Screenshot / YouTube
Article II says that the President’s duty is to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” Big Donnie isn’t doing much of that.
Let’s take a stroll through the brain of the most Amendment-Challenged President in our 244-year history.
Unsplash / Visuals
Adopted in 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights, the First Amendment reads:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
He definitely didn’t study up on the 1st. Trump has
“The ability to criticize the government and its leaders lies at the essence of the First Amendment’s protection of free speech; and threats of libel lawsuits are one of the de facto primary means of curtailing free speech in this country today.” — the Authors Guild
Flickr/Gage Skidmore
“The right of the people to be secure in their person, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
It didn’t take long for Trump to discard the fourth.
When he pardoned Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio, our President showed just how little the Constitution means to him. Reminder: Arpaio arrested and jailed people based ONLY ON THEIR APPEARANCE. A judge’s ruling then told him to stop, but Sheriff Joe ignored him and kept on arresting and jailing random innocents. Finally, he was convicted of contempt of court.
On the other hand, when things don’t go Trump’s way, he cries. After his lawyer Michael Cohen was served with a LAWFUL SEARCH WARRANT by the FBI, the whiny Don called it worse than a break-in.
“It’s an attack on our country. It’s an attack on what we all stand for.” – Donald J. Trump
It gets worse. Warrantless searches at the border are now commonplace. And Trump wants to be able to intercept phone calls and text messages as well as snoop into business records. Just what our Founding Fathers had intended!
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Prohibits excessive fines and excessive bail, as well as cruel and unusual punishment.
The Donald is a huge fan of torture, waterboarding, and “enhanced interrogation.” He’s also the king of separating young children from their parents and holding the kids in cages. If that isn’t cruel and unusual, what is?
He’s not satisfied with that. If Trump has his way, he’ll be able to detain undocumented families INDEFINITELY! Currently, the limit for holding children is twenty days, which is still way too long if you’re living in a cage.
Flickr: Pat Arnow
“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
First, Trump says it’s up to the states to decide when to close down, then he says only he has the authority. But, when challenged, he backs down as bullies are prone to do.
“When somebody’s president of the United States, the authority is total.” – Donald J. Trump
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo blasted him — “The Tenth Amendment specifically says ‘powers to the states.’ We don’t have a king!” — which was predictable. What nobody saw coming was Wyoming Senator Liz Cheney giving Donnie-No-Think a quick history lesson.
The federal government does not have absolute power.
“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” United States Constitution, Amendment X
— Liz Cheney (@Liz_Cheney) April 13, 2020
“Trump has no authority to ease social distancing, or to open schools or private businesses. These are matters for states to decide under their power to promote public health and welfare, a power guaranteed by the 10th Amendment to the Constitution.” – Kathleen Bergin, a law professor at Cornell University
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“All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
Someone must have hacked into Trump’s Twitter account because I thought he was “the least racist person you’ve ever met.”
So-called Birthright Citizenship, which costs our Country billions of dollars and is very unfair to our citizens, will be ended one way or the other. It is not covered by the 14th Amendment because of the words “subject to the jurisdiction thereof.” Many legal scholars agree…..
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 31, 2018
“That birthright is protected no less for children of undocumented persons than for descendants of Mayflower passengers.” — James Ho, a Trump appointee to the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals
Screenshot / Time
This year marks the 150th anniversary of the ratification of the 15th Amendment, which promised: “the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”
In a rare moment of candor, Trump decreed that vote-by-mail and other pro-democratic measures would create “levels of voting that if you ever agreed to it, you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.”
Still, the suppression continues. Georgia purged voter rolls. North Dakota refused to let Native Americans use tribal identification to vote. NATIVE AMERICANS! Hey, the government already stole their land, might as well steal their votes, too!
And we all saw what happened during the Wisconsin pandemic primary debacle that was cheered on by Trump.
Flickr/Gage Skidmore
Prohibits the revocation of voting rights due to the non-payment of a poll tax or any other tax.
Despite an overwhelming 2018 victory at the ballot box by Floridians to reinstate convicted felons’ voting rights, Trump flunky Ron DeSantis and his GOP-dominated legislature decided to ignore the results and instead enact a poll tax so most of the ex-cons won’t be able to afford to vote.
Ah, the sweet smell of democracy!
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Addresses succession to the presidency and establishes procedures both for filling a vacancy in the office of the vice president and responding to presidential disabilities.
Oddly enough, Section 4 of the 25th seems to be the only Amendment in which Trump has a firm understanding.
It empowers the vice president and a majority of the “principal officers of the executive departments” to declare the President unfit and to install the vice president on an acting basis. Because the “principal officers of the executive departments” are not clearly defined, Trump has filled his Cabinet with many “temporary” appointees who weren’t Congressionally approved. Hence, he believes that there wouldn’t be enough “votes” to get rid of him.
