Analysis: As Trump team overhauls government, a constitutional crisis looms (Dem talking points)

CNN ^ | February 10, 2025 | Joan Biskupic

[ransomnote]

Vice President JD Vance, Elon Musk and others in the Trump administration are openly challenging the centuries-old power of the nation’s judiciary, foreshadowing a possible constitutional breakdown of American government.

It’s not simply that the new administration has flouted a raft of federal statutes and prompted a flood of legal challenges. It’s that some of Donald Trump’s top advisers have cast doubt on whether rulings on those lawsuits would even constrain the president.

There are signs that some judges’ orders have been disregarded. On Monday, a federal judge in Rhode Island found that the administration has violated the “plain text” of his earlier order unfreezing billions of dollars in federal aid. The judge directed funding to be reinstated to environmental, health and other programs that had been cut off.

In a separate case Monday, in Washington, DC, federal employees told a judge that the administration had failed to reinstate USAID workers who were put on leave.

In fighting the cases, the Justice Department says the president should have the authority to decide how to run the government and that the judges are overreaching.

Chief Justice John Roberts may have presaged the turn of events six weeks ago as he warned at the end of December that “elected officials from across the political spectrum have raised the specter of open disregard for federal court rulings. These dangerous suggestions, however sporadic, must be soundly rejected.”

A commitment to the rule of law and judicial authority is engrained in the American way of life, tracing to the 1789 creation of the three-tiered federal bench.

Historically, the executive branch, even after vigorously fighting a case, has abided by a Supreme Court resolution.

[batazoid]

“Historically, the executive branch, even after vigorously fighting a case, has abided by a Supreme Court resolution.”

Ho Hum. So which Supreme Court ruling has Trump ignored?

[Z28.310]

And you can make bisquick bunny beanies!

[sauropod]

Yup.

[chiller]

re: SC defiance :

Oh yeah.... that was Joe and his student loan forgiveness.

These recent rulings against Trump have come from lower courts judge-shopped by Ds. Some of these rulings are embarrassingly political, void of logic...tantamount to awarding someone keys to their house but denying entry as the case with Bessant at Treasury.

Keep it up...you’re demonstrating daily why DJT’s common sense is in charge

[nathanbedford]

Let's take note of the sleight-of-hand done by CNN here.

The issue before the court is whether the court has the jurisdictional power to control the actions of the executive as established by Article II.

CNN is the selective in what it's tells us. Yes, the Constitution requires the President, "to take care that the laws be faithfully executed" but it fails to tell us that the Constitution also the vests the entire executive power of the United States in one individual person, the President.

In other words, there is no executive power vested in that III courts, nor in the bureaucracy, nor in Congress unilaterally and perhaps not even by duly passed law. Where does jurisdiction in the court come from to regulate the actions of the executive?

The article does not tell us that there is not a single word in the Constitution that vests power in the Article III courts to pass judgment on executive actions - that power was inferred by the court itself and to this day rests on that inference done by Chief Justice Marshall in Marbury vs. Madison. Yes, that inference is firmly embedded in our constitutional law, a common law of the Constitution, as it were.

But part of that common law of the Constitution is the equally embedded admonition that the courts should exercise judicial restraint and strictly refrain from engaging in advice or political quarrels. This means, in effect, that for the judicial branch ever to interfere in the actions of the executive branch the court must find at least a statute or a plain mandate of the Constitution has been violated by The Executive.

The article does not talk to us about what statutes or what constitutional provisions might be alleged to have been violated. Here is the sleight-of-hand: the article then verges on a "what if" speculation about what might occur if the president disobeyed a court order!

Don't forget, these court orders are by way of preliminary injunction, often one done ex parte without an opportunity for the administration to even be heard and perhaps without even notice of the preceding. Preliminary injunctions should issue only if the right to relief is clear and if the harm is irreparable if the injunction is not granted and then only on a temporary basis.

Such an order is issued upon the representations of one side only that are quite likely to be discredited in a plenary hearing. Note, CNN does not tell us the constitutional provision or the statute that gives rise to a clear right to relief, rather, it tells us that that an order was issued and now the question is not whether that order will stand scrutiny but whether the dastardly Trump administration will violate it.

CNN does not tell us about the steep hill those who seek injunctive relief must climb, it does not tell us about the grounds for that relief, it does not tell us about judicial restraint or the deference that must be granted to the executive in carrying out its legitimate constitutional functions. It does not discuss the separation of powers doctrine that limits the authority or jurisdiction of the court to regulate executive actions and, similarly, the limitations in Congress. It does not tell us of the statutes or constitutional provisions allegedly violated.

The article assumes the worst about the Trump administration's potential actions concerning preliminary and quite temporary orders and so distorts the analysis away from relevant facts to indulge speculations.

[Skwor]

They are literally trying to create a false narrative that Trump is disregarding judges and the rule of law hoping they can spin that publicly to take down trump, ultimately with another impeachment.

The judges and dems know these court actions are in massive violation of the constitution, they don’t care. In fact, that is just an added bonus to them as they spit over out country’s laws.

[AZJeep]

It always surprise me that all the elected officials, President, senators and congressmen bow to one, unelected activist judge.

[TalBlack]

“Vice President JD Vance, Elon Musk and others in the Trump administration are openly challenging the centuries-old power of the nation’s judiciary,“

No, the judiciary has never had the power it is now attempting to claim.

[TalBlack]

“So relax and let the process go forward.“…Schlichter.

Yeah, I guess, but I just wish I hadn’t heard that one so many times before.

[FlingWingFlyer]

America has had hundreds of “constitutional crisis’s and we’re as strong as ever. We survived them all. The RATS can blow that drama queen stuff out their ying yangs. Liberty and Freedom causes “constitutional crisis’s. Without them, we’d be just be another south of the border Marxist crap hole taken siesta all day and run by baldheaded chickenpluckers like Airheader Pressley. She thinks she a star in a new Star Trek series. Geez. What an airhead.

[Organic Panic]

Every time there is a republicans the dems scream,”Constitutional crisis.” Their playbook is old. It doesn’t work anymore. They lost the media monopoly that protects them.

[eyeamok]

judicial authority?

They don’t believe in the Costitution or the Enumerated SEPARATE BUT EQUAL branches of Government/ The judiciary has no Authority over executive branch decisions.

[vivenne]

Joan: Please define “Constitutional Crisis”. Thank you.

[lgjhn23]

The communist RATs are in and of themselves a “Constitutional crisis”.
Thieving, no-good, anti-American SOBs, they are.

[Dr. Franklin]

CJ Roberts needs to reign in his black robed tyrants soon or he and his cohort may find themselves in GITMO. Nowhere in the U.S. Constitution does it state that judges make law or can micromanage POTUS and the executive branch whenever and however they want. People are getting quite fed up with the tyranny of the judges, and Trump is confident that he can win cases eventually at SCOTUS. However, things can change. The Anti-Federalist were most concerned about the federal judiciary. A historical analysis of what courts were and did before the U.S. Constitution and what they became afterwards proves the Anti-Federalist were right. Something is coming down the road and Roberts failure to discipline his underlings will not go unnoticed. Service during “good behavior” in office requires a better check than the drastic rememdy of impeachment, which at the time of the founding of the U.S. Constitution’s scheme of government was limited to criminal conduct of a judge.