President Trump at Prescott Valley Event Center in Prescott Valley, Arizona (Oct. 4, ’16) — by Gage Skidmore (retrieved from Wikipedia Commons)

The Anonymous Op-Ed By a Senior Trump Official Sets a Dangerous Precedent

James L. T.
Sep 8, 2018 · 5 min read

As I am sure everyone has read, heard, or talked about, the New York Times recently published an anonymous Op-Ed in which a senior aid to President Trump reported that they are a part of the resistance and that they were doing things to “frustrate parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations.”

No one should rejoice at this precedent. Rather, we should all be horrified, less at the prospect of having an unfit president in the White House, but because officials would rather illegally manage the President’s power than exercise constitutional checks to remove him.

It is very easy for members of the left to be thrilled at the prospect of confirmation that their instincts are now confirmed about Trump. But those feelings, however motivated, do not justify the very real problem that an anonymous senior aid impeding the president presents. The ends do not justify the means. And of course, we should all expect members of the political right to rally and be opposed to such anonymous disloyalty.

I would call on my liberal friends and colleagues to walk a very careful line between supporting sabotage over constitutional means (i.e., the 25th Amendment) to address the problem, and expressing agreement with very real concerns with Trump’s fitness to be president.

While I, as someone who did not vote for Trump, and do not support Trump, believe that much of Trump’s agenda is dangerous, anti-democratic, authoritarian, racist, and antithetical to progress — I am also aware that he was elected to be all of these things. He was elected because he is reactionary, and because people wanted a “change agent” even if that meant it was dangerous.

The anonymous official wrote:

“ Although he was elected as a Republican, the president shows little affinity for ideals long espoused by conservatives: free minds, free markets and free people. At best, he has invoked these ideals in scripted settings. At worst, he has attacked them outright.

In addition to his mass-marketing of the notion that the press is the “enemy of the people,” President Trump’s impulses are generally anti-trade and anti-democratic.

Don’t get me wrong. There are bright spots that the near-ceaseless negative coverage of the administration fails to capture: effective deregulation, historic tax reform, a more robust military and more.

But these successes have come despite — not because of — the president’s leadership style, which is impetuous, adversarial, petty and ineffective.”

These are all political differences of opinion, and differences of opinion on management style. It’s certainly easy to say that Trump was “elected as a Republican”, but Trump from the very beginning was a RINO: Republican In Name Only. More importantly, Trump ran a populist campaign — not a Republican campaign, and certainly not a campaign built on the “ideals long espoused by conservatives.”

Trump is performing exactly the way that he was elected to perform: adversarial, petty-like, impulsive, and otherwise in a chaotic fashion.

This precedent being set by a senior official is not one that should be set, or one that we should be okay with. If all it takes is a policy disagreement to justify “frustrating” a president’s agenda, then what’s to stop the next set of advisers from not making a thinly veiled justification on similar grounds.

President Trump has since suggested that this anonymous senior official is ‘treasonous’: they aren’t. Other’s have suggested that it’s a coup: it isn’t (although it has been referred to as a soft coup which it could be). What it definitely is, is a constitutional crisis.

The part of this anonymous Op-Ed that should be universally observed as problematic is:

“ Given the instability many witnessed, there were early whispers within the cabinet of invoking the 25th Amendment, which would start a complex process for removing the president. But no one wanted to precipitate a constitutional crisis. So we will do what we can to steer the administration in the right direction until — one way or another — it’s over.”

The fact that this person is anonymous, means that they have unchecked power to make executive decisions or affect policy in ways that they should not have the ability to make. It seems to me antithetical to ignore the constitutional checks in place to remove an unfit president because of authoritarian tendencies only then to exercise unfettered control.

Effectively, the Republicans in Congress are refusing to entertain the possibility that impeachment is necessary. Their abdication speaks volumes. But so, too, has advisers of the president abdicated their constitutional means by which to resolve this issue out of fear of “precipitating a constitutional crisis” — instead, they’ll work silently into the night. Instead, they’ll enable the president’s worst authoritarian tendencies by inflaming the issues.

There’s nothing at all courageous about this Op-Ed. For all the talk of personal responsibility and the importance in following the constitution as often ‘espoused by conservatives,’ I see none of those values being exhibited here by a conservative within Trump’s cabinet. I see opportunism — but certainly not the best interests in preserving democracy. If the American people’s interests were at heart in this piece, or the preservation of democracy — it would have been an unmasked tirade into why the senior officials are going to implement the 25th Amendment.

Our democratic institutions, and the checks and balances built into this Republic serve as a means to preserve and protect fundamental rights and liberties. Abstaining, or otherwise abdicating those responsibilities only supports authoritarian encroachment. Silently ‘frustrating the presidents agenda’ is anti-democratic. The shield by which this individual carries is not one that they may craft by their own vision, but one that is given to them by the 25th Amendment. If they refuse to carry that shield, then they can either step out of the way with a volley of very public outcry upon resignation, or they can begin an appropriate constitutional crisis. Otherwise, they’re fighting anti-democracy with anti-democracy.

If this official is so concerned about senior officials complaining on a ‘daily’ basis because the president veers off topic, goes off the rails, is ill informed, makes reckless decisions, engages in repetitive rants, is impulsive, flip-flops on issues, espouses anti-democratic themes, has erratic behavior, casts aids and other officials as villains, and unstable (all terms used in the anonymous Op-Ed)— then the appropriate next step is not illegal usurping of power from the president and constitutional inaction.

Our democracy is at stake, not least of which because we have a president who supports anti-democratic ideas, such as changing libel laws to go after opponents, or regulating Google to minimize negative viewpoints of him — none of this matters in context of an anonymous senior official in the White House, and apparently others actively taking away executive power in lieu of exercising constitutional checks. This is a full blown constitutional crisis that if not address quickly and appropriately will only set precedent for future officials to take matters into their own hands.

This is how democracy dies — by anonymous and illegal actions that function as constitutional inaction. Ironically, our republic is driving towards the precipice of collapse by those who ‘espouse conservative values’ the most.

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James L. T.

Written by

Mental health counselor by day, political blogger by night. #cat person, #liberal. Twitter: @AntiphonSophist

Be Sad With Me

A place where you may share in the commiseration of modern American politics.

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