Unitarian
Who's in charge anyway?
Judge Says DOGE’s Dismantling of USAID Likely Unconstitutional
Judge accuses the Administration of arbitraging the Appointments Clause in characterizing Musk as an advisor.
‘The Trump administration’s lawyers have said Musk is a presidential adviser giving recommendations with no binding legal effect. But Chuang in his ruling pointed out that Musk has continuously acted as DOGE’s de facto head, without having been properly appointed with Senate approval—likely in violation of the Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution. ‘
Musk’s Role in Dismantling Aid Agency Likely Violated Constitution, Judge Finds
You know how was approved by the Senate? Marco Rubio.
Is the bark greater than the bite here?
‘The judge also ordered that agency operations be partially restored, though that reprieve is likely to be temporary. He ordered Mr. Musk’s team to reinstate email access to all U.S.A.I.D. employees, including those on paid leave. He also ordered the team to submit a plan for employees to reoccupy a federal office from which they were evicted last month, and he barred Mr. Musk’s team from engaging in any further work “related to the shutdown of U.S.A.I.D.”
‘Given that most of the agency’s work force and contracts were already terminated, it was not immediately clear what effect the judge’s ruling would have. Only a skeleton crew of workers is still employed by the agency.
‘And while the order barred Mr. Musk from dealing with the agency personally, it suggested that he or others could continue to do so after receiving “the express authorization of a U.S.A.I.D. official with legal authority to take or approve the action.”’
DOGE's USAID shutdown was likely unconstitutional, federal judge says
This is all going to be part of a bigger court fight about the independent agencies and the separation of powers.
‘The shutdown harmed public interest and deprived Congress of using its constitutional authority as the public's elected representatives to decide what to do with an agency it created, the judge said in his written opinion.’
Trump Fires Democrats on Federal Trade Commission
More fuel for the courtroom fodder when it comes to the independent agencies.
‘Members of the F.T.C. and other independent regulatory boards are protected from removal under a 1935 Supreme Court precedent that says the president may not fire them solely over policy disagreements. Ms. Slaughter and Mr. Bedoya said they planned to challenge Mr. Trump’s decision in court.
‘“Today the president illegally fired me from my position as a federal trade commissioner, violating the plain language of a statute and clear Supreme Court precedent,” Ms. Slaughter, whom Mr. Trump nominated to the F.T.C. during his first term in 2018, said in a statement. “Why? Because I have a voice. And he is afraid of what I’ll tell the American people.”’
What power does the president have over the federal bureaucracy?
Is Congress a co-executive? This is the battle around the unitary executive that the independent agencies’ actions are precipitating.
‘Bamzai suggested we look to the nation’s history for guidance. “The idea of a single executive put forth in the Virginia Plan won out at the [Constitutional] Convention and made its way into our Constitution, so at least nominally, in its form, there is a single executive atop the executive branch at the federal level,” he said.
‘The country’s founders also meant for there to be single executive in substance, he argued. To explore why he believes that to be so, Bamzai proposed a hypothetical. “Imagine that our current Congress were to cleave off a portion of the executive branch, for example, let’s just pick the State Department, and render its head not answerable to the president,” he said. “Would that be constitutional?”
‘Probably not, given Supreme Court precedent, Bamzai said. “That answer suggests, then, that there are some implied limits on how Congress might structure executive agencies at the federal level.”’
The great irony will be if the withdrawal of wholesale American aid leads to better development in the target countries who have become, in a real sense, enslaved to the ostensibly good intentions of Western benefactors.
‘Central idea 2: Healthy states have governments that must fund themselves from their own taxes. Then, they work hard to maintain the tax base, allowing the economy to grow and regulating and taxing reasonably, even if that effort is difficult politically. Governments that get their money from other sources, such as natural resource extraction fees or international support, work to please and keep going those sources of funding. At the extreme, Hamas is kept alive because it pleases outsiders (including many in Europe, the UN, and even the US) who send it money to keep a war going rather than having to please a tax or electoral base.
‘And the same is obviously going to be true of economies whose government budgets depend so crucially on aid.’
When it’s all said and done, we might just find the biggest misappropriation of resources in history, all to favor political allies.
‘"One of the biggest fraud holes we've uncovered ... is that the government can give money to a so called nonprofit ... They then give themselves ... insane salaries, expense everything, buy jets and homes ... on the taxpayer dime ... This is happening at scale."’