Contrary to the conventional wisdom, President Trump cannot simply allow his political adversaries to dictate his actions. No President has ever done so, and none ever will.
Full disclosure: I wrote most of this post before the second ICE shooting left a man dead in Minneapolis less than a month after the first on Saturday morning. While the facts of the shooting itself remain unclear, though it appears on the surface to be a less clearly justified use of force than the first, doesn’t change the reality that organized, brazen resistance aided and abetted by local politicians to lawful federal government functions is simply not sustainable. By design, our system of government is based on the distribution of power across the different branches of the government itself, the federal government, and the state and local governments. While this structure can seem convoluted and cumbersome at times, the underlying reasoning was simple. First, the Founders were deeply skeptical of centralized power and sought a system where politicians would actively check one another throughout all branches and at all levels, believing that each individual politician would jealously guard their own power and setting up a constant competition between them. Though many find the competition distasteful and at times ugly, the alternative is one or a few politicians representing one or few factions abrogating more and more power to themselves at the expense of everyone else. Second, the Founders believed that power should be confined to certain spheres, either where the structure of that sphere best serves the needs, such as the President as the singular Chief Executive responsible for certain clear tasks like national defense and immigration compared to two Houses of Congress with multiple members in each to handle legislation across all government matters, or the sphere itself is closest to the individual needs of the people, believing that empowered local governments where the number of voters and the geographic area was relatively small would make politicians more responsive to the people. At the same time, this doesn’t mean that the Founders didn’t envision a hierarchy between these various governments. The local was always subordinate to the state, and by the supremacy clause, the state subservient to the federal. Though these higher order governments were supposed to be limited to their enumerated powers according to either the federal or the state constitution, they had the ability to override the rungs below, or at least this has been the generally accepted understanding before President Donald Trump.
Suddenly, however, the Democrats have discovered an entirely new interpretation of our constitutional order, where state and local officials are more empowered than the President himself, able to oppose policies they don’t like whether they have the legal authority to do so and believing they can dictate the policies themselves. While some, myself included, have referred to this as a new nullification movement based on some rather eerie parallels to arguments made by Southern Democrats before the Civil War, there are more practical implications in the slugfest that passes for day to day political discourse, especially in the modern era. Namely, beneath the protestations of principle, politics is all about power. Who has it, who doesn’t. Who is seen to have it, and who is not. Whether a politician has actual power according to their office and the structure of our government, they have to pretend they do or their constituents will abandon them and their adversaries will not respect them. People rarely back a candidate or an officeholder for what they cannot do, and no politician defers to another they believe has more bark than bite. Instead, they back them or defer to them because they believe in the promise of what they can do, at times completely independent of what can actually be done in the real world. A politician who regularly declared they didn’t have the power to do this, that, or the other thing regardless of their actual power wouldn’t last long. In this sense, politics is at least partially an illusion, a trick, a fiction, perhaps even a lie if you will. Politicians promise what they might not be able to deliver, fully knowing that they currently lack the power and potentially will never have the power, hoping their constituents, other politicians, and the broader electorate don’t notice the underlying reality. For better or worse from either the public or the politician’s point of view, sometimes that illusion runs headlong into reality and there are few instances where that reality is more apparent than when a state politician, much less a local one attempts to face off against the President of the United States, who is frequently called the most powerful person in the world for obvious reasons. The power of the federal government and the executive branch that he or she controls is awesome, an over used term to be sure, yet one that certainly applies to a person that has the vast resources of a $7 trillion dollar budget and the associated manpower at their disposal.
