#separation-of-powers

#separation-of-powers

For the left, there is little more terrifying than an emboldened Donald Trump. Deep into the first year of his second term, he has behaved like an imperial president, thriving off new precedents set by the Supreme Court to shred democratic norms. He has gutted the federal bureaucracy, wantonly dispatched the National Guard to Democrat-run cities, unilaterally imposed tariffs, unilaterally launched a missile strike on Iran, and wrongfully deported an immigrant to El Salvador.

In a 37-page ruling, US district judge Thomas Cullen of Virginia's western district who was nominated and confirmed to his position during Donald Trump's first presidency wrote that any fair reading of the legal authorities cited by defendants leads to the ineluctable conclusion that this court has no alternative but to dismiss. To hold otherwise, Cullen added, would run counter to overwhelming precedent, depart from longstanding constitutional tradition, and offend the rule of law.

Cullen normally serves in the federal court system for the western district of Virginia, but since all 15 judges in Maryland's district court system were named as defendants in the case, someone from outside the state had to be brought in to resolve the case. The lawsuit was a highly unusual, broad-strokes attack on the federal judicial system in Maryland, where Trump's immigration agenda has faced several high-profile setbacks.

"It's an authoritarian power grab that blatantly violates the Federal Reserve Act, and must be overturned in court," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), the ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee, in a statement.

The US supreme court allowing the president effectively to abolish the Department of Education only reinforces this sense; Sonia Sotomayor, in her dissent, explicitly wrote that the threat to our Constitution's separation of powers is grave.

That's America's secretary of defense. To use a military term, it's conduct unbecoming. He looks rattled. He obviously looks thin-skinned. He's extremely aggressive and volatile.