How Media Learned To Start Worrying And Fear ‘Constitutional Crisis’

Democrat-appointed and activist judges are doing what they were always going to do if Donald Trump won the election, which is tie up and stall as much of his agenda as possible by court order. That’s all fine and good by the news media because they also hate Trump. But what they didn’t anticipate was the zeal with which Trump 2.0’s legal team would fight not just Democrats but also their presumed authority on the Constitution, a governing document still relatively young and far from fully tested.

After several judges in recent days ordered the Trump administration to stop exercising the president’s authority over the executive branch, one of them then accused the administration of defying an order to continue pushing billions of dollars to God knows where. The news media are using it all as an opportunity to microwave their “threat to democracy” hysteria.

“Trump’s Actions Have Created a Constitutional Crisis, Scholars Say,” a New York Times headline blared on Monday. CNN legal analyst Joan Biskupic warned of “a possible constitutional breakdown of American government.” NBC News also reported with alarm that “the nation may be edging closer to a constitutional crisis.”

To be sure, it’s always some kind of “crisis” when the Washington status quo is threatened. The possibility of cutting one dollar from the federal budget or removing one middling bureaucrat from a bloated agency is always “unprecedented” and sure to result in “literally millions of deaths.” The pattern has played out this way for decades.

But now there’s someone in office who’s serious about changing it and who isn’t waving a white flag at the first bit of pushback from the judiciary. Under the radical theory that the executive branch of the federal government is in fact controlled by the executive (that’s the duly elected president), the Trump administration is appealing these court orders issued by unelected judges. And to the extent that the administration is defying them, there’s a non-obscure legal argument that they’re not even constitutional.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller made that point in a social media post on Sunday. “Hey Pete,” he wrote in a response to former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, “care to show us the line in the Constitution where it says a lone unelected district judge can assume decision-making control over the entire executive branch affecting 300M citizens? Any mention of nationwide district court [temporary restraining orders]? Or permanent all-powerful bureaucracy?”

Vice President J.D. Vance similarly wrote on X, “Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power.”

The short version of what’s been happening is Trump has issued a slew of executive orders directing federal agencies to do various things, some more controversial than others, like deny formal citizenship documents to the children of illegal aliens on U.S. soil. Democrat and activist judges have reacted by issuing their own orders compelling the administration to stop some of these policies, including — get this — a freeze on spending some money. Yes, a judge has demanded that the government spend money it literally doesn’t have. That’s where we are in this “constitutional crisis,” and we should think long and hard about who got us here.

Whether district judges even have the authority to issue a nationwide injunction orders is also up for debate. Justice Clarence Thomas in 2018 indicated the Supreme Court “must address their legality.” That’s what the Trump administration is hoping for.

None of this is a “crisis.” It’s the usual reaction from permanent Washington feeling its money and power under siege.