Former WA Attorney General: Trump claim of ‘total authority’ is ‘wishful thinking’
Apr 16, 2020, 9:53 AM | Updated: Oct 8, 2024, 6:55 am
President Trump at a White House coronavirus task force briefing. (Getty Images)
(Getty Images)
Earlier this week, President Trump asserted he has “total” authority when it comes to ordering states to relax social distancing measures. According to former Washington State Attorney General Rob McKenna, though, that’s a problematic claim to say the very least.
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“He has a very expansive view of executive power, and he’s wrong,” McKenna told KIRO Radio’s Dave Ross. “This is just not one of the powers that he has, to order the states to end their states of emergency and to end their stay at home orders when he wants them to — it’s not within his authority.”
“He just seems to be blustering or engaging in wishful thinking,” he added.
McKenna points to Article 10 of the Constitution for guidance, which gives states any and all powers not specifically assigned to the federal government. Among the powers states have is “to protect health and safety,” he notes, “and that’s what the states are doing.”
More than that, the idea that states have the right to make their own decisions on matters like this is something ascribed by the Founding Fathers themselves. Trump’s claim that he has the right to override that authority flies directly in the face of that, according to McKenna.
“Is that the sound of Alexander Hamilton spinning in his grave?” he quipped. “We’re a republic of 50 states and they keep power.”
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The question of presidential powers was again called into question Wednesday, this time regarding a threat from Trump to adjourn Congress to push through a series of appointments.
That’s a claim that again had the President running up against Constitutional barriers.
“This issue of when or whether the president can dissolve the Legislature was very much on the minds of the framers of our Constitution, because the King in England for many centuries used to use the power to dissolve Parliament to have his way with them,” McKenna described.
That being so, the President “can’t adjourn Congress whenever he feels like it.”
“The fact is that our framers understood that this kind of power is, to quote the Heritage Foundation, ‘among the quickest routes to tyranny,'” said McKenna.
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