The Philadelphia Inquirer's editorial board is standing up and bearing down.
Some scholars said Trump’s destructive conduct has already created a constitutional crisis. At the very least, his efforts — including freezing federal spending, limiting birthright citizenship, cutting off foreign aid, ignoring court orders, smothering congressional authority, deporting people based on their political views, and firing career government employees regardless of civil service protections — will upend the founders’ vision for the country, undermine America’s global leadership, and may mark the end of U.S. democracy.
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While some Democrats meekly signaled a willingness to work with Trump despite his extreme proposals and previous abuses, others are finally pushing back.
Sen. Andy Kim (D., N.J.), who is known for seeking bipartisan solutions, rightly said he was willing to shut down the government to protest Trump’s deep funding cuts and attacks on federal agencies. Kim said it made no sense to fund the government if the Trump administration was going “to dismantle” it.
Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D., Texas) has joined citizen protests and is particularly outspoken on social media and television. “Americans thought that it was OK to take a full-fledged criminal and make him the president of the United States, and then they want to act aghast when he does criminal things,” she said.
Rep. Jared Golden (D., Maine) rightly said Trump’s hatchet man, Elon Musk, is unelected, unvetted, and unaccountable. “If I had a staffer like that, I’d probably fire him,” Golden said.
Democrats pulled an all-nighter to protest the confirmation of Russell T. Vought, an ultraconservative behind Project 2025, who is Trump’s pick to lead the White House budget office. Remember during the campaign Trump repeatedly distanced himself from Project 2025?
Sadly, Republicans continue to abdicate their sworn duty to serve as a check against Trump’s abuses of power. Instead, the GOP has confirmed Trump’s dangerous and unqualified cabinet picks and anything else he wants.
Voters should not reward such flaccidity.
The biggest bulwark against Trump’s rogue efforts has been federal judges applying the law.
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Vice President JD Vance echoed Trump’s long-held contempt for the rule of law when he said, “Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power.”
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A serious test looms if Trump ignores the court orders — as one judge has already found. The U.S. Supreme Court bears some responsibility for the president acting as if he is above the law because the conservative majority essentially ruled that way last year.
The good news is millions of average Americans refuse to give up on democracy. Citizens have flooded lawmakers’ phone lines with complaints about Trump and Musk running amok. Protesters marched in cities across the country to speak out against Trump, Musk, and efforts to implement Project 2025.
Voters interested in protecting democracy should continue to contact their elected representatives and only back lawmakers who uphold their sworn duty to support and defend the Constitution.
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“Democrats need to throw every possible wrench into the plans of Trump, Musk and their Republican cultists in Congress,” [political scientist Norm ] Ornstein wrote. “Doing so will also underscore how serious the threat is to our system, thereby forcing media to cover it.”
If that doesn’t work, perhaps the recent mass layoffs, the slowdown in hiring, the uptick in inflation, and the looming fallout from slashing government jobs and federal funding will get voters’ attention.
Until then, sleepwalking into a dictatorship will be difficult to reverse.
Inquirer
