It shows us where the weak spots in the checks & balances system are.
So if the Dems retake both Houses in the midterms (with a veto-proof majority) or Trump's term finally ends, they can be given a thicker coating through various legislative means.
The Congress/handling tariffs thing is a perfect example. So is Presidential pardoning & EO power & as i've lately advocated, a mandatory list of standards Cabinet-level nominees have to meet before they can come up in front of Congress for a confirmation hearing (no more sewage swimming worm brain CTers).
I am not optimistic.
Trump is a "Red Caesar", declaring national security emergencies without an emergency, to seize the power to tax without Congress, to accuse others of "treason" for criticizing him, and to use the Alien Enemies Act as if it were a real war against migrants - all of this and more to have the power of a wartime President without an actual war.
It is worth remembering that Hegseth, a few months ago, warned Nato that the US military had to turn away from Europe to defend the Homefront, apparently meaning illegal migrants and their defenders. And now in LA we have the pretext that Trump was looking for, to demonstrate his military power against both migrants and US citizens who protest. And, if anything, his approval rating will likely rise because of it.
A President's use of military violence against disorderly and violent protests rarely makes him/her unpopular, and I suspect this will only further legitimize Trump's personality cult. Trump has no concern over the correctness of constitutional arguments, or the unitary powers of the executive - those are the rationalizations of Trump loyalists. He simply wants as much power as he can usurp, and to appoint loyalists who will give him whatever stupid, ignorant, unethical or immoral end he desires. And cracking down on the protests will be good for Trump, and what is good for Trump is good for America and thereby legitimizes his King like rule (or so the MAGA crowd believes).
To be fair, Caesarism was not started by Trump. For decades the power of the Presidency has increased step by step, and combined with court opinions giving the President right to not faithfully execute the law (eg to grant mass prosecutorial discretion), has neutered law - making it more aspirational rather than enforceable. And the COVID pandemic and street rage accelerated that loss of faith in Republicanism - an inevitable result when protests are riots (e.g. Minneapolis), when innocents are prosecuted for self-defense, when authorities threaten or retaliate against angry parents for speaking out at school board meetings, or people are "locked down" and made to wear masks and carry vaccination cards for months or told they can't go outdoors and even recreate, more than a year without recourse.
However, Trump is the likely the first to embrace Caesarism openly as legitimate. And so now Trump is the American archetype of the rule by a strongman, and once that becomes the norm then the Republic is a fiction, as was the pretense of Sulla and Augustus that Roman Republic existed as a Republic. Indeed we shall see its full effect after Trump, when the strongman ideology is "Blue Caesarism".
It will take a very special new President to have the love of the Constitution and democratic values to ask, actually demand, that Congress limit his own power. It will take some who will reject the ring of power to be immune to its seductive allure.
My bet is that won't happen after Trump. He or she will keep the usurpation, the tariffs as power, the right to use every law as he/she pleases. When "their" Ceasar takes power nothing will be given back to democracy.
We are firmly on a road we will never leave.
