Discussion: House Dems' Measure To Block Trump Emergency Sets Up Constitutional Clash

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Yes, yes we can!

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The smart move here would be to hold extensive public hearings on the unreality of the need for the wall, its galactic pricetag, its unbuildabilty, and its uselessness even if it could be built.

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Any Trump veto would likely be sustained

Who knew that enough Guardians Of Predators would vote to protect Dear Leader from that pesky Constitution.

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Pelosi wrote that the Republican president’s “decision to go outside the bounds of the law to try to get what he failed to achieve in the constitutional legislative process violates the Constitution and must be terminated.”

How about starting impeachment to terminate Trump’s presidency, Speaker Pelosi?

Do your job.

Impeachment Now!

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What about Mitch’s promise to support the national emergency? Is he really going to go to bat for this guy?

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“Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., is only a reluctant supporter of Trump on the topic.“

I call B.S.

Yertle the Turtle is even helping Don the Con strategize being able to undermine the Constitution’s separation of powers by allowing a fake emergency be used to steal taxpayer money appropriated by Congress for other purposes. McConnell has zero respect for our system of government. He’s the worst of the worst.

Please stop saying McConnell isn’t a big part of the problem. He is.

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I don’t like this approach. Declaring it “terminated” smacks of actually trying to exercise the executive power of determining whether something is a national emergency. Much better would be a mandate that “all monies collected by the administration pursuant to Clowny McDipshit’s arbitrary and capricious declaration of a national emergency are hereby appropriated and reallocated as follows…” He can have his stupid declaration all he wants, and congress can render it a hollow, abstract gesture of impotent white nationalist butthurt. Meanwhile, Dems can snidely thank him for finding funding for some things that matter.

Granted, I’m not fully up on the exact mechanics of the national emergency statutes, which may put this in a posture that makes simply declaring the emergency terminated an effective move, but I would worry that the attack would then be on those statutes themselves, arguing that they are invalid encroachments on executive power and discretion.

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The casual nature of AP…mindlessly writing about destroying the relation of the Three Branches of Government. Especially about the obligation to inform the public about real issues.

Until AP becomes Trump Network

Any Millennial whose idea of “government” is the last episode of NCIS is severely un-informed by this bastardization of the Fourth Estate (which is AP) blithely cataloging…step by step…the post 2016 Regression of the United States of America into Russia-West.

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he he …

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Kinda how it’s turning out anyway.

https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/1098922854932918275

ETA. Deutschebank?

ETA to the ETA

Some on Capitol Hill say they are bracing for another possibility: that the president could move money as he wishes in the Pentagon budget and just disregard the traditional requirement that a president must get congressional approval for shifting sizable amounts of money from one account to another. — Roll Call

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There are two issues: dealing with Trump and changing the law. The idea behind giving the president emergency powers is so that in a real emergency he can act quickly in a way that a most legislators would support. The condition for overriding his action should be much lower, at MOST 50% of both houses, but I think 50% of one house, or even somewhat lower should be enough.

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The GOPee-controlled Senate will not buck tRump. When it’s clear the Senate will not vote to block tRump, Collins will vote with the Democrats. Haven’t we been down this road before?

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OT – I never thought I’d say this…but ALL HAIL NEW JERSEY!

From the article:

The State Senate passed a bill on Thursday that would require presidential and vice presidential candidates to release their tax returns for the previous five years—at least 50 days before the general election—in order to qualify to have their names on the ballot. The bill says that they would have to file copies with the Division of Elections in the Department of State, and also consent to having them made public. The Division of Elections would then post them online within seven days of receiving them. The bill does allow for redactions to be made, where the Division and State Attorney General deem appropriate.

The bill, known as S-119, also aims to block a loophole by preventing the state’s electors from going off on their own and voting for someone who doesn’t comply.

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Or the more common term - constitutional.

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Terminate! with extreme prejudice… Gotta love that mindset. Lead on Nancy!

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This is a good move. The vote itself can be used as evidence of Congress’ view that the national emergency declaration is illegitimate. The debate transcripts will highlight Trump’s own words and provide historical context that this was about politics and about circumventing Congress, not a true emergency. More importantly, the discussion will highlight to the court that Congress considered the very issues raised by the President, debated it, arrived at a compromise solution, voted it out and passed it into a law which Trump signed. So this really isn’t about Trump v Congress. This is about Trump v Trump. He signed that law. Therefore, he admitted that whatever ‘emergency’ existed was adequately addressed in Congress by his own admission. He cannot therefore go around Congress on a matter on which it has spoken and to which he agreed. There was no new emergency that arose since the bill’s passage to justify what Trump did.

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Bernie would get caught up in that too, if I recall correctly. Warren has already released hers, to her credit.

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Apparently, once the Congress gives the executive the money, it can be reprogrammed, but it appears that going back to Congress is indeed traditional. I would imagine Pelosi would have to file suit and that she would have to claim that Trump is misappropriating funds (misfeasance, malfeasance, whatever). It would end up at SCOTUS many of whom love them some unitarian executives.

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