Category: Authoritarian

Donald Trump Threatens to Close Congress Unilaterally

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At his coronavirus press conference on Wednesday, President Donald Trump issued a stunning threat-slash-promise-slash-constitutional fantasy. Complaining that Democrats were blocking his judicial appointees, the president said that the Senate should either end its current pro forma session and come back to Washington amidst a pandemic to approve his appointees or officially adjourn so that he can make recess appointments. “The Senate has left Washington until at least May 4,” Trump said. “The Constitution provides a mechanism for the president to fill positions in such circumstances, the recess appointment it’s called. The Senate’s practice of gaveling into so-called pro forma sessions where no one is even there has prevented me from using the constitutional authority that we’re given under the recess provisions. The Senate should either fulfill its duty and vote on my nominees or it should formally adjourn so that I can make recess appointments.”

“If the House will not agree to that adjournment,” he continued, “I will exercise my constitutional authority to adjourn both chambers of Congress. The current practice of leaving of town while conducting phony pro forma sessions is a dereliction of duty that the American people cannot afford during this crisis. It is a scam what they do.”

Trump is likely referencing Article 2, Section 3 of the Constitution, which provides that the president can “on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper.” Does he have the power to actually do this, though? According to this 1964 article from the New York Times the Senate Parliamentarian issued an opinion in that year, regarding presidential authority to adjourn Congress: “The answer is yes—but only under, certain unusual circumstances. These conditions are so limited that a President has never exercised the power to adjourn Congress.”

The clause as written seems to require that the president can only force the Senate to adjourn “in Case of Disagreement between them,” which suggests that it operates in cases where the House and Senate disagree about a date for adjournment. But the House and Senate have already agreed on a date: Jan 3, 2021.

Trump, it seems, needs Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and a majority of Senators to come back to Washington to adjourn the Senate, which would then trigger a disagreement with the House of Representatives, as Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi would presumably then refuse to adjourn. On Wednesday, McConnell’s office said that he had spoken with Trump about the recess appointment question, but also indicated that he would not be altering Senate rules to get Trump his appointments. If McConnell were to adjourn along a party-line vote—possibly blowing up the filibuster in the process—theoretically, Trump would then adjourn the two disagreeing bodies. Recess appointments under this scheme would last only until January of 2021, but it would still be an unprecedented power grab. As historian Michael Beschloss tweeted, “Wilson, Taft and FDR were all urged to adjourn Congress and all refused.”

“They know they’ve been warned and they’ve been warned right now,” Trump said. “If they don’t approve it, then we’re going to go this route and we’ll probably be challenged in court and we’ll see who wins.”

Indeed, if Trump did manage to get Senate Republicans to go along with this plan, one wonders what the conservative-controlled Supreme Court might do. In 2014, the Supreme Court validated the legitimacy of holding pro forma sessions for the purpose of preventing recess appointments in NLRB v. Noel Canning, but that case did not involve the use of this unprecedented mechanism by a president. It would be challenged on a number of fronts.

“It is unclear that we have an extraordinary occasion in the sense that the Framers were using it,” University of Richmond School of Law Carl Tobias told me in an email. “It is not surprising that the provision has never been invoked, because no president has ever found the existence of an extraordinary occasion that warranted exercise of this power, even [though] the [United States] had the Civil War and two declared World Wars, while the House and Senate have always been able to agree on a time to adjourn.”

It’s possible that the move is also just intended as a feint to distract from Trump’s disastrous response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the spiraling economy. “Trump desperately wants to change the subject—away from the pandemic he’s so badly handled that’s killing Americans and toward this,” Georgetown Law professor Josh Geltzer told me. “It’s important to explain why he is out of step with American constitutional traditions. But it’s also important not to let him change the focus at this critical time.”

Ultimately, the real concern is that someone has advised President Trump that he has the power to adjourn Congress and he’s building an argument for it; his White House Counsel and Justice Department are doubtless crafting the fanciful legal scaffolding right now. As is often the case when the president makes broad claims about untested constitutional authority, the worry is less that he will adjourn Congress tomorrow, and more that he is recreationally floating insane notions, bolstering them with in-house analysis, and laying the groundwork for emergency powers he may someday seek in earnest. It’s happened before and there is no reason it can’t happen again.

