You're right, but it's not just at the federal level, either. I hear things all the time like "we'll try it, and maybe the courts will stop us." And it's utterly inappropriate. You, the legislator, have to consider it's constitutional and decide that it is, otherwise you can't vote for it.
also the court keeps saying (and imo correctly) that in general disputes between congress and the executive branch are not well handled by the court, but by, y'know, the congress asserting itself. If it cannot or will not, those powers atrophy
Yeah - I think these are part and parcel of the same problem. Many legislators don't really see themselves as being there to do stuff, but rather to make other people do stuff.
Like I hate to keep coming back to it, but in the limit, the constitutional remedy for impoundment and presidential misconduct is impeachment, not litigation. Folks, but *especially* congressfolks need to beat this idea that "courts will save us" out of their vocabulary. It is *your* job.
The tediously slow impeachment process, yet a third time, isn't going to erase our deeply embedded fascism problem. Americans are going to have to get out of their comfort zone and stand up, in the millions, now. Fortunately it's happening, but the movement must grow quickly.
I'm tired of "Lazyboy recliner" Democrats who are too LAZY to even get arrested for acts of civil disobedience.
Guess what? During the Civil Rights movement, we had even smaller numbers of supporters in Congress... But they KNEW what to do.
And weren't afraid to go to JAIL.
That's true. They are hoping the courts will do their job for them so they can sit back and play innocent - avoid blowback. It is a cowardly, self-serving thing to do.
I think Congress should at least impeach Musk. It will finally settle the superposition he seems to live in on being someone appointed by POTUS or not. And potentially solve the problem by removing his ass.
I think they should introduce articles of impeachment against the president at the start of every sitting day and when it is voted down, move to adjourn, and otherwise vote no on everything else.
But Pwnallthethings, that might cause some wealthy divorced gen-Xer in the New York Times to write a sneering op-ed asking "Is this the childish way the Democratic Party wants to behave? They won't attract many centrists to their cause with that sort of stunt"
Speaking as a centrist – well, a center-right type who bolted the GOP in 2016 and never looked back, which is close enough – I'd be absolutely delighted if the Dems did this.
Not that that would keep the NYT columnist from claiming people like me don't exist, of course...
A boy can dream, I guess. 😺
[and now back to my fantasy of the senile decayed yam and his posse imprisoned by concertina wire in a FEMA trailer encampment in a muddy, mosquito-infested rural swamp lot in Mississippi, sitting on the stoops in their orange jumpsuits and ankle monitor bling.]
Omfg. He’s literally saying - as Congress - they could solve this crisis and they haven’t.
Glad we agree?!#?!#*?!
But the Constitution isn’t a self-executing document. He can be smug and self-satisfied on TV all day, but it’s still going to be his job to do something. Jfc.
Correct. That’s what the Constitution provides along with possible incremental steps as set out in my last book on presidential lies. But some many aspects of our Constitution appear to be on hold as Congress abdicates.
As much as I agree with this statement, what then is the legal remedy when the majority is bought and paid for Republicans who will not even entertain the notion of impeachment? Are we simply out of remedies unless or until a new election changes the majorities?
The legal remedy for a president doing high crimes against the constitution is impeachment, and if Congress is unwilling to remove him, then he continues in office until they change their mind about that or until he is elected out.
I'm now less sanguine that courts will show their spines. They must be given a chance to beat Trump's over-reach back. It's their job per our Constitutional order. I doubt impeachment could be had over impoundment. It's not a crime. the Founders chose against impeaching for mere malfeasance.
Yeah, that's not going to happen. At least not right now. Rs are terrified of Trump's wrath. Tillis was going to vote No on Hegseth but got cold feet at the last minute. We'll see what happens with the budget bill - there could be a miracle - they've been hearing from their voters.
17 Republicans voted to impeach Trump in 2021. In a 50-50 senate after Trump had left office and they expected him to never return, 7 R senators voted to impeach him anyway. R control of congress makes it hard, but folks should not resign themselves to the idea it is impossible, or it will be.
And I get that impeachment is impossible or whatever at this point but there are literally at least six things trump should be impeached for at this point. Why not have all of them filed so when unemployment spikes to 20% people are saying "wait so can we fix this by removing him?"
