[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Mail]  [Sign-in]  [Setup]  [Help]  [Register] 

"Analysis: The Final State of the Presidential Race"

He’ll, You Pieces of Garbage

The Future of Warfare -- No more martyrdom!

"Kamala’s Inane Talking Points"

"The Harris Campaign Is Testament to the Toxicity of Woke Politics"

Easy Drywall Patch

Israel Preparing NEW Iran Strike? Iran Vows “Unimaginable” Response | Watchman Newscast

In Logansport, Indiana, Kids are Being Pushed Out of Schools After Migrants Swelled County’s Population by 30%: "Everybody else is falling behind"

Exclusive — Bernie Moreno: We Spend $110,000 Per Illegal Migrant Per Year, More than Twice What ‘the Average American Makes’

Florida County: 41 of 45 People Arrested for Looting after Hurricanes Helene and Milton are Noncitizens

Presidential race: Is a Split Ticket the only Answer?

hurricanes and heat waves are Worse

'Backbone of Iran's missile industry' destroyed by IAF strikes on Islamic Republic

Joe Rogan Experience #2219 - Donald Trump

IDF raids Hezbollah Radwan Forces underground bases, discovers massive cache of weapons

Gallant: ‘After we strike in Iran,’ the world will understand all of our training

The Atlantic Hit Piece On Trump Is A Psy-Op To Justify Post-Election Violence If Harris Loses

Six Al Jazeera journalists are Hamas, PIJ terrorists

Judge Aileen Cannon, who tossed Trump's classified docs case, on list of proposed candidates for attorney general

Iran's Assassination Program in Europe: Europe Goes Back to Sleep

Susan Olsen says Brady Bunch revival was cancelled because she’s MAGA.

Foreign Invaders crisis cost $150B in 2023, forcing some areas to cut police and fire services: report

Israel kills head of Hezbollah Intelligence.

Tenn. AG reveals ICE released thousands of ‘murderers and rapists’ from detention centers into US streets

Kamala Harris Touts Mass Amnesty Offering Fast-Tracked Citizenship to Nearly Every Illegal Alien in U.S.

Migration Crisis Fueled Rise in Tuberculosis Cases Study Finds

"They’re Going to Try to Kill Trump Again"

"Dems' Attempts at Power Grab Losing Their Grip"

"Restoring a ‘Great Moderation’ in Fiscal Policy"

"As attacks intensify, Trump becomes more popular"

Posting Articles Now Working Here

Another Test

Testing

Kamala Harris, reparations, and guaranteed income

Did Mudboy Slim finally kill this place?

"Why Young Americans Are Not Taught about Evil"

"New Rules For Radicals — How To Reinvent Kamala Harris"

"Harris’ problem: She’s a complete phony"

Hurricane Beryl strikes Bay City (TX)

Who Is ‘Destroying Democracy In Darkness?’

‘Kamalanomics’ is just ‘Bidenomics’ but dumber

Even The Washington Post Says Kamala's 'Price Control' Plan is 'Communist'

Arthur Ray Hines, "Sneakypete", has passed away.

No righT ... for me To hear --- whaT you say !

"Walz’s Fellow Guardsmen Set the Record Straight on Veep Candidate’s Military Career: ‘He Bailed Out’ "

"Kamala Harris Selects Progressive Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as Running Mate"

"The Teleprompter Campaign"

Good Riddance to Ismail Haniyeh

"Pagans in Paris"

"Liberal groupthink makes American life creepy and could cost Democrats the election".


Status: Not Logged In; Sign In

politics and politicians
See other politics and politicians Articles

Title: Trump Wields Signing Statements, Carves Up Defense Bill
Source: The American Conservative
URL Source: https://www.theamericanconservative ... ents-to-carve-up-defense-bill/
Published: Aug 22, 2018
Author: Bruce Fein
Post Date: 2018-08-25 14:36:26 by Deckard
Keywords: None
Views: 1746
Comments: 12

It is the best of times for power-hungry presidents.

It is the worst of times for the rule of law and the Constitution.

On August 13, 2018, President Donald Trump issued an extraconstitutional signing statement over 50 provisions in the mammoth National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). It was another step on the nation’s century-long journey towards an omnipotent presidency and a Congress that’s little more than a constitutional ink blot. The president now initiates war on his own, kills American citizens on his own, spies on his citizens on his own, makes treaties on his own, classifies information and operates a secret bureaucracy on his own, and, through executive orders and signing statements, makes laws on his own.

Trump’s NDAA signing statement decreed that the 50 provisions unconstitutionally encroached on the president’s prerogatives as “Commander in Chief and as the sole representative of the Nation in foreign affairs.” Accordingly, he would treat them as of no force or effect despite his signing them into law.

Exemplary is section 1290 of the NDAA. It seeks to disassociate the United States from the grisly human rights crimes perpetrated by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in their war against the Houthis in Yemen. Earlier this month, for instance, the Saudi-led and United States-supported coalition bombed a school bus in North Yemen, killing dozens of young boys. The coalition is also starving Yemeni civilians on an industrial scale by blocking humanitarian aid.

