Trump's first 100 days have been pushing the EU to get its act together on both trade and defense policy. It can't quite rely on Washington anymore to stand with Ukraine, and it's been boosting its own capabilities and investments in defense to reach NATO's 2 percent of GDP target. 'Never waste a good crisis' is something EU officials here in Brussels have told me countless times. Camille, to stay on that idea for a moment, how does it feel in Europe to watch an 80-year security alliance begin to unravel? Gijs: It's definitely unsettling. Watching signs of it weaken creates a real sense of uncertainty — because it's not just about defense, but about broader cooperation on global stability, trade, cyber security, etc. In a way, the EU now feels a bit stuck between trying to stick with Ukraine and the values it stands for in its fight against Russia, while at the same time not alienating the U.S. too much. There's this growing realization in Europe that it has to take more responsibility for its own security in ways it hasn't fully done before. OK, everyone, give me one of Trump's biggest successes. Khardori: The law firm deals. Stanton: From his perspective, the tariffs. Bringing the entire world to heel by forcing them to make deals with him. Gijs: Yes, to Zack's point, I don't think the EU would label those tariffs as a 'success.' Who's going to mention the drop in border crossings? I'm getting a thumbs up from Zack. Messerly: You hear this one a lot in Trump world: picking Susie Wiles as chief of staff. She really has kept the White House chaos at a minimum. Even with Signalgate and everything going on at the Pentagon, the fact that no heads have rolled among the Cabinet or top staff at the White House is a testament to the tight ship she's been running over there. And so different from Trump 1.0. Rogers: Going back to what I mentioned at the start of this discussion, running across all of these smart examples is Trump's success of putting the loyal people he wanted in place around government so that he can execute on a lot of his bigger, bolder, more risky plans. What has been his biggest blunder? I suspect there's a lot of agreement on tariffs here. Anyone want to take a contrarian view? Tessa? Rogers: Tariffs aside, as Megan just mentioned, Signalgate and the continued fallout from that has been a dominant storyline in recent weeks. So we may need to mention nominating Pete Hegseth as Defense secretary and using a lot of political capital to get him confirmed. Hegseth is still in place but what has become clear are real problems with his lack of experience and management style at a massive agency with an enormously important and sensitive mandate. Ankush, what has been the most under-reported thing he has done? Khardori: From a legal perspective, I'd point to the many steps that the administration has already taken to curtail white-collar criminal enforcement. This is not surprising given what we saw during the first term, but it's not good for Americans and will have very negative repercussions. Just last week, the FBI issued an annual report showing — yet again — that internet crime/fraud is rising at a disturbing rate: 33 percent increase in reported losses. This has been a steady trend for nearly 25 years, and it's only going to get worse. Anyone else see a gap in the media's coverage? Perhaps Trump family memecoin ventures promoted from the White House? Stanton: Yeah, that's a fair one. I think one of his successes — again, from his perspective — is how much he's moved the Overton Window in what gets coverage or even gets people riled up. There's an Onion article I think of from time to time that's a fake op-ed from President Jimmy Carter back in the first Trump administration: 'You People Made Me Sell My Peanut Farm.' Last question! Everyone grab your torpedo bats and swing for the fences: What's the biggest thing coming in the NEXT 100 days? Messerly: Reconciliation. It's been on the back burner the last few weeks as tariffs have taken center stage. But Trump needs to get an extension of his tax cuts passed, or it's going to be a huge political problem for Republicans. I hear this constantly talking to folks in Trump world. There's a lot of anxiety about getting this done. Khardori: I have to imagine we are headed toward some sort of major Supreme Court decision dealing with Trump's executive power, but exactly when and on what topic remains unclear. There are a bunch of important cases working their way through the courts, and the administration has been aggressively trying to get them to the court as quickly as possible. Rogers: I second Megan! After a flurry of executive orders, a huge legislative challenge ahead. Gijs: More counter-tariffs to the existing tariffs? The EU is still working on its next batch of retaliation — if the talks don't yield any concrete outcome during the 90-day pause. What's not helping is the poor to non-existent relationship between Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, and Trump. He also doesn't believe in the EU as an institution and prefers to deal with countries bilaterally, as we have seen with the recent visits of the French, Irish or Italian leaders, and this is not conducive to any prospect of a deal with Washington and Brussels. Stanton: So, that's the big question. In his first administration, he fired James Comey in the second hundred days and then had the Charlottesville 'very fine people' debacle just after Day 200. Who knows what's in store this time around?