In principle, everyone knows this. There’s a reason why we used to say that even if we don’t respect the occupant of the Oval Office, we respect the office itself. There’s also a reason why, until very recently, few would have dared to openly attempt to dictate presidential policy, making demands that they have no means to carry through and setting their own constituents up for grievous disappointment after whipping them into a frenzy when they can’t. In practice, however, many seem to have forgotten that the President wields more power than anyone else, especially when Trump is involved, but if recent events are any indication, Democrat politicians might be forced to remember, big time. While it has become a convenient fiction that concerns over our deportation policy have only recently arose as a result of the first and now second shootings, prominent Democrats Governors and Mayors have been carrying on about the topic for months, frequently making promises and demands they simply cannot deliver while calling for actual blood and someone getting shot. Though it has long been established that immigration enforcement is the domain of the federal government, meaning they have little to no say according to our constitutional order, these progressive leaders have been futilely attempting to force their own policies on the President, claiming their state and local laws and executive orders, many of which like declaring yourself a sanctuary city are already unlawful by definition, can override federal law and urging their supporters to march in the streets for that reason rather than telling them the truth. By now, we all know the headlines. Minnesota Governor Tim Walz demanded that ICE cease operations in his state after the killing of anti-immigration protester and agitator Renee Good almost two weeks ago, even calling up the National Guard supposedly to protect citizens from ICE itself, or what he referred to as “rogue” agents. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey demand ICE “get the fuck out of Minneapolis. We do not want you here.” Similarly, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker threatened to use state laws to block ICE from executing its lawful duties and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson has issued executive orders to create ICE free zones back in October, when local police refused to respond to a potentially violent incident because ICE was involved. While I cannot see what is in their head and hearts too divine their true intentions, by all indications they and others seem to believe that the strategy of bold, insupportable local demands and people in the street causing chaos will cause the President to relent despite them lacking any of this power to begin with, that the mere illusion of their forceful resistance can cause Trump to somehow surrender his own power to their demands. At the same time, they never seem to ask how the most powerful person in the known universe can possibly to do so, succumbing to the will of his political inferiors wielding imaginary power and destroying the illusion of his own power, forever. Needless to say, the result of this deference would not be an outpouring of thankfulness from his opponents that the President has come to his senses, listened to reason, or did the right thing. There will be no sudden awakening that maybe the President isn’t so bad after all. The result will only be more demands, assuming he will cave again because he lacks either the power or the will to prevail. There will be the sense that blood is in the water, and the President can be pushed around if the opposition is forceful or brazen enough.
Therefore, President Trump has begin no indication he is deferring to their demands. Instead, he is doing what he must do to preserve his political future and that of his party, what only the President can do: He is beginning to unleash the power of the federal government upon these local officials with the express goal of teaching them a lesson in how power itself works, who has it and who doesn’t, what’s real and what isn’t. In Minneapolis, he has ordered the FBI to investigate both Governor Walz, Mayor Frey, and others for potentially impeding federal law enforcement. As NBC News described it, “The Justice Department has sent subpoenas to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and other state leaders, escalating its investigation into whether state officials conspired to impede law enforcement during the Trump administration’s immigration operations, according to a document reviewed by NBC News and a person familiar with the investigation. The subpoenas were also sent to Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, the office of St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her and two counties, according to the document and the person familiar with the probe.” Not surprisingly, legal observers do not believe the investigation will result in any charges as political rhetoric is normally considered outside the realm of prosecution and proving that they actively impeded ICE operations will be challenging, but that’s not the point. The point is to make them suffer and make them aware that he can make them suffer, or as a Republican House Member Michael McCaul said, “I think that is very uncommon to go after political figures like that. I think it may be more of a statement more than anything else.” While decrying the investigations and claiming they will not be intimidated, what Mayor Frey described as “When the federal government weaponizes its power to try to intimidate local leaders for doing their jobs, every American should be concerned. We shouldn’t have to live in a country where people fear that federal law enforcement will be used to play politics or crack down on local voices they disagree with,” they have no choice except to comply. As President Trump himself learned when he was out of power and his home was raided, the investigative authority of the federal government simply cannot be resisted. You will have your day in court, but open resistance or defiance is futile. Mayor Frey, in fact, has already agreed to cooperate with the probe, saying “Look, we have done nothing wrong, so of course we will comply in it, but at the same time, we need to be understanding how wild this is. We are doing everything possible right now to keep people safe in our city. We have spoken out to make sure that our residents are protected and people’s constitutional rights are upheld. Speaking out in that way is not illegality.”
