The President of the United States, Donald Trump, who has multiplied decrees since his return to the White House, recently recorded important victories testifying to an authoritarian derivative at the head of the country, warn lawyers.
Several specialists in the Constitution contacted Thursday by The press On the eve of the American national holiday indicated that the institutions to serve as a counter-power against the head of state did not adequately play their role at the moment.
The congress is used in particular to “formally confirm” the desires of its administration, notes David Lopez, professor of Rutgers University.
He sees the adoption Thursday of an important budgetary bill called One Big Beautiful Bill By the president as a new illustration of the situation rather than a normal legislative process.
Several Republican elected officials had promised to oppose it, but most finally rallied under high pressure from the administration, allowing its adoption by a small majority.
“We have seen in the past Republican elected officials denounce George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan or Richard Nixon. Today, the elected officials of the party only serve to approve what comes from the administration because they are afraid of Donald Trump, “says Lopez.
Exceptional “Aplaventism”
The congress has been dysfunctional for a long time due to the political cleavage existing in the United States, nuance Devon Ombres, of the Center for American Progress.
The republican elected officials of the House of Representatives and the Senate, where they are the majority, however showed an exceptional “flatventism” which leads them to accept without blinking major attacks in the power of the institution, including with regard to the power to spend.
We are facing a beaten dog who is afraid of being hit by his master.
Devon Shadows, from the Center for American Progress
Ilya Somin, a lawyer attached to the George Mason University, notes that President Trump is trying to “massively” widen the powers of the presidency without fear of the Congress’s wrongs and does not hesitate, to justify his actions, to invoke “emergencies” which do not fit with the legal meaning traditionally given to this term.
The scheme, he notes, has been used to impose customs duties on foreign countries without the agreement of the congress, preventing the requests for asylum for migrants appearing at the southern border of the country or refusing American citizenship to children born of undocumented on American soil.
Ineffective appeal
The Supreme Court facilitated the president’s ambitions by deciding last week to limit the ability of the courts to pronounce provisional national scope injunctions, notes Mr. Somin.
Other mechanisms, for example collective actions, could be used, but their effectiveness at this stage remains uncertain, he underlines.
Mr. Ombres notes that collective actions are “very complex and costly” and will not be able to thwart the effect of the decision of the highest court in the country. The decision is all the more shocking, he says, that it was taken as part of a cause a clearly unconstitutional decree.
Photo Alex Wroblewski, agency France-Presse
Headquarters of the American Supreme Court
The result of the decision of the conservative majority of the court is that the president will be able to multiply the decrees on sensitive subjects and even flout the Constitution if he wishes without having to fear being blocked quickly by a judicial appeal.
If people cannot call on the courts or the congress, which has abdicated their powers in the face of the administration, what are they supposed to do?
Devon Shadows, from the Center for American Progress
The question will arise with even more acuity, says Mr. Somin, with the adoption of the budget bill dear to President Trump who will hit hard many poor Americans from the middle class.
The text provides for a massive increase in defense and immigration expenses as well as the extension of significant tax credits. They must be funded in part by cuts in health insurance and food aid likely to receive millions of people.
Popularity rating
Russell Wheeler, constitutionalist of the Brookings Institution, thinks that the bill will affect the president’s popularity rating by hitting its political base and will weigh in the mid-term elections provided in 2026.
A republican victory that would allow the party to maintain control of the two chambers would not bode well for American democracy, he warns.
Photo Mandel Ngan, Agence France-Presse Archives
Donald Trump in the face of the press after the Supreme Court limited the ability of the courts to pronounce interim national injunctions on June 27
“We cannot currently say that the foundations of the Republic are shaking, but the prospects will not be good if the current situation with a servile congress continues” over four years, “says Wheeler.
Mr. Ombres thinks that the president’s efforts to maximize his powers by multiplying the decrees already have a dramatic impact on the country.
“The Americans must remember that we revolted 249 years ago against a tyrannical monarch and that we see the current administration reproducing the same tyranny denounced in the declaration of independence,” he said.