Politico
21-04-2025
- Business
- Politico
‘An Enormous Usurpation': Inside the Case Against Trump's Tariffs
President Donald Trump listens as Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick speaks in the Oval Office of the White House, Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Washington. | Alex Brandon/AP Ankush Khardori is a senior writer for POLITICO Magazine and a former federal prosecutor at the Department of Justice, where he specialized in financial fraud and white-collar crime. He has also worked in the private sector on complex commercial litigation and white-collar corporate defense. His column, Rules of Law, offers an unvarnished look at national legal affairs and the political dimensions of the law at a moment when the two are inextricably linked. The Trump administration's trade war has prompted chaos and countermeasures across the globe, but a potent counterattack has emerged in the courts in recent weeks — and in the long run, it could fatally undermine President Donald Trump's unprecedented global tariff regime. California Gov. Gavin Newsom was the latest to join the fray with a lawsuit in federal court in California, a development that has already prompted public wrangling between Newsom and the administration. He follows plaintiffs in at least three separate federal suits — by members of the Blackfeet Nation in Montana, the New Civil Liberties Alliance in Florida and the Liberty Justice Center in the U.S. Court of International Trade. All three cases take direct aim at the Trump administration's reliance on the once-obscure International Economic Emergency Powers Act. The challenges were inevitable, but they are also strong on the merits — drawing directly on the interpretive tools and legal doctrines frequently embraced by the conservative justices on the Supreme Court. The question is whether the courts — including perhaps the Supreme Court itself — will agree, or whether they will blink in the face of the economic and diplomatic turmoil that Trump has unleashed. In fact, Trump may have unintentionally created his best legal argument by upending the global economy: that the courts should be wary of interfering in the president's handling of international affairs given the complexity and high stakes of the trade war now playing out. Lawyers challenging the administration's use of the IEEPA to impose tariffs say they are optimistic about their chances. 'This is an enormous usurpation of legislative power by the executive and an abuse of emergency powers,' Ilya Somin, a libertarian law professor at George Mason University and one of the attorneys working on the Liberty Justice Center's case, told me. 'If this were to get to the Supreme Court and the case were to be decided on the merits, as opposed to some technical procedural issue, I think we have a good chance of getting the five votes that we need,' he added. On Friday, the Liberty Justice Center filed a motion seeking a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction that would block Trump's tariffs. The legal case against the tariffs is straightforward. The plaintiffs in the four cases to date frame their complaints slightly differently, but they generally boil down to a handful of arguments. First, the Constitution gives Congress the authority to tax and impose tariffs. Congress has delegated that authority to the executive branch in a handful of trade laws passed over the course of the last century, but the president's power in this area is a function of the particular language contained in those statutes. (The likely reason that Trump invoked IEEPA is that, unlike the more commonly invoked trade laws, IEEPA does not require administrative investigations or consultations with Congress.) Second, the relevant provision of the IEEPA contains a bunch of words, but none of those words is 'tariffs' or 'taxes.' Indeed, no president before Trump has ever used the IEEPA to impose tariffs. The law has typically been deployed to impose economic sanctions, such as prohibitions on transactions with designated foreign governments or businesses. In theory, these facts should resonate with the Republican appointees on the court, who typically hold themselves out as committed textualists, eager to adhere only to the words on the page. Third, even if the IEEPA granted the president the authority to impose tariffs, there are no actual 'emergencies' here that would support them (though we will return to this notion). The law authorizes the president to act when there is 'an unusual and extraordinary threat … to the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States,' and the Trump administration has claimed that there are several different emergencies. They include the opioid crisis and illegal immigration, which Trump has invoked to support tariffs against Canada, Mexico and China. To support other global tariffs, Trump has claimed that the country's 'trade deficits' constitute the emergency. At least as a factual matter, credible independent analysts have generally rejected these claims. Take the country's trade deficits. 'They're not actually harmful any more than it's somehow harmful if I have a trade deficit with my local supermarket,' Somin said. 