As the United States marks 250 years since the American Revolution, President Donald Trump will be celebrating with more presidential power than any of his predecessors in generations. This power, according to legal scholars and several Supreme Court justices, goes beyond the scope of the monarchy from which Americans fought to liberate themselves. Empowered by a Supreme Court increasingly drawn into his administration’s legal crusades, and unmoored from a Republican-controlled Congress uninterested in checks and balances, the president enters the next chapter of U.S. history testing how far the country has come since then.
The administration has deployed a legal theory that effectively grants the president virtually limitless authority across the government, known as the ‘unitary executive’ theory. This theory, which the Supreme Court has appeared to endorse, gives the president absolute control over the executive branch and its dozens of government institutions and millions of employees. The landmark decision in Trump v Slaughter could open the door for the president to direct federal law enforcement to prosecute his enemies with impunity, bend independent agencies to his will, and launch military actions without congressional approval.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in her dissent, ‘The court gives the president a power unknown even to the English Crown against which the Founders revolted.’ She also stated that the decision ‘upends its precedent, misconstrues our history, and sheds any pretense of judicial modesty.’ The conservative justices’ decision has been met with criticism from experts, who argue that it contributes to a decades-long trend of Democratic and Republican presidents consolidating the powers that the Constitution grants to Congress. Alix Fraser, vice president of advocacy for campaign finance reform organization Issue One, said the decision ‘opens the floodgates for more governing decisions based on the president’s whims and self-interest.’ Trump has welcomed the decision, saying it ‘gives power back to the president at a time when the president really needs power.’ He also wrote on Truth Social, ‘This Decision gives tremendous additional Power back to the Presidency, where it belongs.’ However, others have expressed concern about the implications of the decision. Slaughter, the fired FTC commissioner at the center of the case, said the ruling made her ‘sad for America.’ She told MS NOW, ‘I’m very worried about a future where presidents, like President Trump, can wield this enormous grant of executive power that the Supreme Court just handed to him in order to reward his friends and punish his enemies and do so with impunity.’
