The world’s richest man, Elon Musk, said Monday that the U.S. Agency for International Development will be closed on President Donald Trump’s orders, after the prominent tycoon tasked with cutting government spending called the aid agency “evil.”
The world’s richest man, Elon Musk, said Monday that the U.S. Agency for International Development will be closed on President Donald Trump’s orders, after the prominent tycoon tasked with cutting government spending called the aid agency “evil.”
It seems crazy to me that the famed “checks and balances” system of the US government would allow a president to unilaterally shutter an agency with a $50b budget and 10k employees without at least running the idea past the legislature. Even worse, he shouldn’t be able to delegate the authority to shutter agencies to some random dude who hasn’t been confirmed by the senate. Maybe it’s all technically above board, but it definitely shouldn’t be.
It makes no sense that the head of USAID would have to be confirmed by the senate, and yet the agency can be dissolved and stripped for parts on the president’s whim.
The gameplan is: ignore the courts, ignore Congress, do what you want and move fast enough that no one can stop you with the actual legal process. By the time they possibly get a result, even if it’s that what was done was illegal, it’s too late to undo it.
No, it’s not above board at all. It will be challenged in the courts, and the challenge will win. The question becomes, what happens then?
A court can say “This is plainly illegal, it needs to stop and be reversed”, but if that ruling is ignored it’s not like they are going to send in US Marshals to kick DOGE out. Unless there is a clear enforcement mechanism that the court can use, Elon will just stay, like a squatter.
In fact, a squatter is the perfect analogy. Elon simply moved in, without paying rent, because he is a friend of the property manager. And won’t leave because he knows it will take forever for the landlord to evict him and then even after that there is no force to it.
He has already ignored the Supreme Court in regards to TikTok. Under Biden, Abbott ignored the SC with no repercussions as well.
This is not at all above board. Budgets and Departments are squarely in Congress’ jurisdiction, and it’s Congress’ job to step in and impeach him for overstepping his authority. Unfortunately, the fascists took over Congress as well and they’re cheering it on.
The fascists took over congress after being voted in as a majority by the fascist-loving American population.
Absolutely was not above board, I’m afraid. Pretty sure they took a task force that was supposed to look for ways to streamline the IT services of the executive branch and handed it to Musk. But since members of that team didn’t need confirmation (given they had no authority to enact what’s going) they used that as their excuse that it’s legitimate.
When the president was not elected but still given the power, he’ll do whatever he feels like.