'I buy a lot of things from them, but they virtually never buy anything from me.' Fourth, as the California complaint correctly notes, IEEPA was passed as part of an effort in the 1970s to limit the president's emergency economic powers. Congress did not intend to expand the president's powers or to give him carte blanche to overhaul the global trading system. That fact may not move the Republican appointees on the Supreme Court if the issue gets to them — they generally oppose the use of legislative history in statutory interpretation — but it is likely to prove relevant to the three Democratic appointees. Most importantly, the complaints to varying degrees draw on two doctrines that the Republican appointees have developed and embraced in recent years — both of which should weigh heavily against the Trump administration's position. In particular, the 'nondelegation doctrine' championed by conservatives holds that Congress cannot delegate its lawmaking powers to other bodies, including the executive branch. Five of the Republican appointees on the court have signaled that they are interested in deploying this theory more aggressively in the coming months. Liberals have good reason to fear that would severely constrain Congress and administrative agencies, but in this particular case, it would suggest that Trump's use of tariffs is unconstitutional. The Republican appointees on the court have also deployed the 'major questions doctrine' in recent years to nullify executive actions that exceed an undefined threshold of 'economic and political significance.' In those situations, the conservative justices have held that there must be a clear delegation of authority from Congress on the matter; otherwise, the president has overstepped. That clear delegation does not exist here, and there is little question that Trump's tariffs carry extraordinary 'economic and political significance.' When the court threw out Joe Biden's student-loan forgiveness plan, the conservative justices cited a budget model from the University of Pennsylvania estimating that the program would cost taxpayers around $500 billion. As for Trump's tariffs? A model from Yale University estimates that they will increase inflation, result in nearly 800,000 lost jobs and shrink the American economy by roughly $180 billion a year. Those are just the economic effects. The various geopolitical shifts, including China making new moves on the global stage, have made it clear that Trump's tariffs also carry incredible 'political significance.' It is possible that the challengers in these cases could all lose in the lower courts or that the administration could lose and choose not to take it all the way to the Supreme Court. But if the case does end up before the Supreme Court, the conservative justices will be in a very tricky bind. 'One of the advantages of being a Supreme Court justice is you can do what you want,' Somin observed, 'but if they were to rule against us on this, it would look like a deep contradiction in their position, and it would be at odds with things they have done in other cases.' That may not stop them, particularly given the Republican appointees' apparent willingness to abandon their theoretical commitments to textualism and originalism when they would dictate an outcome that they might not like. We saw this last year when the 6-3 conservative majority gave Trump a stunning victory in his bid for criminal immunity that had no credible basis in the Constitution's text or the framers' expectations when they wrote it. The Supreme Court might also side with the Trump administration given that the court is generally deferential to the president's handling of foreign policy and his assessment of what constitutes a national emergency. We may not have had any national emergencies before Trump returned to office, but ironically, his tariffs may themselves have caused a global emergency — one that could give the justices reason to pause before coming in against the president in a way that could now severely constrain his powers on the global stage and diminish his international diplomatic standing. As the lawsuits against Trump's tariffs have slowly gained steam, one question has nagged at some in trade and legal circles: Why haven't more businesses challenged the tariffs in court? Notably, the powerful U.S. Chamber of Commerce will not be joining the lawsuits, according to a POLITICO report. Perhaps businesses and trade groups don't think the legal strategy will work. Perhaps they want to avoid a public fight with the Trump administration and believe they can lobby the administration for changes and exemptions that would serve their specific interests. Regardless, it is a risky approach, and it may have helped pave the road to where we find ourselves now. After all, Trump first made clear his intention to use IEEPA two months before 'Liberation Day,' back when he was still focused on tariffs targeting Canada, Mexico and China. It is impossible to know for sure what would have happened if the business community had mounted a swift legal challenge in the courts, but perhaps it would have drawn further attention to this issue and shifted some of the political dynamics on Capitol Hill, where most Republicans have backed Trump's tariffs, either enthusiastically or begrudgingly. That might be particularly true if someone had managed to secure a preliminary ruling in their favor that called into question the scope of Trump's power under IEEPA. Instead, nothing happened. At the moment, it is unclear how this all ends. Maybe Trump will eventually back off after he can claim that he secured some new trade agreements, but the challenges in the courts are now way behind, and the consequences of the administration's haphazard tariff regime will continue to unfold as these lawsuits move forward. The economic and political effects, both domestically and internationally, could prove irreversible by the time a case ever gets to the Supreme Court. But if that day arrives, the Republican appointees on the court will once again face a crucial and recurring question — one with profound legal and political ramifications: Do they really mean what they say?