Congressional dictation of military or foreign policy as ordained in section 1290 is neither novel nor unconstitutional. During the Spanish-American War, for instance, the Teller Amendment to the congressional declaration of war provided that the United States “hereby disclaims any disposition or intention to exercise sovereignty, jurisdiction, or control over [Cuba] except for pacification thereof, and asserts its determination, when that is accomplished, to leave the government and control of the island to its people.”

And during the Vietnam War, a non-funding bill was passed in 1974 to cap American personnel levels in Indochina at 3,000. Congress enacted the Cooper-Church amendment in January 1971, which prohibited the use of any appropriated funds to introduce ground troops into Cambodia. Legislation enacted in 1973 cut off funds for combat “in or over or from off the shores of North Vietnam, South Vietnam, Laos or Cambodia,” designed to prevent President Richard Nixon from reintroducing troops or bombing if the North Vietnamese violated the Paris Peace Accords. The 1973 bill also terminated funding for U.S. bombing of Khmer Rouge forces in Cambodia.

Section 1290 of the NDAA requires the secretary of state to certify, within 30 days of enactment and biannually thereafter, that the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia are undertaking “urgent and good faith” efforts to support a diplomatic end to the civil war in Yemen. They must also pursue appropriate measures to alleviate humanitarian conditions there, reducing the risk of harm to civilians from military operations and, in the case of Saudi Arabia, taking appropriate actions to reduce delays in shipments. If the secretary cannot make this certification, then Section 1290 prohibits the use of funds for in-flight refueling services for the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen except under a narrow set of circumstances (which includes targeting al Qaeda and the Islamic State). This prohibition may be waived, however, if the secretary of state certifies that it is in America’s national security interest and describes the coalition’s shortcomings that prevented certification.

Section 1290 falls well within Congress’s authority over the offensive use of the military pursuant to the Declare War Clause. President Trump’s contrary unelaborated assertion in his NDAA signing statement is frivolous. Congress, however, has does nothing despite standing on impregnable constitutional ground.

Presidential signing statements are not authorized by the Constitution’s text. They are superfluous to defending the president’s constitutional prerogatives. As elaborated in Federalist 73, the qualified veto power conferred in Article I, section 7 is supposed to be used to defend against unconstitutional congressional encroachments on executive power.

Signing statements, however, are to qualified vetoes what nuclear bombs are to muskets. Qualified vetoes can be overridden by supermajority votes in the House and Senate. Congress, for example, overrode President Nixon’s veto of the War Powers Resolution (WPR) to make it law. In contrast, signing statements are never presented to Congress for approval or rejection. If, in lieu of a veto, President Nixon had issued a signing statement declaring the WPR unconstitutional and void, the law would have been stillborn.

Moreover, qualified vetoes apply to the entire legislation Congress presents to the president. The latter may not pick and choose which provisions will pass into law and which will be vetoed. Thus, President George Washington, who presided over the constitutional convention, acknowledged that he had to either “approve all the parts of a Bill, or reject it in toto.” President William Howard Taft, later chief justice of the Supreme Court, observed that the president “has no power to veto part of a bill and let the rest become law.” The Supreme Court thus held in Clinton v. New York (1998) that the line-item veto power Congress had conferred on the president by statute was unconstitutional.

Such authority would cripple congressional independence from the executive. It’s Congress’s right to, as it often does, combine in a single bill provisions both wanted and unwanted by the president to force a difficult political decision between all or nothing. Likewise, members of Congress routinely confront tough choices in voting on entire bills that contain provisions they both approve of and oppose. Accordingly, signing statements cannot be justified on the theory that the Constitution intended the president to enjoy an easy and uncomplicated political life. As President Harry Truman admonished, “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.”

Signing statements were a rara avis for nearly two centuries before the inauguration of President Ronald Reagan. Then they became epidemic as the American Empire waxed—especially after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. As I previously wrote, you can’t have an Empire without a Caesar, and you can’t have a Caesar without executive usurpation of legislative power.

Before the Golden Age of Empire, the law was clear. Signing statements were impotent to overcome what Congress had passed. In 1971, President Nixon signed a bill that included a provision directing the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Southeast Asia. A signing statement declared that the provision “does not represent the policies of the Administration.”

A year later in DaCosta v. Nixon, a federal district court instructed President Nixon that when he signed the bill, it established U.S. policy “to the exclusion of any different executive or administration policy, and had binding force and effect on every officer of the Government, no matter what their private judgments on that policy, and illegalized the pursuit of an inconsistent executive or administration policy.” No executive statement, including that of the president, “denying efficacy to the legislation could have either validity or effect.” I served on a 2006 American Bar Association Task Force on Presidential Signing Statements and the Separation of Powers Doctrine, and it echoed the federal district court in DaCosta v. Nixon.