[Slate]

Trump accuses governors of ‘mutiny’ as tensions mount over reopening

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President Donald Trump compared strain between himself and a group of governors to the film “Mutiny on the Bounty,” as tensions mounted over when and how to reopen economies amid the coronavirus pandemic.

“A good old fashioned mutiny every now and then is an exciting and invigorating thing to watch,” Trump said in a tweet. “Especially when the mutineers need so much from the Captain,” he added.

Trump addressed his comments to the “Democrat Governors,” after a group of six eastern states on Monday said they would jointly develop a plan to reopen the region’s economies and schools. After the announcement, Massachusetts, which is led by a Republican, joined the effort.

The governors of California, Oregon and Washington announced similar plans. Those states are led by Democrats.

Monday, Trump asserted he had authority to open states, a claim that drew fire from New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, among others.

[MarketWatch]

Trump lashes out at Cuomo over remarks on presidential authority

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President Trump lashed out at New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) on Tuesday after Cuomo questioned the president’s authority to override governors’ wishes and reopen states’ economies amid the coronavirus outbreak.

Trump tweeted that Cuomo couldn’t have “independence” after receiving support from the federal government, including critical medical supplies to address the massive outbreak of COVID-19 in New York. 

The remark came shortly after Cuomo warned Trump against trying to force New York to loosen physical distancing restrictions too early and rejected the president’s statements about having “total authority” over when states open up.

“Cuomo’s been calling daily, even hourly, begging for everything, most of which should have been the state’s responsibility, such as new hospitals, beds, ventilators, etc. I got it all done for him, and everyone else, and now he seems to want Independence!” Trump tweeted Tuesday morning. “That won’t happen!”

The developments foretell further fissures between Trump and governors over the president’s efforts to revive the U.S. economy as the coronavirus outbreak subsides. Most states, including New York, have implemented stay-at-home orders and instructed nonessential businesses to close in order to lessen the spread of the virus, causing a massive spike in unemployment claims.

Trump is currently weighing a decision on when to begin to relax federal guidelines on social distancing in some areas of the country to get Americans back to work, though he has indicated he will not look at doing so in New York or states that have seen significant community spread for the time being. Health experts have raised concerns about a potential move by Trump to reopen even parts of the country to early when there aren’t sufficient testing and contact tracing capabilities in place. 

More than 580,000 Americans have been infected with COVID-19 and the virus has cause over 23,000 domestic deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.

The president insisted several times on Monday that he has absolute authority to make a decision on when states can reopen. But Trump did not offer a constitutional explanation for his claims, and legal experts have disputed his assertion by saying the president does not have the authority to reverse state or local quarantine orders.  

“The president of the United States has the authority to do what the president has the authority to do, which is very powerful,” Trump said at a White House briefing on Monday. “The president of the United States calls the shots.”

As the U.S. has grappled with the coronavirus, Trump has insisted that the federal government’s stockpile of critical supplies is merely a “backup” and asserted that states have the foremost responsibility to accumulate medical supplies to prepare for the virus.

Trump has also largely refrained from offering recommendations to states on implementing stay-at-home orders and other restrictions, though the president’s latest comments have signaled a shift in his thinking about the role of the federal government in states’ decisions.

Cuomo responded to the president’s remarks on Tuesday morning in several interviews, saying on NBC’s “Today” that there would be a “problem” if Trump tried to reopen New York against the governor’s wishes. 

“The president doesn’t have total authority. The Constitution is there, the 10th Amendment is there, number of cases over the years, it’s very clear. States have power by the 10th Amendment, and the president is just wrong on that point,” Cuomo said.

[The Hill]


Trump lashes out in grievance-filled briefing claiming ‘total’ authority as president

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President Donald Trump lashed out at criticism of his handling of the coronavirus crisis during a grievance-fueled appearance from the White House that featured a propaganda-like video he said was produced by his aides.

