Since the era following the Nixon presidency and the Watergate investigation, the Congress of the United States has allowed its power as a coequal branch of government with the executive branch to become diluted.   Some of this dilution began well before Watergate while more recent causes were the results of need for timeliness of action and the desire of individual members of Congress to avoid making difficult choices for which they could later be held accountable, in other word cowardliness. To be fair however, no one anticipated the possibility of someone like Trump becoming the nation’s chief executive.

In addition the extreme partisanship of the current era has made it difficult if not impossible for the members of Congress to work together to restrain presidential overreach of power.  The framers of the Constitution believed that the separate branches of our government would compete for power keeping one from gaining advantage over another.  Apparently, they didn’t anticipate the possibility of members of Congress becoming the lapdogs of the president.

Then into that environment came an authoritarian narcissist with a lust for power and insatiable need to destroy his enemies.  From the beginning it was a receipt for disaster.  But what would you expect from a president who declares, “Then, I have an Article II, where I have to the right to do whatever I want as president, . . .”  Of course, Article II of the Constitution, which established the executive branch, says no such thing, but that is of no concern for a man who would be king and lies as easily as speaking.

As you are aware, Trump’s overreaches of power are numerous. He has used the office of the president to increase his personal wealth. Sighting a security emergency he rerouted funds authorized by Congress into a project which Congress specifically refused to fully fund, usurping Congress’  power to solely determine how the funds it provides are used.  Again declaring an emergency he unilaterally established tariffs on our trading partners at great risk to the world’s economy, though the Constitution calls for Congress to approve all tariffs.

He used his responsibility to protect members of our armed forces as an excuse to order the assassinate a member of the foreign government  without even informing Congress, an action which could have easily plunged our country into a hot war. He did this despite the Constitutional mandate that only Congress can declare war.  He ordered this attack without later supplying Congress any proof that the assassination was required to prevent an eminent attack on our soldiers,

The these are just a few examples of Trump abusing his powers as president.  His method of operation in such cases has been, “I am going do what I want to do and all you can do is go to the courts to try to stop me.”  However, in almost every case Trump misused legislation where Congress had previously abrogated some of its power to the office of the presidency in a very limited number of specific situations. He simply falsely claimed that those situations applied.  Like the framers of the Constitution, the members of earlier Congresses obviously never anticipated that someone like Trump would ever become the occupant of the White House and that he would be able hold the congressmen of his party hostage.

However, let’s put of these abuses of presidential power and the ways to prevent them in the future aside for discussion in another articles in order to address Trump’s most flagrant abuses of power. Those are of course the subject of the current impeachment trial. They involved illegally depriving an ally at war with a hostile power congressionally authorized funds for selfish personal gain while weakening our national security.  They also include attempts to cover up his actions including, but was not limited to, barring every member of his administration from testifying before Congress.

Regardless of his guilt or innocence, regardless of whether witnesses are allowed in his impeachment  trial, Trump’s lapdogs in the Senate are determined to find him “not guilty”. This will be an invitation to Trump, and even his successors in the White House, to do the same kind of things over and over again. If it is clear that Congress cannot remove the Chief Executive of the United States for the type of crimes which Trump perpetuated on this country, there is no incentive for this or future presidents to stay true to their oaths of office.

Something must be done to at least ensure that future presidents do not benefit from Trump’s escape from justice.  Congress must take action to ensure as best they can that this type of abuse of presidential power and subsequent coverup don’t happen again.  I am not kidding myself here; I know full well that that that kind of legislation hasn’t a snowball’s chance in Hades of seeing the light of day as long as this president is in the White House and McConnell and other Trump lapdogs still control the Senate. However, that situation will not last forever.

Following Watergate Congress passed sweeping reforms which included limiting political contributions, adding financial disclosure requirements, limiting the president’s ability to put troops in combat without Congressional consent, amendments of the Freedom of Information Act to make it more difficult to hide government information,  and creating requirements that Congress be kept informed of covert actions being taken in other countries. What legislation can a future Congress pass which will limit the ability of future presidents from following Trump abusive path?

1. Congress should pass legislation requiring that governments that attempt to interfere with our elections are harshly sanctioned.
2. Congress should pass legislation making it a crime punishable by jail time for any government official to solicit a foreign government to interfere with our elections. (This would eliminate the “no crime was committed” defense. Maybe a sitting president cannot be indicted, but a jail cell should be waiting for him/her upon leaving office.)
3. Congress should pass legislation to make it a crime punishable by jail time for any subpoenaed member of the executive branch to not appear before Congress unless the president specifically exerts executive privilege and in the process explains specifically what matters cannot be discussed and why. (This would prevent wholesale orders preventing everyone in the executive branch from testifying and make it easier for the courts to determine quickly if individuals can be compelled to testify.
4. Congress should pass legislation specifying the specific time period allowed for the entire judicial process of deciding if members of the executive branch can be compelled to testify or not. (While such a law would not be binding on the judiciary, a separate and branch of government, perhaps as a result an agreement can be reached between Congress and the Supreme Court that cases involving requests to compel individuals to testify can be full expedited so that it will take minimal amount of time to make their way through the entire court system. One way to achieve this is to make such cases immediately appealable to the Supreme Court.)

These remedies address only Trump’s recent egregious abuses of power and the subsequent coverups. I’ll suggest additional remedies in future articles to address the other abuses Trump has committed since taking residence in the White House.

It would be interesting and informative to hear your views on these suggested remedies. I would also be interested in hearing your suggestions as to what other Congressional actions might be necessary to keep future presidents from being able to follow Trump’s example in the Ukraine fiasco. (Let’s keep suggestions of remedies required to prevent Trump’s other abuses of power for discussion in subsequent articles.

Cajun      1/28/2020