From what has been reported by this site, as well as from other daily media and cable outlets, it is no longer approaching a Constitutional crisis. We are in one.
We see a president who cares nothing about what binds our nation as a democracy—the rule of law—and for that we need to protect our nation’s existence. The foundation for this is based not only upon my 52 years as a licensed attorney who in his career has traveled the country representing litigants with varying political stripes and thus being expert in recognizing what this rule means, including as legal counsel for Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle in cases before the Supreme Court, but more importantly based upon the following recent constitutionally-shredding events.
Trump is forcing certain, prominent law firms, in order to escape his wrath via executive orders, to bow on bended knee to his threats and provide him millions in free pro bono work to carry out his agenda, no doubt among which are areas that have been adjudicated unlawful by preliminary court decisions decided adverse to his interests. Other law firms are fighting back in court, with all having been successful to date!
A unanimous Supreme Court then assailed Trump by not having provided constitutionally grounded due process, i.e., notice and a court hearing, to an immigrant who was unlawfully deported to that hellhole of a prison in El Salvador. Many more no doubt are in this queue. And when our high court said for Trump’s administration to “facilitate” the immigrant’s extraction from El Salvador, his administration tells us the high court did not tell it to “effectuate” a return. Trump confirmed thereafter that the U.S. is not responsible for reclaiming this individual back to U.S. shores even though the administration initially admitted it made a mistake to deport him. The El Salvadoran leader punted as well, denying he can return this immigrant. This ” ‘ping pong’ match” is nothing but obfuscation, subverting our rule of law. And the federal district trial judge to whom the Supreme Court’s opinion was returned for further proceedings soundly criticized Trump for doing NOTHING to date. And only the other day, he also said he was open to deporting “homegrown” criminals—an indication of U.S.-born citizens being locked up overseas without the constitution’s guarantee of due process.
As if adding fuel to this fire, House Republicans passed legislation to limit the scope of federal judges issuing nationwide orders even though they have been required due to Trump’s serial unlawful executive orders impacting the entire nation. Within this same group are legislators who have filed articles of impeachment against judges ruling against him, and the threats, suggestive as well of physical harm, being lobbed by those in the public at members of the judicial branch. It was then necessary to have Chief Justice Roberts declare publicly in recent days that the legal system provides a process to contest unfavored decisions; it is called appealing to a higher court.
More critically, we know Trump ordered his AG to investigate two U.S. citizens who criticized him during his first term, Chris Krebs who ran Trump’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency, and former senior Department of Homeland Security official, Miles Taylor. Both, notably, never committed any crime, and with Mr. Krebs, he found as part of his job there was no fraud in the 2020 election that saw Trump defeated. If Trump can order investigations into two Americans who did nothing wrong except to criticize him and find adversely to his interests, to scoop up immigrants without providing them due process of law, and saying he is open to deporting American citizens he does not like, what then can we as ordinary U.S. citizens expect who find his ways unfathomable and un-American? Can we next be secreted to a location far from our homes, and then be transferred to an out-of-country gulag?
Moreover, now Trump has violated yet another court order, by not allowing the AP to cover his press events, from which the organization has been barred.
So to all, including all those that read this site regardless of political affiliation, we must be resolute, so that silence because of being afraid or scared of Trump’s efforts is not anyone’s option. We need to ensure our democracy survives by upholding the rule of law. If we do not, then we all fall prey to a despot—-yes, call Trump what he has become, a tyrannical dictator—that violates court orders, violates our constitution’s guarantees, and sets out to punish those that speak ill of him, much like perhaps what we read about in our high school history books concerning the 1930s in Germany under Hitler, or how we see leaders in autocratic regimes rule in this century.
Only WE THE PEOPLE will be able to stop Trump’s insanity on this score.
Miles Zaremski is a resident of the Village of Dunedin.