This entire thing exposes how selfish the political apparatus is. The only reason elected officials aren't going nuclear is they want to keep friends and influence so they can make money. If they had ANY empathy or sense of duty they would be actively leading a revolution, but they don't.
Republicans need to remember they took an oath to defend the constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Trump is a domestic enemy. If you have a Republican rep, call, email, send physical letters. Demonstrate outside their local office. Let them know how you feel in no uncertain terms.
Congresscritters mostly see their job entirely as fundraising and getting re-elected, rubber-stamping whatever their President and/or Partly leaders tell them to, so they don't get Primary-ed in their Gerrymandered districts. Except for a few with the ambition to want to be Party Leaders or POTUS.
The rest just want to be re-elected until old enough to retire with an extremely fat pension and enough contacts for a second career as a lobbyist or Corporate Board Member. And the surest way to lose re-election is to vote to impeach your own Party's President. Traitors and RINOs lose primaries.
And if a President were ever to be actually impeached and convicted, being members his party will be toxic enough to risk flipping even fairly safely Gerrymandered districts. Even for, perhaps *especially* for, those with the courage of convictions to vote against him.
*Feels like* the judiciary should have more say, or otherwise have some safeguard. Having a simple majority come in and disregard *the last Congress'* appropriations, in collusion with the president, sure sounds both unconstitutional and simple to enact.
President: I am the law
Congress: why wont someone do something
Court: the delegated institution to do the something is you
Congress: why is the court so mean to me, I am just a smol bean
Congress: will you please solve my political question, politics is too hard for me
Court: No, here are all the things you could do, but complaining to the court isn't one of them
Congress: oh well we did everything we could
Court: CAN YOU READ OMFG
Like I don't want to be mean, but how many elected members of congress do you think have actually read the opinion in Trump v US? Or Anderson? Or hell, why not, the Project 2025 document?
At the time of the Mueller Report, only the Republicans who went on record as having read the Mueller Report voted for impeachment. The rest claimed they didn't read the Mueller Report and took Bill Barr's word for it.
To be fair, Trump v Anderson and Trump v US aren't cases in which Congress gave up powers, and are asking for a judicial solution, but rather cases in which the Supreme Court just struck out parts of the constitution because they were too unfavorable to Trump/Republicans.
🤣😆🤣😆 'smol bean'. 🫘 Smol and beans, as in foot pads, makes me think of cats. So now in my mind Congress is a cat, so antisocial, but that is also self pitying.
Congress ceding power to the president because it is afraid of using it is an underexplored dynamic in modern politics. It’s really weird and I don’t fully understand it tbh.
Oh my GOD people, stop it with this Congress are cowards thing. The Republican majorities in both houses actively support fascism, they’re not cowards, they’re just embarrassed to articulate their true beliefs to their social peers because they self consciously know they’re doing evil.
Roberts Court: Magna Carta has nothing to say about notice-and-comment rulemaking so we must assume the Framers intended the President to have the same powers as the Crown in the reign of King John
Where are the Republicans? The Republicans in Congress, in addition to being corrupt, are cowards and hacks. They are merely servants to Trump and the billionaires. Spineless minions! Shameful and disgraceful! We must loudly speak out! Every single Republican in Congress must be voted out!
The fact that it’s been leaking that Republican members of Congress are afraid to go against rump in fear of retaliation tells it all. Republicans, as always, are spineless cowards that fall in line to those that tug the leash hard enough. It’ll only take about three to break ranks to fix this.
A thought-experiment for you: you are a republican elected official who is being threatened
Question 1) Why are you being threatened?
Question 2) Why do you leak that fact?
Question 3) Do you want it to end?
Question 4) Are there no circumstances you are a yes on impeachment?
(Yes, yes: Collins and Murkowski are "concerned": we all know how much that matters; the rest of the majorities are "unaware" of what Trump's doing or justifying it.)
This is how I got to the conclusion that the proximate cause for the current situation is that members of Congress started to understand themselves as members of a political party first and members of a branch of government second
Which is borne out when you look at all of the massive legislation that followed Nixon and Watergate...you can't even call what followed Jan 6 a wet fart because they couldn't even make a fart
It's the kind of thing that when you juxtapose it against what the Framers designed, you realize that the constitutional system may very likely have reached its expiration date
The question I want to see people answered is if Elon Musk can be impeached and prevented from holding any office under the United States. Impeachment is broken (by GOP having 33+ votes), but maybe we can get some GOP Senators to hate Elon.
