Trump Escalates Assault on Democratic Governance and Rule of Law

Recently I wrote about Venezuela’s slide into dictatorship. Such regimes hold elections but exploit their control to effectively deny citizens a voice.

America’s Republicans do this. There’s gerrymandering, of course, both parties do that, but voter suppression is a particularly vicious specialty of Republicans alone. And when Wisconsin elected a Democratic governor, the Republican-controlled legislature passed bills to strip the office of key powers. And in 2018 Florida passed a referendum restoring voting rights to ex-felons — but the Republican governor and legislature say, “Nothing doing.” And the Trump administration is trying to game the census to undercount Latinos, to reduce their voting power.* This travesty seems likely to be upheld by the Supreme Court’s Republican majority. (Time was, I’d bridle at such cynical partisan characterization of the court. Chief Justice Roberts might step back from shredding its cloak of impartiality. But don’t hold your breath.)

In Venezuela, the Maduro regime was so unpopular by 2015 that its vote-rigging wasn’t enough to keep the opposition from winning Congress. Which then tried to hold the regime accountable. What did Maduro do?

He quite simply disregarded Congress. That’s right — whatever Congress legislated, the President ignored. (He set up another body, packed with regime toadies, supposedly superseding Congress.) Control of the courts helps Maduro get away with this.

“It can’t happen here?”

It’s happening.

Our democratic constitutional system vests various powers in Congress, to hold the presidency accountable. The House Ways and Means Committee has sent the Treasury Department a demand for Trump’s tax returns. This was done pursuant to an explicit law, it’s legally incontestable. But the White House says the returns will never be handed over. (What is he hiding?) The lawful requisition is being simply ignored. And the Trump organization is suing Congress to keep requested business records hidden too.

The White House is also telling its people to defy subpoenas for them to testify before Congress. This includes former White House Counsel Donald McGahn testifying about Trump’s lies concerning Mueller. And Carl Kline, responsible for the improper security clearances for Jared Kushner and others, that Trump also lied about. And John Gore, a Justice Department official subpoenaed to testify about the lies involved with the mentioned census manipulation.

How does Congress enforce its subpoenas for testimony and documents? By prosecutions for “contempt of Congress.” Which go through the Department of Justice. Controlled by guess who. Meantime Trump may try to assert “executive privilege,” like Nixon did regarding the Watergate tapes. The Supreme Court ruled Nixon had to turn them over. Will it reverse this precedent for Trump? We’ll see.

Remember when Republicans used to posture as Constitution worshipers? They still bang on about the law when it comes to immigration. But Trump feels his regime can — just like in Venezuela — simply ignore Congress and anything it tries to do. Cocking a snook at constitution and law.

And why not? He’s spent his whole life getting away with such shit. The Mueller investigation found he attempted to obstruct justice, yet there are no consequences. Indeed, he’s even braying exoneration. Now he feels he’s Prometheus unbound.

Democratic governance? Checks and balances? Accountability? Rule of law? Those are for chumps.

* At issue is adding a citizenship question to the census. The administration’s pretext is that the Justice Department somehow needs this to enforce the Voting Rights Act. They say this with a straight face — as if they’re not actually eviscerating the Voting Rights Act.

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