The appearance only affirmed the impression that some of Trump’s chief concerns amid the global public health disaster are how his performance is viewed in the media and whether he’s being fairly judged.

He clearly did not believe that was the case Monday. He stepped to the podium armed with a video meant to frame his response in a positive light after his initial handling of the crisis has come under increasing scrutiny.

After it aired, Trump grew increasingly irate as reporters probed the time line of his response, claiming the criticism wasn’t fair and that he’d handled the outbreak effectively.

“Everything we did was right,” Trump insisted after an extended tirade against negative coverage.

Pressed later about his authority to reopen parts of the country, Trump delivered an eyebrow-raising statement asserting absolute control over the country.

“When somebody is president of the United States, your authority is total,” he said. He later added he would issue reports backing up his claim, which legal experts say isn’t supported by the Constitution.

Before the President’s extended defense of himself,, Dr. Anthony Fauci stepped to the podium to clarify comments he’d made a day earlier about the administration’s handling of the global coronavirus pandemic, a striking show of reconciliation following a day of questions about his future on the White House task force.

Fauci said he was responding to a “hypothetical question” during an appearance on CNN’s “State of the Union” program on Sunday when he said more could have been done to save American lives. He claimed his response “was taken as a way that maybe somehow something was at fault here” and said his remark about “pushback” inside the administration to some of his recommendations was a poor choice of words.

The episode capped a stretch where Fauci’s position in the administration seemed tenuous. Trump on Sunday evening retweeted a message critical of Fauci’s comments on CNN along with the hashtag #FireFauci.

Trump shrugged off the retweet on Monday — “I retweeted somebody,” he said, “it doesn’t matter” — but many of Trump’s allies in the conservative media have fueled calls for Fauci’s ouster, painting him as overly focused on the health aspects of the coronavirus crisis and not attuned to Americans’ economic suffering.

Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, conceded to CNN’s Jake Tapper on Sunday morning that earlier mitigation efforts could have saved more lives and again called for a cautious reopening of the nation, despite Trump’s calls to quickly restart the economy.

“You could logically say that if you had a process that was ongoing and you started mitigation earlier, you could have saved lives,” Fauci said.
But a day later, he sought to characterize that comment as hypothetical and not about any specific actions that could or should have been taken before Trump announced social distancing recommendations last month.

Fauci said that there were discussions among the “medical people” about the pros and cons of strong mitigation efforts, but when he and Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, ultimately recommended mitigation efforts to the President for the first time last month, Trump listened.

“The first and only time that Dr. Birx and I went in and formally made a recommendation to the President to actually have a ‘shutdown’ in the sense of not really shut down, but to have strong mitigation, we discussed it,” Fauci said. “Obviously there would be concerns by some, and in fact, that might have some negative consequence. Nonetheless, the President listened to the recommendation and went to the mitigation.”

Fauci added that when he and Birx realized the initial 15-day guidelines were not enough and would need to be extended, Trump listened to that recommendation as well.

“The next second time that I went with Dr. Birx into the President and said 15 days are not enough, we need to go 30 days, obviously there were people who had a problem with that, because of the potential secondary effects, nonetheless, at that time the President went with the health recommendations, and we extended it another 30 days,” Fauci said.

Fauci’s attempts to clarify his earlier comments reflected an attempt to quell speculation he was on shaky terms with the President, who has come under pressure to reopen parts of the economy quickly by some wealthy friends and economic advisers.

Trump spent part of the Easter weekend calling allies and associates complaining about recent media coverage of his handling of the coronavirus pandemic, people familiar with the conversations said.

Trump believes “everybody is trying make themselves look good,” said one source, who claimed the President has been fixated on two government officials at the center of the response: Fauci and Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar.

“He’s been fretting about Fauci for a while,” the source said of Trump’s focus on the popular public health expert, summing up Trump’s comments about the doctor as “why isn’t Fauci saying nice things about me?”