It is still beyond belief that they didn’t relish this job on Jan. 7. Shows they never had the JD right, and amazingly learned nothing from that world-historical fuckup
At this point, the hope for a good outcome for democracy rests on Democrats winning the 2026 and 2028 elections, hopefully by wide margins, and the economy being reasonably stable across the second Trump administration.
All the other paths involve the military being involved in serious shit.
Exactly. Trump is a fascist dictator now because Congress didn't do their jobs as specified in the Constitution. This is especially true for Republicans but also for Democrats who didn't take the threat of Trump seriously.
You make this whole argument for why Congress actually matters, Congress has to exercise their power. But every word of it applies to the courts too. They limit the President in small and large ways
Impeachment or nothing is like having capital punishment or nothing
You're right, but most of them see their jobs as call time (fundraising), casting votes, doing committee work, and constituent service. They (or the leadership) never signed up for resolving constitutional crises. Not defending them, I just wonder if any of them are cut out for the *current* job…
There is quite a bit you could do...if you carried the majority with you. Considering MTG, any moron can hold the job as Rep. So people, myself included, should consider if they could be that moron. FYI, you only need 500 signatures to run as an independent in Texas as a Congressional Rep.
Because there's no hope of it succeeding. I'm fine with the argument that the dems are not doing enough, but it's not clear that anything they could do would have any significant impact.
The courts are more capable of being a solution than impeachment. They probably won't here because of the makeup of the Supreme Court, but it's not an absurd's system where they are.
I hear you, and also when Mueller said as much in writing and congressional testimony, the consensus reaction was 'oh nothing to see here, it was all BS' instead of the clear call for congressional action that it was
The challenge with impeachment lies in the fact that Republicans hold the majority in both the House and the Senate. Consequently, impeachment is unlikely to occur unless we regain the majority in both chambers during the upcoming midterms.
Republicans have abandoned their constitutionalist principles and are willing to do anything. Trump instructs them to take even extreme actions, disregarding the constitution they will do so!
He's going to ignore the courts. Him and Vance and the co-president have already said so. If they say something incredibly insane believe them. This administration isn't going to last 4 years. It's either going to get so bad he's impeached or it will never end. I guess I'm cheering for option 1?
That only works with a Congress interested in the constitution. The current republicans are so afraid of death threats from the alt-right militias that they won’t do anything against Trump.
Yeah, but impeachment was tried twice, and both resulted in failure. And since the GOP won't do their job, the courts are now only legal options to fix some of this.
So you suggest that a bout of insanity will remedy this situation? This isn't a kid learning to play the piano. This is just a citizen that realizes tackling the source problems would be more fruitful than useless performative action.
Also, I may be confused, but I thought the testing of laws was against the constitution. The constitution was the measure and the tested laws needed to measure up to it. Not the other way around. A constitution that is as strong as a well cooked noodle is not a constitution.
We’ve got some profoundly stupid people at the top who think this sort of talk makes them sound hard. The problem is, they’re being taken seriously instead of being met with amused incredulity. Ballooning egos seriously needing a needle.
How does the party out of power impeach. (Let alone convict since this is a senator speaking). Everyone says “do what Mitch did!”). Mitch had the majority for the majority of Obamas tenure. When he didn’t he was powerless to stop ACA and (too small) stimulus. What are we even doing here
I have a hard time comparing the two situations because I don’t know their system at all? Do they also have a legislative branch that was majority party same as the president?
Bc the party in power chose to. Some day we’re going to get past Dem beating for things solely within the power of the gop. “Withhold consent!” What. Are. We. Doing. The Dems are relatively powerless aside from the bully pulpit for two years. Can we stop bashing them?
I mean, the party in power didn't choose to. That's sort of the thing. The first impeachment of Yoon *failed*. They all walked out of the vote. The opposition did it again, and said they would reintroduce it every week until it succeeded. It was that, plus mass-protests, that got the required votes
The way to do it is by making sure that GOP congresspeople know if they don’t stop it, they will get the blame for enabling this government, and threatening to make the word ‘Republican’ so electorally toxic that they have to hit the eject button.
