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"Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

whitehouse.gov

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Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#561

Post by jv22222 »

arunabha wrote: post #503

In general, people are going to interpret this EO with their own lens. Unsurprisingly, reasonable people may disagree on the merits of the EO as a whole. However this part of the EO is pretty concerning > 'The President and the Attorney General, subject to the President’s supervision and control, shall provide authoritative interpretations of law for the executive branch' and later > 'No employee of the executive bra…

If they were able to follow through on this absolute power would California succession be on the cards?

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#562

Post by FranzFerdiNaN »

eadmund wrote: post #544
axus wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Supreme Court literally said that Trump has absolute immunity for criminal use of presidential power. Combined with the statistical impossibility of a 2/3 senate majority for impeachment, this is a license to grab as much power as that same court will allow.

I don’t think that’s an accurate description of the decision. I think that it stated that when the President exercises core constitutional power (e.g. the pardon power, or the veto power) then the exercise itself cannot be illegal. I’m not sure if the decision of the Court left open the possibility that the conduct around the exercise of such power can be illegal. If so, then this could be a distinction without much…

It 100% was written with the explicit purpose of giving Trump the power to do whatever he wants. Including ignoring the Supreme Court hilariously enough.

Anyway, the whole discussion is moot because Trump is turning America into a authoritarian state, so rules and laws and elections soon don’t matter anymore.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#563

Post by rchaud »

arunabha wrote: post #530
codewench wrote: post #515

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nothing prevents the next president from having a radically different opinion. Of course, this is only relevant if they are interested in having a 'next' president, something which it seems a segment of society is less than open to.

I would like to believe(perhaps naively) that the segment of population which genuinely believes in doing away with democracy is pretty small. However, in case such an event comes to pass, what is far more important is the segment which actively opposes such a power grab. Authoritarians reply on the passiveness of the majority coupled with a small but very vocal and rabid fan base. It's quite possible that a slow and…

The civil rights movement would not have succeeded without the confluence of growing anti-government sentiment and protests around the Vietnam War, and fears about the spread of communist influence in the US. This forced American leaders to give 15% of their population basic human rights denied to them under Jim Crow laws.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#564

Post by concordDance »

afpx wrote: post #499
concordDance wrote: post #468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly dang, I'm seeing mostly not thoughtful substantive commentary here, just ideological battling. Which is a shame because this is certainly a topic it's possible to do that on (e.g. this comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43105417 ). Are the good comments really worth the large amount of heat?

I'm seeing a lot of helpful discussion, and I'm learning a lot. It's been easy for me to skip over the hyperbole.

When I made that post this was in the main branch (e.g. starting at top comment and going down you hit this before any leaf): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43103830

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#565

Post by DiggyJohnson »

masklinn wrote: post #407
beezlebroxxxxxx wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's kind of fascinating is the way they've introduced things like the Major Questions Doctrine (MQD), which asserted the importance (really, necessity, in their view) of Congress's explicit delegation powers, as a way to curtail agency actions. But then faced with something like this EO, they seem quite obviously faced with something that runs up against the fact the Congress gave explicit statutes for how and wha…

It’s not fascinating in any way, it’s completely habitual for fascists to use every means at their disposal to prevent their opponents from doing anything only to ignore all roadblocks when in power. The GOP has been ramping up their support of unitary executive theory since the 80s yet no democratic president has been able to take a piss without cries of tyranny.

> It’s not fascinating in any way, it’s completely habitual for fascists to use…

This is a tiring way to speak to other reasonable people.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#566

Post by ceejayoz »

NotYourLawyer wrote: post #538
nielsbot wrote: post #518

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who will enforce following the law if the executive branch ignores the judicial? In theory the military is sworn to defend the constitution, but if the DOD is headed by a Trump loyalist (it is), then what?

There is no suggestion that that’s going to happen.

The Vice-President of the United States is openly suggesting it. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gx3j5k63xo.amp

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#567

Post by rchaud »

Zamaamiro wrote: post #258

This EO, combined with his proclamation that "He who saves the country does not violate any law" paint a very concerning picture. This has, historically speaking, been the language of tyrants. No President is above the law, nor does the President "interpret" the law; that is the domain of the Judiciary. “Wherever law ends, tyranny begins”

"He who saves the country" sounds suspiciously close to the "Founder Mode" thinking that Valley CEOs have been bandwagoning behind.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#568

Post by Vegenoid »

dizzant wrote: post #543
arunabha wrote: post #503

In general, people are going to interpret this EO with their own lens. Unsurprisingly, reasonable people may disagree on the merits of the EO as a whole. However this part of the EO is pretty concerning > 'The President and the Attorney General, subject to the President’s supervision and control, shall provide authoritative interpretations of law for the executive branch' and later > 'No employee of the executive bra…

In the second quote, the phrases "in their official capacity" and "as the position of the United States" are doing a lot of heavy lifting. The EO is going out of its way to broadcast that its purpose is to establish a unitary policy position of the executive branch that stems from the President, rather than having "independent" agencies providing contrary position from within "in their official capacity" "as the posi…

> The disincentives that have always prevented the executive from blatantly violating the law are still in force and unchanged. They have been functional through 250 years of Presidents testing the limits of their authority.

Can you elaborate on what those disincentives are? I am thinking:

- Impeachment

- Charged with a crime, found guilty, sent to jail. It seems like this one is no longer possible due to Trump v. United States

- Killed by opponents

Without the criminal charges being on the table, those disincentives look a lot weaker to me.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#569

Post by dathinab »

NotYourLawyer wrote: post #463
Zamaamiro wrote: post #258

This EO, combined with his proclamation that "He who saves the country does not violate any law" paint a very concerning picture. This has, historically speaking, been the language of tyrants. No President is above the law, nor does the President "interpret" the law; that is the domain of the Judiciary. “Wherever law ends, tyranny begins”

> nor does the President "interpret" the law; that is the domain of the Judiciary Everyone tasked with enforcing a law must necessarily interpret its meaning. The judiciary gets the final say though.

you are mixing up different meanings for the word "interpret". "Authoritative Interpreting law" (or in general interpreting law) doesn't mean "trying to understand what it means" but means "deciding what it means in practice"

especially if you add a "authoritative" in the front it in legal language means they gave themself the right (i.e. authority) to decide (i.e. interpret) how law should be interpreted, i.e. what the meaning behind the written word is in practice

this is 100% without doubt or question not compatible with any democracy (including the US constitution) and is pretty much one of the default approaches Dictators use to get unchecked authority

It means that in practice (assuming people comply with the EO) means they can do whatever they want as they can just willfully absurdly, but with authority , misinterpret laws. Including to e.g. persecute judges which "step out of line", or members of the senate which don't vote for whatever he wants etc.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#570

Post by tartoran »

UncleOxidant wrote: post #556
arunabha wrote: post #503

In general, people are going to interpret this EO with their own lens. Unsurprisingly, reasonable people may disagree on the merits of the EO as a whole. However this part of the EO is pretty concerning > 'The President and the Attorney General, subject to the President’s supervision and control, shall provide authoritative interpretations of law for the executive branch' and later > 'No employee of the executive bra…

> setting up the president as the sole power center is an inherently unstable system. Autocracies can be very stable... for a while depending on how much people are able to protest (or not). You could argue that N Korea has been "stable" (from the standpoint of the ruling family) for over 60 years. > There is a very good reason why the founding fathers built in an elaborate system of checks and balances. Sure that's…

> Autocracies can be very stable...

Sure, if you kill all dissenters , keep population terrified and into the dark, remove all sources of information with propaganda then things could stay like that for a while.

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