[CNN]

Fauci acknowledged a delay in the US coronavirus response. Trump then retweeted a call to fire him.

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President Donald Trump retweeted a call to fire Dr. Anthony Fauci Sunday evening, raising concerns about the job security of the public health expert, while once again highlighting the precarious role of experts and the overall uncertainty that has plagued the Trump administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic.

The retweet came following a spate of television appearances by Fauci — who is head of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a member of the White House coronavirus task force — including a Sunday morning CNN interview in which the doctor said earlier action could have limited Covid-19-related deaths in the US.

A conservative former California congressional nominee who has been a sharp Fauci critic on Twitter, DeAnna Lorraine, responded to the interview by tweeting, “Fauci is now saying that had Trump listened to the medical experts earlier he could’ve saved more lives. Fauci was telling people on February 29th that there was nothing to worry about and it posed no threat to the US public at large. Time to #FireFauci…”

Trump had refrained from publicly criticizing Fauci, but Sunday, he retweeted Lorraine and added some of his own commentary.

While the president did not engage with the call to fire the official, he did once again push the unsubstantiated claim that he acted early and decisively to curb the spread of the virus.

Trump didn’t seem to appreciate Fauci pointing out the obvious

Fauci himself suggested more could have been done by the administration Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union, when host Jake Tapper asked him what might have happened if the federal government promoted social distancing in February rather than in March, when the White House rolled out its “15 Days to Slow the Spread” guidelines.

“It’s — it’s very difficult to go back and say that. I mean, obviously, you could logically say, that if you had a process that was ongoing, and you started mitigation earlier, you could have saved lives,” Fauci said, adding, “But there was a lot of pushback about shutting things down back then.”

Fauci did not elaborate on what that pushback was, and who it came from, but did say earlier in the interview when asked about the administration listening to expert advice, “We make a recommendation. Often, the recommendation is taken. Sometimes, it’s not.”

But we do know from reports — including an investigation published Saturday by the New York Times — that much of the pushback came from Trump himself.

Experts warned of what was to come, but Trump did not take decisive action

Among other things, the Times report details how Dr. Nancy Messonnier, the director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases and one of the few federal voices warning the public of the threat the coronavirus posed in February, was sidelined due to these warnings. It also documents how Trump’s anger over her messaging both led to a leadership vacuum at a moment when there was no time to waste, as well as the cancellation of an important presidential briefing on mitigation strategies scheduled for February 26:

On the 18-hour plane ride home [from a state visit to India], Mr. Trump fumed as he watched the stock market crash after Dr. Messonnier’s comments. Furious, he called Mr. Azar when he landed at around 6 a.m. on Feb. 26, raging that Dr. Messonnier had scared people unnecessarily. Already on thin ice with the president over a variety of issues and having overseen the failure to quickly produce an effective and widely available test, Mr. Azar would soon find his authority reduced.

The meeting that evening with Mr. Trump to advocate social distancing was canceled, replaced by a news conference in which the president announced that the White House response would be put under the command of Vice President Mike Pence.

Pence reportedly put a moratorium on messaging like Messonnier’s — which may explain Lorraine’s assertion that Fauci claimed everything was fine in late February. Fauci did in fact tell the public not to worry in February, but tempered that message by saying Americans needed to be prepared for a rapidly changing situation.

On February 29’s NBC’s Today, for instance, Fauci said: “At this moment, there is no need to change anything you’re doing on a day-by-day basis, right now the risk is still low, but this could change. … When you start to see community spread, this could change, and force you to become much more attentive to doing things that would protect you from spread.”

According to the Times’ report, Fauci and other public health experts on the coronavirus task force were more than convinced that not only “could” things change, but that they would — particularly after a February 21 meeting at which pandemic simulations were run, leading those present to believe “they would soon need to move toward aggressive social distancing, even at the risk of severe disruption to the nation’s economy and the daily lives of millions of Americans.”

Getting Trump to reach the same conclusion became a weeks-long struggle, and it wasn’t just the advice of his public health experts the president reportedly shrugged off.