They don't, of course. Congressional Republicans do.
I wouldn't assume this is impossible. Not because they care if Donald golfs away his term, or exceeds his authority; they do not. But because everyone hates Elon, including Republican constituents and voters.
And NO, to any #ConflictBots thinking about responding to that with unAmerican voter suppression tripe, if all you have to offer as a comment is cynicism, I’m not interested in hearing you, and you will be blocked ASAP.
I lecture/teach on authoritarianism in history. I guarantee — now that the guardrails are off, the judiciary stacked, and no political opposition in place ('we are concerned' isn't close) — there's nothing to make it work.
Happens every time. Very Bad Things are falling into place to happen.
Then we still fight. We start making commerce difficult. We block federal LE from their raids. If they come with weapons and kick in our doors, we fight with what's at hand.
Impeachment will never pass with this congress, definitely not conviction. That will have to wait at least 2 years, we don't have 2 years. We might have 2 months. At least litigation is slowing the process of completely devolving into fascism.
Comments
Guess what? During the Civil Rights movement, we had even smaller numbers of supporters in Congress... But they KNEW what to do.
And weren't afraid to go to JAIL.
Seriously
Not that that would keep the NYT columnist from claiming people like me don't exist, of course...
it is deranged but fuck everyone, I’m right
[and now back to my fantasy of the senile decayed yam and his posse imprisoned by concertina wire in a FEMA trailer encampment in a muddy, mosquito-infested rural swamp lot in Mississippi, sitting on the stoops in their orange jumpsuits and ankle monitor bling.]
Glad we agree?!#?!#*?!
But the Constitution isn’t a self-executing document. He can be smug and self-satisfied on TV all day, but it’s still going to be his job to do something. Jfc.
You think an impeachment resolution has any chance?
#Ceaușescu
But the actual way you win GOP votes is by telling their constituents they suck loudly and consistently.
Courts: LOL immune!
McConnell: well shucks
Congress: why wont someone do something
Court: the delegated institution to do the something is you
Congress: why is the court so mean to me, I am just a smol bean
If we go down that path at this point in time, the contract is inevitably gonna go to Neuralink (and probably bypass the bidding process).
https://youtu.be/iZ8mowuxX9U?si=wgEjWzYg9XN61NcLg
Court: No, here are all the things you could do, but complaining to the court isn't one of them
Congress: oh well we did everything we could
Court: CAN YOU READ OMFG
Literally the whole plan was in there. And we collectively just don’t have the attention span anymore.
America is pretty close to some pretty ugly decisions.
wired: autogolpe
inspired: judicial coup
Congress: “Donald Trump said some mean things, we will run away like babies”
Question 1) Why are you being threatened?
Question 2) Why do you leak that fact?
Question 3) Do you want it to end?
Question 4) Are there no circumstances you are a yes on impeachment?
Hell they impeached him twice and the republicans shot down their ability to remove him
The courts may not save us, but they can do more than we can count on congress for currently.
All the other paths involve the military being involved in serious shit.
Isn’t this obvious to everyone?
You make this whole argument for why Congress actually matters, Congress has to exercise their power. But every word of it applies to the courts too. They limit the President in small and large ways
Impeachment or nothing is like having capital punishment or nothing
Normalize impeachment. The Presidency has gotten far too big for its britches.
Their oath means nothing to them, they put their own positions & safety ahead of the nations survival.
They do not care how many die, how many are extorted, how much is looted, only that they get to pretend they have power.
#IMPEACHtRumpAGAIN
I wouldn't assume this is impossible. Not because they care if Donald golfs away his term, or exceeds his authority; they do not. But because everyone hates Elon, including Republican constituents and voters.
But in this world, Trump got RFK, Jr, Patel, Gabbard and Hegseth confirmed, so we're pretty much screwed.
So YEAH, we actually SHOULD “focus on the midterms” and make double, triple, quadruple sure that no FUCKERY takes place next time.
If you want to get involved, this IS a valid thing to pursue.
Fool me once....
The good news is it's likely Democrats will win them, the bad news is Trump will almost certainly try to fuck with election machinery.
Happens every time. Very Bad Things are falling into place to happen.