@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
No, I'm suggesting that the law acknowledges it's existence and refers to it, but doesn't codify it's existence or structure.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins yes. an administration could internally reorganize AID! but AID must exist, and it must pursue the purposes for which Congress mandated it, until Congress unmandates it.
taking something to the "wood chipper" means destroying it. that is illegal. is taping over the name of US AID and removing all signange an internal reorganization?
what DOGE was clearly doing was abolishing. yes, they'll be stopped, because it's illegal. it's rich for you to try to rely on that.
@interfluidity @Phil Is there anything in the law that dictates that #USAID must exist in perpetuity?
@realcaseyrollins @Phil Congressional action doesn't sunset unless the law they pass explicitly imposes such a sunset. absent some explicitly enacted executive option to abolish, only Congress can undo what Congress had said must exist.
@interfluidity @Phil So...I'm guessing no?
@realcaseyrollins @Phil No. Nothing must exist in perpetuity. The Constitution can be constitutionally abolished by amendment (everything except equal suffrage of states in a Senate which would no longer exist). But only Congress can end USAID's existence.
@interfluidity @Phil It's hard for me to get to that conclusion based on what you've presented so far.
@realcaseyrollins @Phil To what conclusion? That something Congress establishes in law can only be unestablished by Congress?
@interfluidity @Phil No, that #Congress established #USAID as something that exists in perpetuity, therefore only #Congress can abolish it
You yourself actually admitted that #Congress didn't even established it by law lol, #JFK created it as an executive order. And parts of the law both you and phil quote only refer to #USAID, they don't establish it or its lifespan.
@realcaseyrollins @Phil they explicitly foresee a reorganization that might even abolish it, and set a deadline for that, which is long passed. what point is there for Congress to define these things, define a process by which they might be reorganized, and define a termination date for that reorganization, if a President could with no process just reorganize it away anyway? 1/
@realcaseyrollins @Phil Congress creates things by saying they exist. Let there be light. That in this case there did exist something of the same name that they were explicitly codifying and formalizing doesn't somehow deplete that. /fin
@interfluidity @Phil Are there other examples of #Congress establishing agencies using identical language?
@realcaseyrollins @Phil Perhaps not, because AID did already exist as an executive creature. i don't know if there are others quite the same. 1/
@realcaseyrollins @Phil how about this one? "There is established in the Federal Reserve System, an independent bureau to be known as the 'Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection', which shall regulate the offering and provision of consumer financial products or services under the Federal consumer financial laws." https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=(title:12%20section:5491%20edition:prelim) 2/
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
The only justification needed is the evident corruption. It is the presidents duty to root it out.
And the President has the power to remove any personell from the executive brance, so while the agency can continue to exist, he can still remove all the people and it's legal.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins it has to continue also to perform the function for which Congress established it. Trump’s job is to take care that the laws be faithfully executed. the laws Congress made.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
And don't forget that the Executive branch and Congress and the Judicial branch are all supposed to be co-equal. Congress isn't superior, the courts are not supposed to be superior and the executive isn't supposed to be superior.
You seem to be holding Trump to a standard that no previous president has met.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins Congress is fact is superior. It is Article I for a reason. "coequal" is inexact. separate powers, non hierarchical is more exact. there are things each branch can do that the other cannot, ways each branch can check the others. but Congress is who ultimately rules, not the executive, not the judiciary. our Constitutional crisis is an absence of a functional Congress, at a deep level. https://theimaginativeconservative.org/2019/10/myth-of-coequal-branches-david-j-siemers-richard-bishirjian.html
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
I see nothing in the constitution that makes congress superior.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins Article I. It sits before and above all the rest. The logic of a representative democracy. I'm sure there are stronger legal theories, I mean to read Siemers' book. Might not be a bad exercise for you as well.
@interfluidity @Phil I see no precedent that the #POTUS can refuse to execute laws passed by #Congress. What makes #POTUS' executive powers unique or special IIRC is that he can tell people to do *extra* things, not keep people from doing stuff like following the law.
@realcaseyrollins @interfluidity
Biden didn't enforce immigration laws.