Even more broadly, President Trump has used other aspects of his power to initiate a review of all federal funding provided to 14 Democrat states with the obvious threat of pulling federal dollars if they refuse to comply with this lawful authority on immigration and other matters. As Politico described it, “The Trump administration this week ordered a review of federal funding for 14 Democratic states and Washington, D.C., the latest step in the administration’s effort to target states that do not cooperate with the administration. An OMB spokesperson confirmed the initiative, mandated by the agency in a memo dated on Tuesday and reviewed by POLITICO. All federal agencies except the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Defense have been charged with responding to the request.” The memo itself doesn’t say so directly, but the inherent threat is pretty clear. The President controls the distribution of money to the states and states that pursue sanctuary or other policies that run afoul of federal law will be punished, “The purpose of this BDR is to collect a detailed spending report on Federal funds provided to entities in a select list of States. This information will be used to better understand the scope of funding in certain States and localities in order to facilitate efforts to reduce the improper and fraudulent use of those funds through administrative means or legislative proposals to Congress.” Earlier in the month, the President warned the states he perceives as being recalcitrant more directly, citing illegal sanctuary cities in particular, “Starting February 1, we are not making any payments to sanctuary cities or states having sanctuary cities, because they do everything possible to protect criminals at the expense of American citizens.” Not surprisingly Democrats have decried it as “Political retribution.” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer noted, “This is a classic tactic used by Donald Trump and Russell Vought to intimidate and bully people he thinks are his enemies.” While I rarely say this, the Senator is correct. That’s exactly what it is, but what is the alternative?
Contrary to the conventional wisdom, President Trump cannot simply allow his political adversaries to dictate his actions. No President has ever done so, and none ever will. The last time the states were in such open rebellion was the late 1950’s, when President Dwight D. Eisenhower usurped Governor Orval Faubus’ control over his own National Guard. The segregationist governor had called up the Alabama Guard to prevent the integration of schools as demanded by the Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Ed decision, believing he could use the powers of the state to set federal policy. Eisenhower simply couldn’t allow it, however, so he took control of the guard himself, invoked the Insurrection Act to deploy troops, and used them to ensure the schools would be integrated as ruled. Though Eisenhower attempted to resolve the issue without such drastic action, not wanting the public to witness a “trial of strength” between a President and a Governor, and hoping to avoid humiliating Faubus, he has no choice after he continued to prove recalcitrant, deploying the guard to bar black children from school. During an address to the country on September 24, 1957, Eisenhower said, “Our personal opinions about this decision have no bearing on the matter of enforcement; the responsibility and authority of the Supreme Court to interpret the Constitution are very clear. The very basis of our individual rights and freedoms rests upon the certainty that the President and the Executive Branch of government will support and insure the carrying out of the decisions of the Federal courts, even, when necessary, with all the means at the president’s command,” adding that “Mob rule cannot be allowed to override the decisions of our courts.” In another eerie parallel to our own day, New York Times’ reporter Roy Reed claimed that Faubus “knew that Eisenhower was on firm, constitutional ground and that this was a struggle he could not win, but there was enormous pressure to do what he did, and he simply caved in.”
Sadly, Governor Walz, Mayor Frey, and others are making the same mistake, caving to the most radical demands of their resistance addled base and they will be forced to pay the price. The alternative from President Trump’s perspective is to appear to have lost a contest of power and will with a local official when the law is clearly on his side with a local official. No President can or will allow it, not when they have the power and the Governor or Mayor does not. Democrats might cry foul and deny this is the case, claiming it is political retribution, but that’s all they can do other than foment outrage and violence. This is the reality. The President has the power, they don’t, and he has no choice but to teach them a lesson in how this works, same as it ever was and always will be.
Confessions of a Conservative Atheist 