5/19/17  //  Commentary

The major constitutional challenge to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau rests on the claim that the President of the United States does not have enough power over the agency.

5/18/17  //  Commentary

No, the President cannot act for any reason. If President Trump fired Comey in an attempt to obstruct an investigation into the Russian connection, that too would constitute an impeachable offense and a federal crime.

5/18/17  //  Commentary

If the Trump Administration chooses to remain in the Paris Agreement, it will be fascinating to see how the administration participates in its implementation. Here's a guide to some of the key legal and political questions.

5/17/17  //  Commentary

On today's two-part episode of Versus Trump, Take Care's podcast, we answer three burning questions related to whether the sitting President can face criminal charges, and how that prosecution could be started. We also have an interview with James Williams, the County Counsel for Santa Clara County, where he discusses his County's lawsuit against Trump Administration that has so far successfully prevented the Trump Administration from enforcing an executive order that would have withdrawn federal funding from so-called sanctuary cities.

5/17/17  //  Commentary

While inquiries into motive need not control legal analysis of Trump's recent conduct, such questions will inevitably shape public (and legal) understanding in profound ways. Sadly, that means we're all about to voyage still deeper into Trump's psyche. This may be a path to madness, but there is no other way forward.

5/17/17  //  Commentary

Today on Take Care, Professor Ann Carlson offers a provocative idea. She suggests that we should be rooting—alongside EPA administrator Scott Pruitt—for the Trump Administration to withdraw the United States from the Paris climate accords. Here’s a less provocative take: No, we shouldn’t.

5/17/17  //  Commentary

Trump already has eviscerated U.S. climate policy. Leaving the Paris Agreement would thus do little harm, while remaining would provide Trump with a fig leaf to obfuscate the damage he is doing. From an environmentalist point of view, the U.S. might be better off if Trump withdraws.

5/17/17  //  Commentary

With briefing almost completed in G.G. v. Gloucester County School Board, it’s good to remember the way in which the case can be resolved on straightforward statutory grounds without deciding whether Title IX prohibits discrimination against transgender persons, as such.

5/16/17  //  Commentary

A particularly brazen part of Trump’s attack on the press has been his assertion—both as a candidate and as President—that he will change the libel laws to make it easier to sue the media for unfavorable coverage. That won't work, for many reasons. But Trump’s outrageous threats are brilliantly successful in other ways, no matter how unlikely they are to formally succeed.

5/16/17  //  Commentary

Trump suggested in a recent signing statement that he could disregard an appropriations restriction on federal marijuana enforcement. But Trump is mistaken.

5/15/17  //  Commentary

Imagine that the President lacked credibility entirely, whether because he was a pathological liar or because his lying was – hypothetically speaking – one symptom of a narcissistic personality disorder. Would there be anything the American people or government officials should or could do about it, short of waiting until the end of the President’s term.

5/15/17  //  Commentary

James Comey’s firing threatens more than just the rule-of-law norm against self-investigation. It also threatens the rule-of-law norm against politically motivated policing and prosecutions.

5/12/17  //  Commentary

Even if Trump fired Comey because Trump knows himself to be innocent of Russia-related wrongdoing, that would still be unacceptable.

5/12/17  //  Commentary

The President's Commission On Voter Fraud Is Not Designed To Seek Data. Instead, The Commission Has Preordained Conclusions It Will Recommend.

5/12/17  //  Commentary

President Donald Trump is known for changing his political views after a ten-minute history lesson. In this continuing feature, I encourage the president to take a few minutes to learn about the historical background of things he says. This first edition, on his signing statement regarding HBCUs, concerns one of his favorite historical topics: A nineteenth-century general who saw the Civil War coming, was angry, and did something about it.