Congress is too cowardly to directly resist President Trump’s NDAA signing statement. If it’s going to shirk its full assignment of powers, it might consider a lesser measure: legislation to pass the buck to the federal judiciary by authorizing relevant congressional committees to sue the president seeking declaratory judgments that the signing statement has no constitutional standing. There are several preferable and more muscular congressional options, but politics is the art of the possible, as Otto von Bismarck advised.

Bruce Fein was associate deputy attorney general and general counsel of the Federal Communications Commission under President Reagan and counsel to the Joint Congressional Committee on Covert Arms Sales to Iran. He is a partner in the law firm of Fein & DelValle PLLC.

Post Comment   Private Reply   Ignore Thread  


TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest

#1. To: Deckard (#0)

Earlier this month, for instance, the Saudi-led and United States-supported coalition bombed a school bus in North Yemen, killing dozens of young boys terrorist larvae.

Hank Rearden  posted on  2018-08-25   14:43:21 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#2. To: Deckard, *Neo-Lib Chickenhawk Wars* (#0)

Senate Leadership Blocks Voting on Amendment to Defund Yemen War

Sen. Murphy's amendment won't get hearing for Defense Appropriations Act

Sen. Chris Murphy’s (D-CT) amendment to withdraw all funding for the US involvement in the war in Yemen was blocked by Senate leadership on Wednesday, preventing it from getting a vote for inclusion in the 2019 Defense Appropriations Act.

There was language aiming to limit US involvement in Yemen in the 2019 NDAA, but President Trump’s signing statement indicated that he doesn’t intend to comply with that. This meant using control over the funding, through the appropriations act, was the next real chance to require compliance.

The Murphy Amendment said largely the same thing that the language in the NDAA said, except with the added threat of revoking funding. It seeks for the administration to certify that any US involvement complies with international law. President Trump objected to offering such a report to Congress.

Senate leaders complaining they felt that the appropriations act was too important to pass to allow it to be cluttered by amendments that limit where the war funding included in it goes. This means, barring another bid for a War Powers Act challenge, the unauthorized US involvement in the war will continue.

https://news.antiwar.com/2018/08/22/senate-blocks-voting-on-amendment-to-defund-yemen-war/



Hondo68  posted on  2018-08-25   15:10:45 ET  (1 image) Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#3. To: Deckard (#0)

Trump’s NDAA signing statement decreed that the 50 provisions unconstitutionally encroached on the president’s prerogatives as “Commander in Chief and as the sole representative of the Nation in foreign affairs.”

Then we have, "Section 1290 falls well within Congress’s authority over the offensive use of the military pursuant to the Declare War Clause."

So ... which is it? A shining example of "Truth isn't truth".

misterwhite  posted on  2018-08-25   17:56:28 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#4. To: Deckard (#0)

Fear monger propaganda from the left... scaring the ignorant sheep, shitless.

Don’t be a sheep

I'm the infidel... Allah warned you about. كافر المسلح

GrandIsland  posted on  2018-08-25   18:18:30 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#5. To: Deckard (#0)

Nixon lacked the stones to fight Congress to the death. Trump doesn't.

Vicomte13  posted on  2018-08-25   18:54:19 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#6. To: GrandIsland (#4)

Fear monger propaganda from the left...

Source: The American Conservative

“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul

In a Cop Culture, the Bill of Rights Doesn’t Amount to Much

Deckard  posted on  2018-08-25   19:16:25 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#7. To: Deckard (#6)

Fear monger propaganda from the left...

Source: The American Conservative

Aren't they a bunch of Moderates?

Vegetarians eat vegetables. Beware of humanitarians!

CZ82  posted on  2018-08-26   9:26:13 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#8. To: CZ82 (#7)

(The American Conservative)

Aren't they a bunch of Moderates?

YUP.

Liberator  posted on  2018-08-26   9:38:24 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#9. To: Hank Rearden (#1)

terrorist larvae

Like it!

Liberator  posted on  2018-08-26   9:38:51 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#10. To: GrandIsland (#4)

Fear monger propaganda from the left... scaring the ignorant sheep, shitless.

Don’t be a sheep

It's too late for him. But then you know that already.

Liberator  posted on  2018-08-26   9:39:30 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#11. To: CZ82 (#7)

Aren't they a bunch of Moderates?

Founded by Patrick J. Buchanan. No moderate.

A K A Stone  posted on  2018-08-26   10:16:24 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#12. To: A K A Stone (#11) (Edited)

Aren't they a bunch of Moderates?

Founded by Patrick J. Buchanan. No moderate.

Then why do the members of The American Conservative call themselves "Main Street Republicans", which are Centrists and Moderates??

Pat is a paleoconservative (which means "old conservative").

Vegetarians eat vegetables. Beware of humanitarians!

CZ82  posted on  2018-08-26   12:03:53 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest

[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Mail]  [Sign-in]  [Setup]  [Help]  [Register] 

Please report web page problems, questions and comments to webmaster@libertysflame.com