OPINION:
What is it within the U.S. Constitution that President Trump doesn’t understand?
Article I, Section 8 clearly states that the Congress will have the “power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States …”
The power of the purse is unmistakably embedded in the Congress, as in Section 7 which states that “All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House …” and then sent to the Senate … “before it becomes a law …”
And then there is this additional warning in Article I, Section 9: “No money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in consequences of appropriations made by law.”
The president’s sole power over raising revenues is to either approve the bill with his signature, or return it to the Congress with his objections.
The reason this is now a burning constitutional issue is because Congress has given Mr. Trump only a fraction of the money he is demanding to build his wall along a lengthier stretch of the Mexican border.
And the president says he no longer needs Congress’ money or its approval, because he’s found a way around the Constitution to find the nearly $6 billion he wants to build the wall:
Declare that a “national emergency” exists on the border that he says threatens the health and safety of the American people from migrants who come here in search of jobs and a better way of life for themselves and their family.
Under the Constitution, Mr. Trump says, the president is given the authority to declare such an emergency when our country is threatened by illegals crossing our border.
And under such a declaration, he plans to use $8 billion from the defense budget, military construction accounts, and other agencies.
But a growing coalition of at least 16 states filed a federal lawsuit Monday to block Mr. Trump’s scheme for an end-run around that Constitution to build his border wall without Congress’ approval.
The lawsuit was brought by the states — all with Democratic governors, except one, Maryland. It was filed in U.S. District Court in the Northern District of California, in the San Francisco area where the judges have ruled against the
Trump administration on immigration policies and other issues.
Their action accused Mr. Trump of “an unconstitutional and unlawful scheme,” saying their suit is seeking “to protect their residents, natural resources, and economic interests from President Donald J. Trump’s flagrant disregard of fundamental separation of powers, principles engrained in the United States Constitution.”
The 56-page suit argues that when Congress enacts laws and the president signs them, the Constitution requires that the nation’s chief executive “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.”
Another major argument in their lawsuit states that it is unconstitutional to spend money from the U.S. Treasury unless Congress appropriates it.
But perhaps the most powerful argument in the states’ legal arsenal is that the “federal government’s own data prove there is no national emergency at the southern border that warrants construction of a wall. Customs and Border Protection data show that unlawful entries are near 45-year lows.”
Many newspaper editorials across the country said the lawsuit raised important issues in support of the federal courts striking down Mr. Trump’s specious action.
“Their complaint presents a persuasive case against the president’s move, to the effect that it runs contrary to the constitutional rule that the executive branch may not spend money without Congress’ permission,” The Washington Post wrote in its lead editorial Wednesday.
“Not only is there no national emergency, the complaint argues, but also the wall would not meet the definition of “military construction” in the statute Mr. Trump claims as authority for $3.6 billion of his proposed spending,” The Post said.
Other arguments have been proposed to block Mr. Trump’s power grab, like a joint resolution of disapproval, a move that the House is planning to do soon.
In the final analysis, though, this legal battle is headed for the U.S. Supreme Court where, I predict, Mr. Trump’s illegal gambit will be unanimously shot down.
Donald Lambro is a syndicated columnist and contributor to The Washington Times
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