White House trade adviser and Trump confidant Peter Navarro wrote memos in late February warning of the looming coronavirus crisis in America. Trump told reporters last week, “I didn’t see ’em, I didn’t look for ’em either.” The National Security Council recommended shutting down large cities based on intelligence it gathered in January. As Vox’s Aja Romano writes, “The security experts went dismissed even as an unfounded conspiracy theory about the virus’s origin spread among some government officials and economic advisers pushed back against taking drastic measures to thwart China.”

Although the president was eventually brought onboard with mitigation efforts beyond border closures in March, the administration’s refusal to heed the advice of experts bearing dire warnings led to well-documented delays in scaling up testing, acquiring needed equipment, and offering consistent federal messaging on what was needed to limit the spread of the virus.

But the response remains a fractured one, sometimes plagued by infighting and frustration over who has taken on what. And as the president considers when to encourage Americans to resume normal life, it is still uncertain how much weight Trump is giving expert advice. When asked Saturday on Fox News what will influence his decision-making on extending social distancing guidance past April 30, the president said, “a lot of facts and a lot of instincts.”

Is Trump going to fire Fauci?

In this context, what Trump’s retweet means — if anything — is unclear. On one hand, he has a history of communicating displeasure with members of his administration on Twitter before firing them, tweeting once, for example about his dissatisfaction with former Inspector General Michael Atkinson four months before suddenly firing him. On the other hand, Trump has been effusive with his praise of Fauci, calling him “extraordinary” and a “good man.”

Friday, Trump told reporters, “I have great respect for this group. In fact, I told Tony Fauci — I said, ‘Why don’t you move to New York, run against AOC? You will win easily.’ But he decided that he’s not going to do that, okay? I kid.”

Given the president’s unpredictability, any number of explanations for the tweet are possible, from Trump blowing off steam at a moment of frustration over the CNN interview to him retweeting before having read the whole of Lorraine’s post. But as Fauci is, like Trump noted, widely popular — a Quinnipiac University poll released April 8 found 78 percent of Americans believe the doctor is handling the pandemic well, compared to the 46 percent who said the same of Trump — firing him seems inadvisable. Such a move would not only strip the US of a valuable expert at a time when such voices are badly needed, but would likely lead to widespread anger of the sort the president got a taste of Monday, as #FireTrump trended in response to his tweet.

[Vox]

Trump slams Fox News: ‘What the hell is happening’ over there?

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Not even Fox News is safe from President Trump’s Twitter finger these days.

After Fox News host Chris Wallace on Sunday brought up the notion, as reported by the New York Times, that more lives could have been saved if only the president had reacted more decisively to the coronavirus outbreak, Trump blasted him and the network in this tweet:

Later, Wallace went on to ask former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer about the president’s briefings, saying that while Trump initially got “high marks,” he’s lately been “getting into fights with governors he did not think were sufficiently appreciative or reporters.”

This isn’t the first time Trump has bashed Wallace, whom the president said will never live up to his father’s legacy and should go work for one of the “fake news” networks:

Previously, Wallace shrugged off the attacks by saying he wouldn’t let them get in the way of his reporting. “Generally speaking, I think it is an indication that you’re doing your job,” he said. “I mean I’m not in this to make friends. I am in this to do the best reporting that I can do.”

After Trump’s critical tweet, “Chris Wallace” began trending on Twitter

Media

Trump removes watchdog at head of committee overseeing coronavirus relief funds

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President Donald Trump has removed a top Pentagon official leading the committee tasked with overseeing implementation of the $2 trillion coronavirus law, putting his own pick in place.

Trump is replacing Glenn Fine, acting inspector general of the Defense Department, whom a panel of inspectors general had named to lead the oversight committee, with Sean O’Donnell, inspector general of the Environmental Protection Agency.

O’Donnell will temporarily be lead watchdog for both agencies pending the confirmation of Jason Abend, whom Trump has nominated to fill the Defense Department role.

