Phony emergency, true threat
President Trump’s declaration of a national emergency at the southern border Friday claimed another casualty in his war on the law and language. Under every accepted definition and precedent, his socalled emergency is not one.
Rather, it’s a brazen attempt to violate the Constitution’s basic restraints on presidential power to compensate for the limitations of his policies and politics. Having diminished the already weak support for his border wall with the longest government shutdown on record, Trump vowed to use emergency and other powers to redirect more than $6 billion to the project.
That’s nearly five times what Congress eventually approved for additional border fencing this week in the bill Trump reluctantly signed. Even as the president thereby dropped the threat of another pointless shutdown, his emergency declaration leveled a direct assault on Congress’ spending authority. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and others rightly promised to oppose the maneuver, which drew criticism from several Republican senators. Unfortunately, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Minority and ready The other to National accommodate Leader Republicans Emergencies Kevin Trump. were McCarthy all Act too allows challenge Pelosi’s the declaration House Democrats and trigger to a mandatory Senate vote. It would be a rare case in which McConnell could not block a floor vote, forcing his Senate Republicans to say yea or nay to a directive that pits their fear of Trump against their avowed constitutionalism. A majority vote against the emergency could be vetoed by Trump, however, and an override would require many more Republican defections.
The emergency declaration has fiscal as well as constitutional implications. While the administration appears to have abandoned the controversial prospect of redirecting funds for flood control in California and other places, it’s now eyeing money for an array of military construction projects that are sure to have their backers in Congress.
The declaration is also bound to be disputed in court, with Gov. Gavin Newsom and California Attorney General Xavier Becerra among the eager plaintiffs.
Every invocation of the National Emergencies Act since it became law has targeted hostile foreign governments or groups or responded to clear domestic crises such as the 2009 flu pandemic and the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Trump’s own extensive deliberations over whether to declare this emergency offer one indication that it’s disingenuous. Trump even acknowledged that he “didn’t need to do this.”
The border “invasion” Trump proposes to stop with his emergent wall simply isn’t occurring. Illegal crossings have fallen to about a fourth of their peak during George W. Bush’s administration, and there’s no evidence of Trump’s claims that more fortification will substantially thwart drug smuggling, human trafficking, crime or terrorism. Despite the president’s harping on the threat of those surreptitiously crossing unsecured stretches of the border, the recent uptick in immigration from Mexico has consisted mainly of Central American families seeking asylum under U.S. and international law.
With the nation recognizing a holiday set aside for its greatest presidents, Trump’s fake emergency evokes tin-pot autocracy and marks another low for his presidency.