At one point, he said “as to this issue”, and that would have been a better way to frame it. It is something that involves interstate commerce and national security. He did talk about the state of emergency, which does affect the issue as well. Although I am not in general agreement with the way the feds have usurped all state roles since Wilson and FDR, it is clear that under Supreme Court precedents the feds can do just about whatever they want vis-a-vis the states. They can take over any role, because interstate commerce has been defined to mean a butterfly’s wings flapping in Idaho. And Congress has given much of its power to the President in emergency and national security.
I don’t agree with that line of cases, but it is the current state of the law, so Trump is for the most part correct as a legal matter.
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Thanks for this excellent analysis.