Teaching Trump
Hopefully the White House can refrain from creating any new constitutional conundrums for a semester.
Hopefully the White House can refrain from creating any new constitutional conundrums for a semester.
The strongest critics of unilateral decisions to attack other countries include Tulsi Gabbard and Bernie Sanders, while Joe Biden thinks anything goes.
Sen. Chuck Grassley and the Senate Finance Committee will debate two bills this fall aimed at restricting presidential authority to impose tariffs without congressional approval.
Even if Trump doesn’t follow through on his bad ideas, the uncertainty is still a drag.
In a testy exchange about immigration, the former vice president argued that Trump alone was the problem.
“It should have been easy for the Court to say goodbye to Auer.”
The ruling upholds a trial court decision holding that the president cannot divert military funds to builds his proposed border wall.
The senator and the president she wants to unseat are determined to have their way, regardless of what the law says.
The decisions expand on the same judge's earlier preliminary ruling holding that the president cannot reallocate military funds to build his border wall.
Today's ruling in Gundy v. United States allows Congress to delegate to the executive broad power to create new criminal offenses. But there is hope the Court might reconsider Gundy in the future.
India, unlike America, lacks checks against the designs of a populist authoritarian.
In a new report, the Treasury Department declares it will begin scrutinizing any nation that runs a bilateral trade imbalance of more than $40 billion with the United States
The United States is currently operating under 32 different national emergencies. This proposal would require Congress approve those declarations within 72 hours, and again after 90 days.
A letter signed by a wide range of scholars with different political and jurisprudential views urges Congress to sue to end illegal US involvement in the Yemen conflict.
Jamelle Bouie's counterintuitive recommendation would effectively eliminate constitutional limits on elected officials, including Trump and every demagogue who follows him.
The decision does not reach the merits of President Trump's attempt to divert military funds to build his border wall.
Free market reformers and authoritarian nationalists battle it out to reshape Brazil.
The symposium includes contributions by 16 legal commentators, including VC bloggers Keith Whittington and myself.
The first court decision on Trump's plan to reallocate federal funds to "build the wall" goes against the administration.
A federal judge rejects the President's attempt to block a Congressional subpoena of his financial records.
Plus: "Offending religious feelings" in Poland, Trump tax returns, the latest "heartbeat bill," Denver's mushroom measure, and more...
The libertarian legal analyst says Trump, like his White House predecessors, has abused executive power in all sorts of ways.
The Fox News legal analyst says the president is abusing executive power.
That's a potentially dangerous combination.
Reason editors discuss Russia, Biden, Moulton (?), and that television show with the dragons.
Forget about Donald Trump and the Mueller report and think about all the little (and not-so-little) people who get crushed by the feds.
The symposium includes contributions by a variety of legal commentators, including fellow VC blogger Keith Whittington and myself.
Extreme partisanship and the desire for power will play as big a role in saving Trump's presidency as his aides did by ignoring his orders.
Donald Trump's rhetoric is breathtakingly authoritarian, but so far he's done less than his predecessors to expand executive power.
Thank Donald Trump for the belated attempt to enforce the Constitution's separation of powers.
How the overwhelming vote against Trump's position could potentially affect the lawsuits challenging the legality of the declaration.
The nation's force mustered in service of the nation's will.
How has residuum theory gotten this all so wrong?
The administration continues to try to impose grant conditions on state and local governments that were never authorized by by Congress. In two new decision, courts continue to rule against them.
Against the Imperial Presidency.
The strongest legal argument against Trump's attempt to use emergency powers to build the wall is that declaring an emergency does not authorize him to spend money and condemn property for that purpose. But he also lacks grounds to declare an emergency in the first place.
Congress seems to have authorized this end run around its spending power. Can it do that?
"Extraordinary conditions do not create or enlarge constitutional power."
Bargaining over policy is supposed to be frustrating. That's a feature, not a bug, of limited government.
My 2015 critique of Presidents Day is, if anything, even more relevant four years later.
A variety of legal experts weigh in on the subject, including me. Most conclude Trump may have the authority to declare an emergency, but not to spend funds and seize property for the wall.
There is no good justification for what the president is doing. Republicans and conservatives need to call him out on it.
Plus: Congress forgets to fund the First Step Act, The New York Times chastises smug politicians over Amazon, and what if the U.S. were 100 city-states?
A summary of the reasons why Trump lacks the power to use emergency powers to build his border wall, and why it would cause great harm and set a dangerous precedent if he did. Other than that, it's a great idea!
The way the travel ban policy has been implemented both before and after the Supreme Court's decision further underscores the magnitude of the Justices' mistake.
The op ed explains why this option is not legal - and why it would set a dangerous precedent if the president succeeded in doing it.
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