Politico
20-02-2025
- Business
- Politico
Trump Is Making It Harder for the Supreme Court to Side With Him
The Trump administration is expecting legal challenges and hopes that they can change longstanding principles of constitutional law with the assistance of a Supreme Court stacked in Republicans' favor. | Roberto Schmidt/AFP via Getty Images Ankush Khardori is a senior writer for POLITICO Magazine and a former federal prosecutor at the Department of Justice, where he specialized in financial fraud and white-collar crime. He has also worked in the private sector on complex commercial litigation and white-collar corporate defense. His column, Rules of Law, offers an unvarnished look at national legal affairs and the political dimensions of the law at a moment when the two are inextricably linked. President Donald Trump has embarked on the most ambitious and wide-ranging effort to change the country's constitutional system in at least half a century. He may well get there — but the way he's been going about it is undermining his own chances of success. Trump's list of dramatic executive actions grows by the day — the massive spending freeze, the widespread firings within the federal government, the decision to ignore various laws, not to mention the work of Elon Musk's DOGE, which has neutered multiple federal agencies. All of these moves have two things in common. They all appear to be illegal under laws that Congress has passed, and they all reflect a bid to dramatically expand the power of the presidency and significantly diminish the power of Congress. The apparent violations of federal law are a feature, not a bug, of the effort. The Trump administration is expecting legal challenges and hopes that they can change longstanding principles of constitutional law with the assistance of a Supreme Court that is stacked in favor of Republicans after decades of conservative activism and political hardball. The strategy, at least in its broad strokes, makes sense if you want to change the law or move it in a different direction. When the dust finally settles, Trump may get at least some of what he wants — maybe even a lot of it — once the Supreme Court weighs in. But as with all things Trump, he is both his best advocate and worst enemy. The Trump administration may have made a conscious political decision to engage in 'shock and awe,' but it has undermined its own legal agenda by proceeding too aggressively, too quickly and too haphazardly. For instance, Trump has been operating without a fully staffed Justice Department, and it has shown up in the form of serious mistakes in court proceedings. To execute his plan, he has been relying on Musk, a volatile force who has already made comments that undercut the administration's legal rationale and effectively concede the absence of any meaningful legal process in their review. And all the while, Trump's moves have been deeply controversial while fueling tangible upheaval in the federal government and American society, which should ultimately make it tougher for the Supreme Court to rule in his favor without attracting harsh scrutiny. For the sake of his own agenda, he would be smart to slow down a little, to improve the quality of his administration's lawyering and to take his lumps in the lower courts as they come without members of his administration implying, among other things, that they are free to ignore court orders. It's worth laying out exactly how some of Trump's sweeping array of executive actions run up against current constitutional hurdles and how they might be received by the Supreme Court. First are the firings of high-level officials in the executive branch, including the dismissals of more than a dozen inspectors general, the head of the Office of Special Counsel and members of several different independent agencies whose members cannot be removed under federal law except in limited circumstances. These moves reflect a particularly aggressive version of the so-called unitary executive theory, a conservative legal theory that posits that the president has the constitutional power to fire officials in the executive branch at will, irrespective of any limitations that Congress has specified in the law. The theory is based on the presidential ' vesting clause ' in the Constitution, but it cannot be reconciled with the Supreme Court's 1935 decision in Humphrey's Executor v. United States, which affirmed Congress' constitutional authority to insulate members of independent agencies like the Federal Trade Commission from at-will removal. Conservatives have been angling for the Supreme Court to overturn Humphrey's Executor for years, but if it does, the upshot is that every agency could undergo a wholesale, partisan reconstruction any time a new president enters office. That means private parties (including businesses) would not be able to assume any meaningful long-term regulatory stability in areas that span the American economy and society, which could give some conservative justices pause. The second category concerns Trump's effort to seize Congress' spending power in order to allow him to unilaterally determine how Americans' taxpayer dollars are spent, irrespective of what elected officials in Congress may have specified in federal appropriations measures. There are several constitutional problems with these moves. Most notably, it is Congress that holds the power to make laws, and it is Congress that holds the power to tax and spend. Congress has historically been allowed to delegate much of this authority to the executive branch, but there is no meaningful legal support for the notion that the president can unilaterally make these decisions for himself or that he can wholly disregard the laws that Congress has passed. Notably, Trump's position cannot be reconciled with a decision that the Supreme Court handed down against President Bill Clinton that invalidated even a congressionally authorized line-item veto. The majority in that case, which included Justice Clarence Thomas, observed that there 'is no provision in the Constitution that authorizes the President to enact, to amend, or to repeal statutes.' But that, in effect, is the power that Trump has claimed. A third category, though one that has received much less attention, involves the administration's effort to increase the federal government's power over state and local government officials. At the moment, you can slot into this category the Justice Department's lawsuits against Illinois and New York over so-called sanctuary laws, which, according to the administration's allegations, impede the