The moves comes as Trump’s critics take aim at a wave of presidential actions and comments that stand to reshape the ranks of independent federal watchdogs. Late Friday, Trump fired the intelligence community’s inspector general, Michael Atkinson, who flagged the Ukraine whistleblower complaint to Congress that ultimately led to the president’s impeachment.

Trump also lashed out on Twitter at Health and Human Services Inspector General Christi Grimm after her office issued a reportdescribing widespread testing delays and supply issues in response to the coronavirus outbreak.

While Fine will no longer serve on the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee, he will continue working at the Defense Department, going back to his previous position as the principal deputy inspector general.

[NBC News]

Trump Repeatedly Quotes Fox Guest to Rail Against ‘LameStream Media’ Criticism of Coronavirus Briefings

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President Donald Trump kicked off the new week by repeatedly praising Gayle Trotter, a guest on Fox News, for bashing the media coverage of his coronavirus response and White House press briefings.

“Thank you Gayle. I only wish the public could fully understand how corrupt & dishonest so much of our Lamestream Media is,” Trump wrote in response to a tweet from Trotter claiming the media is at “war” with the president.

“My Press Conferences are vital. They are reaching millions of people that are not being told the truth, & haven’t been for years (Witch-Hunts, Fake News)!” he added.

Here’s another tweet where Trump quoted Trotter — though lacking a bit in context.

Trump’s interest in Trotter emanated from her appearance Sunday with Fox News host Howard Kurtz on MediaBuzz. Trotter, a conservative pundit, was asked about media criticism of Trump spreading false information passing blame to others throughout the pandemic. She responded that “the establishment media has not admitted that they were wrong and the president was right” on how to deal with it.

Other comments from Trotter on MediaBuzz got Trump’s attention, including one in which she criticized PBS reporter Yamiche Alcindor, who was berated by the president for her questioning last week:

[Mediaite]

Trump Calls Media Critics ‘Bad for the World’, Tells Press Get Coronavirus Crisis Over With ‘THEN Go Back To Your Fake News’

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At Saturday’s coronavirus task force briefing, President Donald Trump once again lit into the media over reporting on his administration’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

“Every decision that we’re making is made to save lives. It’s really our sole consideration, we want to save lives. We want as few lives lost as possible,” said Trump, leading into his remarks about the press.

“It’s therefore critical that certain media outlets stop spreading false rumors and spreading fear and even panic with the public. It’s just incredible,” said Trump, shaking his head, “I could name them, but, it’s the same ones. Always the same ones.”

“I guess they’re looking for ratings, I don’t know what they’re looking for,” he said. “So bad for our country.”

He then said that the media’s approval ratings with the public are “the lowest they’ve ever been.”

“It’s so bad for our country, so bad for the world,” said the president. “Ought to put it together for a while, get this over with and then go back to your fake news.”

[Mediaite]

Trump says he agrees with Navy Capt. Crozier’s firing

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President Donald Trump defended the firing of Navy Capt. Brett Crozier during a coronavirus task force press conference Saturday afternoon, calling Crozier’s letter asking for help for the sailors of the USS Theodore Roosevelt “not appropriate.” 

Trump said he did not make the decision to fire Crozier, but he disagreed with Crozier’s actions and suggested the captain was at fault for the coronavirus infections on board the aircraft carrier for docking the ship in Vietnam.

“Perhaps you don’t do that in the middle of a pandemic,” Trump said, adding the letter was “not appropriate” and “he shouldn’t be talking that way in a letter.” 

Crozier had circulated a four-page letter later obtained by the San Francisco Chronicle asking for “decisive action” as the coronavirus ravaged his crew. 

“We are not at war, and therefore cannot allow a single Sailor to perish as a result of this pandemic unnecessarily,” Crozier wrote. 

Four days after he pleaded for help, Crozier was fired by the Navy. 

Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly said Crozier had “exercised extremely poor judgment” in distributing the letter. 

The Navy said Saturday 44% of the crew of the USS Theodore Roosevelt had been tested for the coronavirus, and 155 service members had tested positive. About 1,548 service members had been moved onshore. None had been hospitalized. 

[USA Today]

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