Category: Government

Domestic Policy, Government

Portland

Bob Claude |

https://www.voanews.com/usa/race-america/judge-hears-oregon-request-restrain-federal-agents

President Trump never fails to find a way to do the right thing for the wrong reason and in the most ham-handed manner.   The deployment of US Marshall’s and Homeland Security agents to Portland could have been justified simply by the need to protect the Mark Hatfield Federal Building, the judicial employees who work there, and those who need to do business there.   If anyone interfered with those functions, the president had a duty to deploy the marshals to protect the facility and arrest violators. That’s what the US Marshals Service was established to do. See 28 USC Section 566.

If local authorities refused to assist and effectively condoned the attacks, the Insurrection Act provided a process to federalize the National Guard to protect federal authority.  Specifically, it requires the president to first “by proclamation, immediately order the insurgents to disperse and retire peaceably to their abodes within a limited time”. See 10 USC Section 254.  In addition to being legally required, such a proclamation would have enabled him to build the public support for such an admittedly extraordinary action.  If the attacks continued nevertheless, the situation would have been no different than when the South Carolina militia fired on Fort Sumter in 1861 or when George Wallace stood in the schoolhouse door to stop desegregation in Alabama.  The President would have to act to protect federal authority and the Union.

Instead, the President has used other provisions under the act intended to provide equal protection under the law to protect not people, but monuments and statues and now to enforce local laws.  As I mentioned in a previous post, the federal government should support a “surge” in metropolitan police forces to rebuild their effectiveness and legitimacy.  However, it should have been accomplished through increased funding of local police departments subject to strict guidelines.   Federal enforcement agencies do not have the manpower or the local support to enforce local laws.

 The drastic actions in Portland and elsewhere could have been an opportunity to unify the nation in support of federally protected rights.  Once again, the president squandered that chance.  A federal judge in Portland is currently considering a suit by the state of Oregon to restrain the forces protecting the very building which she holds court.  Our only hope is that the judge will deny the state’s motion with enough legal eloquence to start to create the national unity we so desperately need.

Domestic Policy, Government, Immigration

The Swamp Wins Again

Bob Claude |

In this site’s mission statement, I said that as much as Theodore Roosevelt was a model, there would be times we would disagree with his likely approach to an issue.  The Supreme Court’s recent opinion on the DACA immigration program highlights one of those differences – the wisdom of unchecked presidential power. 

The Court’s opinion errs not just because it continues a program that flouts the basic rules of immigration law.  The so-called Dreamers would have been granted permanent residency eventually. However, it should have occurred through the legislative process as part of a comprehensive immigration reform that created real and enforceable limits on future immigration.  Instead, the Court used arcane administrative obstacles to allow the Obama Administration to evade the Congress and the people to achieve its political goals. In doing so, the Court has undermined the constitutional separation of powers and the democratic process.

The breadth and depth of the power granted by the Court to administrative agencies (and thus the presidency itself) can only be understood by delving into the details. The court admits that the DACA program (and the corresponding rule protecting the parents of DACA children) were affirmative rules subject to the Administrative Procedure Act. This law ordinarily would require such rules to be issued through a notice and public comment process and adopted only after “reasoned decisionmaking” (the Court’s language). They then could be appealed for judicial review by interested groups such as the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which advocates for immigration restrictions. Instead, the program was initiated by a three-page “memorandum” not posted for prior comment and justified on conclusory grounds that such immigrants “lacked the intent to violate the law”, are “productive contributors” and “know only this country as home”. No other justification or evidence was cited to support the memorandum. In addition, by acting through such a memorandum, the administration made it more difficult to challenge the program in the courts.

Thankfully, several states did challenge it and the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a preliminary ruling holding it to be an illegal rule making.  After President Trump took office, Attorney General Jeff Sessions issued an opinion to the Department of Homeland Security holding it to be illegal. Based on these opinions, the acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security decided to rescind the program. That should have been the end of the matter. Instead, a new set of appeals were filed and the Supreme Court struck down the rescission and sent it back to the agency so it can consider at least 8 different objections by supporters of the rule. In short, the court ruled that an agency rule having a multi-billion dollar economic impact and granting new rights to over 20 million people could be adopted without public comment or congressional input on conclusory grounds, but could only be repealed by engaging in a detailed factual and legal analysis.

Justice Thomas’s dissent accurately describes the danger to our constitutional democracy, stating that an agency is  now “not only permitted, but required, to continue administering unlawful programs that it inherited from a previous administration”.  It grants agencies and the beneficiaries of their largesse more rights than the people as a whole. No wonder many refer to Washington as a swamp. Policies adopted through the democratic process go in, but become so mired in governmental and special interest muck that they never come out.

To his credit, President Trump has issued an executive order prohibiting this kind of rogue administrative action.  At the same time, he encourages the same culture of presidential power by constantly acting through executive orders rather than by legislation.  He has never seriously pursued a comprehensive administrative law reform in the Congress.  Without this, a succeeding administration can undo his restraints by its own executive order. As we approach the 2020 election, American nationalists who believe in the unique value of our constitutional democracy should insist that candidates, including Trump, commit to reform that drains the administrative swamp once and for all and opens up policy making to the American people.

Domestic Policy, General, Government, Politics

An Ugly Betrayal of American Nationalism

Bob Claude |

“We are all Americans.  Our common interests are as broad as the continent. I speak to you here in Kansas as I would speak in New York or Georgia, for the most vital problems are those which affect all of us alike.”

Theodore Roosevelt, The New Nationalism, August, 1910.

Like many Americans, I did not vote for Donald Trump (or Hillary Clinton) in the 2016 election.  As an American nationalist, former Secretary Clinton’s globalist history and her express commitment to continue the Obama Administration’s policies that weakened America were clearly anathema to me.  At the same time, no authentic American nationalist would support the Russian and WikiLeaks hacks of a fellow American citizen.  Nevertheless, I hoped Trump still might be able to unify us around a new nationalist foreign and domestic program to develop a realist and sustainable foreign policy and to renew the American Dream. 

Some welcome steps have been taken toward these goals, such as the new National Security Strategy and the rollback of unnecessary regulations. Sadly, the positive accomplishments have been overshadowed by the President’s constant appeals to rank ethnic bigotry and jingoistic international provocations.  His recent tweets telling four congressmembers to “go back to the….places from which they came” further proved he has no real understanding of the principles of American nationalism. Those principles are grounded in our democratic values and our commitment to helping all citizens achieve the American Dream.  As I said in previous posts, there is, and never should be, any such thing as an ethnic American.

Theodore Roosevelt welcomed anyone from any nationality that embraced American values and could work to strengthen our nation. This positive nationalism would reject the kind of hateful rhetoric the President has directed toward Reps. Ocasio-Cortez, Omar, Pressley and Tlaib.  It is the purpose of this site to save American nationalism from permanent association with such ugly demagoguery.