federal government's efforts to deport undocumented immigrants. (You could also argue that the Trump administration's co-opting of New York City Mayor Eric Adams — giving him an unwarranted reprieve on criminal charges in apparent exchange for his cooperation with the Trump administration's deportation efforts — ought to fit into this category, though there is likely no judicial remedy for that.) The Supreme Court has historically looked askance at efforts to 'commandeer' state and local governments for federal purposes, particularly given the principle of dual federalism that is reflected in the structure of the Constitution. Every Republican appointee on the court in 2018 affirmed this so-called anticommandeering rule, though it is unclear if the justices will see things in the same way in the immigration context. Trump and his team have eschewed a traditional, incrementalist approach to litigating, opting instead for a quicker and more aggressive effort that moves simultaneously on multiple fronts. But that incremental approach, as a strategic matter, has considerable benefits: It makes it harder for the country to detect (and object to) major constitutional developments that more typically occur over relatively long stretches of time. Trump's legal campaign effectively presents the country and the court with the question of whether the president has power akin to a monarch. There is no credible support for this claim in the country's history or in its law — not least because the country was founded in order to reject precisely that type of imperial authority. In theory, this should make it harder for the Republican appointees on the court to rubber-stamp Trump and his administration's actions. Since the overturning of Roe v. Wade in 2022, the court's public approval has hovered near all-time lows, and signing off on major revisions to our constitutional system is not likely to help matters. Chief Justice John Roberts, who seems to care about his public standing and legacy, risks becoming one of the most controversial and widely criticized chief justices in the court's 235-year history, so it is not hard to imagine this all being too much for him or, say, Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who is seen as another potential swing vote on these issues. Both of them could align in some cases with the Democratic appointees to form a 5-4 majority against some of Trump's moves. It is also one thing to advance an aggressive theory of executive power on paper and in court, where you can rely on constitutional abstractions, but an entirely different matter when dealing in the real world. That has been one effect of the careless manner in which the Trump administration has proceeded, as well as its decision to outsource much of the work to Musk, who appears to have little understanding of the federal budget, or the government functions and agencies that he has thrown into chaos. Musk is not a good public representative on these issues. White House officials are reportedly growing frustrated with him, and a recent poll reported that only 13 percent of Americans want him to have 'a lot' of influence in the Trump administration. But his role is not just a potential political problem for the White House; it's a legal one. When Musk speaks, he says false and reckless things. And his claim that he can ' delete entire agencies ' should figure prominently in the litigation over Trump's authority to restructure federal agencies given it directly conflicts with the Supreme Court's ruling in the line-item veto case. Trump and Musk could have achieved all of the same objectives by proceeding more incrementally — by spending, say, a month at each agency in order to develop at least nominally credible and legally sturdy rationales for what they are doing. What has emerged instead looks like politically motivated and arbitrary decision-making that has led to a stream of stories in recent days about how the Trump administration's work may harm everyday Americans, including many Republican districts, in areas that run the gamut from health care to cybersecurity to national security and even air travel safety. Will the Supreme Court's Republican appointees all ignore this real-world tumult when the legal challenges reach them? Only two of them need to side with the Democratic appointees in order to thwart or constrain the enterprise, which would effectively result in the end of the federal regulatory regime as we have known it since the New Deal. There have been tactical failures as well. Trump set all of this off without having his Justice Department leadership in place. He still does not have a confirmed solicitor general or deputy attorney general, but if you wanted to pursue a litigation portfolio that is this aggressive, you would ideally have your appointees in place and firing on all cylinders. There have also been a series of missteps on the part of the Justice Department lawyers defending Trump's actions, who have shown up to court proceedings providing inaccurate information to judges that they have had to walk back — and at times without even knowing what they are actually defending. This has several effects: It undermines the Justice Department's credibility in court, underscores the haphazard and heavy-handed nature of what Trump and Musk are doing and also suggests a disdain for both the legal process and the judiciary. That tends to rub judges the wrong way, compounds the potential violations of federal law and makes it easier for judges to issue injunctions. Last but not least, Trump has coupled these legal maneuvers with a decision to effectively pick and choose which laws to enforce based on his personal and political preferences, be they the TikTok ban or the foreign anti-bribery statute that he has hated for years but is still very much on the books. All of this underscores the breadth of Trump's ambition. It is not difficult to imagine a more effective litigation strategy even now for Trump. He should roll out further executive orders in a seemingly less arbitrary manner; if there are more laws that Trump refuses to enforce, he should try to create some semblance of a credible legal process around the decision; and his administration should stop showing disdain for lower court judges. All of this demonstrates the unworkability of the Trump administration's theories when taken as a whole. There is no question that the volume and intensity of Trump's efforts to greatly expand his power present the country — and the courts — with a constitutional power grab that has almost no precedent in American history.
