'Extortionate': Legal expert shreds Trump's 'impermissible' war on 'constitutional rights'

President Donald Trump's pattern of exerting strategic pressure on various groups into supporting his agenda by threatening their federal support is blatantly unconstitutional, according to one legal expert.

In a Friday op-ed for the Washington Post, University of Pennsylvania law and philosophy professor Mitchell Berman observed that during the first five months of his second term, Trump has demonstrated a willingness to use everything from federal grants, to security clearances, foreign visas and press credentials as "leverage" to arm-twist American institutions into submission.

Berman alluded to Trump threatening to pull federal funding from public universities that have diversity, equity and inclusion programs, withholding press credentials from media outlets that don't use his preferred name for the Gulf of Mexico and denying security clearances for law firms that represented clients Trump disagrees with politically, among other examples.

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"Different targets, but one common tool: leverage," Berman wrote. "Trump uses federal funds and other government benefits to pressure individuals and institutions into exercising their constitutional rights as he prefers. This is extortionate. And therefore unconstitutional."

In his essay, Berman pointed out that Stephen Miran, who is the chairman of the Trump White House's Council of Economic Advisers, admitted that the president "views tariffs as generating negotiating leverage for making deals," saying that "access to the U.S. consumer market is a privilege that must be earned, not a right." Berman argued that even though federal funding for education and research is also a privilege, Trump is nonetheless taking that same approach to American institutions despite those institutions having explicit rights spelled out in the First, Fifth, Sixth and Tenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

"[I]t’s impermissible to withhold benefits for the purpose of shaping or punishing American institutions for exercising the rights they do have — including free speech," Berman said.

"The courts have long recognized that such power requires constitutional limits," he added. "The president may not withhold otherwise available funds, or deny access to government benefits, to make it costly for Americans to exercise their constitutional rights."

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Click here to read Berman's full op-ed in the Post (subscription required).