Bush signed the Patriot act, with an announcement that his administration would not enforce certain provisions in it that he deemed unconstitutional.
nearly Every president has selectively enforced the law, based on their own agenda.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins officials do not always do their jobs. the parameters of a law are sometimes in dispute.
that's what lawsuits are for. it's not grounds to abandon the principle that the executive's duty is to ensure Congress' laws take effect.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
Sure, but there is no getting around the president interpreting those laws, in a way favorible to his objectives, particulary when those objectives were articulated and accepted by the majority of voters.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins a majority of voters voted against the current President. a narrow plurality voted for him. yes, Presidents necessarily interpret laws, but those interpretations must be bound by good faith readings, can and must be disciplined by the courts and Congress.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
And who is the arbitor of good faith? You?
@Phil @realcaseyrollins not me alone. you and me and 350M of our peers.
but like pornography, most of us know betrayals of good faith when we see them, and most of us will agree. taking Congressionally established agencies to the wood chipper or tombstone without any Congressional authority strikes me as a pretty clear betrayal of a good faith reading of the law. do you really disagree?
@interfluidity @Phil Wait wait wait back up did you just say #KamalaHarris won the popular vote in 2024???
@realcaseyrollins @Phil No, Harris did not win the popular vote.
Trump won a plurality, but not a majority. Most voters voted either for Harris or for a third party candidate.
Trump won the popular vote in the sense he got more votes than any other candidate. But no candidate, not Trump, got a majority of votes. A majority of voters voted against Harris. A majority of voters also voted against Trump.
> Trump won 77,284,118 votes, or 49.8 percent of the votes cast for president.
That's close enough for me
@realcaseyrollins @Phil close enough is not in fact a majority. 50.2% of those who came out did so to pull the lever for someone other than Donald Trump. most of the country never endorsed any of this. most voters, even, never endorsed any of this.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
he has a 53 percent approval rating, so obviously it's endorsed now.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins says CBS. 47% says Pew. and polls are noisy, fidgety things, not meaningful endorsement.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins the voters can't perform the Congress is intended to perform. Congress exists because voters can't be expert on the mechanics and happenings of government. direct democracy, in that sense, can't be "smart". so we hire professionals to learn our interests and values, and then capably represent those in government.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
Do you really believe that congress is an expert on anything?
People are generally far better off making as many decisions for themselves as possible and don't need some morons that are obliged to their donors making them for them.
The coutry is to vast and varied for so much centralized control and much more should be left to states/local government, where the people have more influence.
90% of the federal laws/regulations on the books need to be replealed.
@realcaseyrollins @interfluidity
My fantasy is a constitutional convention by the states. I would like to see the following amendments passed.
1. The SC is not the final arbitor of what is constitutional, that is left to the states and the people.
2. The federal govt is forbidden form requesting, possessing, viewing, intercepting, or accessing, private date of the people, irrespective of whether or not they have shared it with a 3rd party, absent a warrant base on probable cause.
3. cont.
@realcaseyrollins @interfluidity
the 16th and 17th ammnedments are hereby repealed.
4. State laws superceded federal laws, except in those areas explicitly mentioned in this constitution.
5. A majorty of states, through their normal legislative process can nullify any federal law.
6. The federal register is limited to 10000 pages, beyond that, ignorance of the law is a valid defence.
7. every jury must be instructed that they can find somebody not guilty based on a law being unreasonable..
@Phil @interfluidity I'm on board with 2, 4, and 5
On point 1, there HAS to be a safeguard against unconstitutional actions. #SCOTUS is flawed, but I'd argue the best system we have to guard against that.
On point 6, you might end up seeing multiple pieces of legislation stitched together to work around this, so I don't think it'd be effectually binding.
/1
A lot of people are missing at the moment that the safeguard against unconstitutional actions is NOT through #SCOTUS but through the Congress, and more importantly, through voters electing representatives who will react to unconstitutionality appropriately.
SCOTUS has no enforcement power against the Executive Branch. That was left to the Congresss.
Both SCOTUS and Congress can and should judge the President in different ways, but at the end of the day, it's up to the people we elect to Congress to react to whatever has been found about what the president has been doing.
Far too many congresspeople shirk their duties by pointing fingers at the other two branches when they're the only ones with the actual power to act, and that's critical to the US system.
