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WASHINGTON: Donald Trump has spent six months testing the limits of his authority like no other modern US president, say analysts — browbeating Congress and the courts in a power grab that may come to define his second term.
Since January, the Republican leader has repeatedly pushed to secure more power for himself, calling for judges to be axed, firing independent watchdogs and sidestepping the legislative process.
Barbara Perry, a University of Virginia professor and an expert on the presidency, called Trump’s successes in shattering the restraints on his office “frightening.”
“All presidents have been subject to Congress’s and the Supreme Court’s checks on their power, as well as splits in their own political parties,” she said.
“Trump has faced almost none of these counterpoints in this second term.”
It is all a far cry from his first stint in office, when Trump and his supporters believe he was hamstrung by investigations and “deep state” officials seeking to frustrate his agenda.
But those guardrails have looked brittle this time around as Trump has fired federal workers, dismantled government departments and sent military troops into the streets to quell protest.
He has also sought to exert his influence well beyond traditional presidential reach, ruthlessly targeting universities and the press, and punishing law firms he believes have crossed him.
Checks and balances
The US system of checks and balances — the administration, the courts and Congress as equal but separate branches of government — is designed to ensure no one amasses too much power.
But when it comes to Trump’s agenda — whether ending diversity efforts and birthright citizenship or freezing foreign aid — he has largely dodged the hard work of shepherding bills through Congress.
Policies have instead been enacted by presidential edict.
Six months in, Trump has already announced more second-term executive orders than any American leader since Dwight Eisenhower in the 1950s.
He has even sought to bend the economy to his will, escalating attacks on the chief of the independent central bank in a bid to lower interest rates.
Once a robust restraining force against presidential overreach, the Republican-led Congress has largely forsaken its oversight role, foregoing the investigations that previous presidents have faced.
That has left the judiciary as the main gatekeeper.
But Trump has managed partly to neuter the authority of the federal bench too, winning a Supreme Court opinion that mostly reduces the reach of judges’ rulings to their own states.
In his first term the high court made Trump immune from prosecution for actions taken as part of his official duties — no matter how criminal.
And almost every time Trump has turned to the country’s highest legal tribunal to rein in the lower courts in his second term, it has obliged.
The shadow of US President Donald Trump is shown on the text of The Declaration of Independence during the first presidential debate with Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden at Case Western Reserve University on September 29, 2020 in Cleveland, Ohio. (AFP/File)
'Project 2025'
His long shadow has extended far beyond Washington’s institutions, pushing into private realms his predecessors avoided.
Trump has picked fights with elite universities, prestigious law firms and the press — threatening funding or their ability to do business.
The arts haven’t escaped his clunking fist either, with the 79-year-old taking over the running of the Kennedy Center in Washington.
Trump has claimed falsely that the US Constitution gives him the right to do whatever he wants as the ultimate authority over government activities.
This so-called “unitary executive theory” was pushed in the “Project 2025” blueprint for government produced by Trump’s right-wing allies during last year’s election campaign.
Although he disavowed “Project 2025” after it became politically toxic, Trump’s own platform made the same claims for expansive presidential powers.
Pessimistic about the other branches’ ability to hold the administration to account, the minority Democrats have largely been limited to handwringing in press conferences.
Political strategist Andrew Koneschusky, a former senior Democratic Senate aide, believes the checks on Trump’s authority may ultimately have to be political rather than legal or constitutional.
He points to Trump’s tanking polling numbers — especially on his signature issue of immigration following mass deportations of otherwise law-abiding undocumented migrants.
“It’s not entirely comforting that politics and public opinion are the primary checks on his power,” Koneschusky said.
“It would be better to see Congress flex its muscle as a co-equal branch of government. But it’s at least something.”