Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas look on during the 60th presidential inauguration on Jan. 20, 2025, in the U.S. Capitol in Washington. Chip Somodevilla/Pool Photo
During Donald Trump's second presidency, many of his critics, both left and right, are warning that he is failing to respect Congress as a "coequal branch of government." But New York Times columnist David French, a Never Trump conservative and scathing Trump critic on the right, dislikes that phrase — arguing that the U.S. Constitution gives Congress even more power than it gives presidents in the United States' system of checks and balances.
Quite a few MAGA Republicans, in contrast to French, are pushing the Unitary Executive Theory — a far-right legal theory claiming that the Constitution gives presidents sole authority over the federal government's executive branch and that Congress has no business limiting presidential authority.
In an article published on December 7, the New York Times' Ann E. Marimow examines the U.S. Supreme Court's views on the powers that the federal government's executive branch enjoys under the Constitution. And Marimow warns that the Roberts Court is inclined to give presidents more, not less, power.
"Once he ascended to the Supreme Court," the Times reporter explains, "Chief Justice Roberts joined other conservatives on the bench in a series of rulings that have chipped away at Congress' power to constrain the president's authority to fire independent regulators. That decades-long project of the conservative legal movement collides on Monday with President Trump's desire to oust officials across the government, in defiance of federal laws meant to protect their jobs and shield them from politics."
Marimow adds, "The result, the Supreme Court's recent decisions suggest, is that the majority will likely side with Mr. Trump in a move that could significantly shift power from Congress to the president and usher in a dramatic change in the way the federal government is structured."
This Monday, December 8, the High Court will be hearing oral arguments in Trump v. Slaughter — and Marimow fears that the GOP-appointed supermajority will side with Trump.
"Monday's case specifically tests whether President Trump can fire Rebecca Slaughter, a Democratic member of the Federal Trade Commission, simply because he says she does not align with his agenda — despite a law that says the president can only remove commissioners for 'inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office,'" Marimow observes. "The (Trump) Administration is asking the justices to toss a 90-year-old precedent that said the Constitution allowed laws like that one and let Congres7s put limits on the president’s authority to dismiss some quasi-independent government officials."
Read Ann E. Marimow's full article for The New York Times at this link (subscription required).
