We Need Mitt Romney. And We Need Him Now.
The national emergency over the border wall gives him a chance to rise to the occasion.
With Donald Trump’s proclamation of a phony national emergency in response to a phony invasion on our southern border, the country has entered a genuine constitutional crisis.
Military funds have been diverted under emergency presidential authority only twice before in our history: by Bush 41 after Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, and by Bush 43 following 9/11. Never before has a president run roughshod over Congress in this manner, abusing statutorily granted emergency powers for an obviously pretextual and nakedly political purpose, and thereby usurping Congress’s constitutionally allotted power of the purse.
Trump has not even bothered to conceal the fraudulent nature of the endeavor, openly acknowledging that there is no genuine emergency, admitting that “I could do the wall over a longer period of time, I don’t need to do thisâ€â€”and explaining that the politics of the 2020 White House race loomed large in his calculations: “the only reason we’re up here talking about this [emergency] is because of the election.â€
A great deal now hinges on how Congress will respond to this frontal assault on the Founding Fathers’ tripartite division of our federal government, designed to ensure, in James Madison’s words, “sufficient guard against those encroachments which lead to a tyrannical concentration of all the powers of government in the same hands.â€
In other words, we have arrived at a crossroads in which we will discover whether the GOP, which over the past two years has abased itself with slavish obeisance to Trump’s personality cult, will rise from its supine position and stand for the rule of law.
With nothing less than the constitutional order on the line, every Republican lawmaker will be judged in history by his or her attitude toward Trump’s counterfeit emergency. One Republican elected official in particular, the new senator from Utah, Mitt Romney, will fall under an especially bright limelight. With national standing as his party’s former presidential standard-bearer, Romney is uniquely positioned to marshal Republican opposition to presidential lawlessness and to defend the Constitution. The burning question of the moment therefore is: will Romney rise to the occasion?
The national emergency over the border wall gives him a chance to rise to the occasion.
With Donald Trump’s proclamation of a phony national emergency in response to a phony invasion on our southern border, the country has entered a genuine constitutional crisis.
Military funds have been diverted under emergency presidential authority only twice before in our history: by Bush 41 after Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, and by Bush 43 following 9/11. Never before has a president run roughshod over Congress in this manner, abusing statutorily granted emergency powers for an obviously pretextual and nakedly political purpose, and thereby usurping Congress’s constitutionally allotted power of the purse.
Trump has not even bothered to conceal the fraudulent nature of the endeavor, openly acknowledging that there is no genuine emergency, admitting that “I could do the wall over a longer period of time, I don’t need to do thisâ€â€”and explaining that the politics of the 2020 White House race loomed large in his calculations: “the only reason we’re up here talking about this [emergency] is because of the election.â€
A great deal now hinges on how Congress will respond to this frontal assault on the Founding Fathers’ tripartite division of our federal government, designed to ensure, in James Madison’s words, “sufficient guard against those encroachments which lead to a tyrannical concentration of all the powers of government in the same hands.â€
In other words, we have arrived at a crossroads in which we will discover whether the GOP, which over the past two years has abased itself with slavish obeisance to Trump’s personality cult, will rise from its supine position and stand for the rule of law.
With nothing less than the constitutional order on the line, every Republican lawmaker will be judged in history by his or her attitude toward Trump’s counterfeit emergency. One Republican elected official in particular, the new senator from Utah, Mitt Romney, will fall under an especially bright limelight. With national standing as his party’s former presidential standard-bearer, Romney is uniquely positioned to marshal Republican opposition to presidential lawlessness and to defend the Constitution. The burning question of the moment therefore is: will Romney rise to the occasion?
Ain't that the truth? And often. 
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