The only rebuttal I see in the media is that congress set these up to be “independent”. But our government doesn’t have independent branches. In fact that sounds a lot like “unelected and unaccountable”.
So which branches are these agencies under? Is it in the judicial, legislative, or executive - and if it’s in the executive why can’t the chief executive manage business?
On the other hand, one of the issues brought up in the Obama years was whether a president can choose not to enforce a law like immigration. If congres’s laws can be ignored than what power do they have?
Genuine question. Does anyone have a constitutional framing for the duties of the executive branch in prioritizing enforcement or implementation of law?
Congress makes lots of rules about how the executive can wield power:
* FOIA tells the executive branch when/how to share documents.
* APA tells executive agencies what they have to do to make a rule.
* Congress gives line item budgets, and the executive doesn't get to reassign funds.
* Executive agencies must submit to audits from GAO (within congress)
It's perfectly reasonable for congress to limit how executive agency heads can be hired/fired too. After all, it's agencies that congress enacted and gave power too, and for legitimiate reasons that congress has.
Why is that the question? I think it's clear that some of them work for the president, and the president (perhaps filtered through cabinet members and others) tells them what to do. But that doesn't mean that Congress can't put limits on when and how the president can fire them.
That isn't necessarily the case for all officials. For example, I believe Congress can't prevent the president from firing a member of the cabinet. But that doesn't mean the president can do whatever he wants to anyone.
There is no central FOIA office. Each agency has is responsible for their own FOIA requests. IF you are referring to this news story [1] That was just the FOIA office at OPM.
Yeah, don't be so hard on Musk and Trump. They're destroying oversight agency by agency, not all at once. Starting with the agency in charge of HR oversight.
They aren't 'independent' they are 'a mix between executive and legislative'. The Supreme Court decisions are Meyers v US and Hunters Executor v US. And I'm not a constitutional scholar but my reading of it is that the protections in question come from the legislative delegating some of their power to the executive, think legislative actions (researching laws, etc) but retaining their constitutional prerogative to protect them from executive control.
This is something that has existed for a very long time but has been changing lately and will almost certainly show up in the Supreme Court again.
“ Myers v. United States, 272 U.S. 52 (1926), was a United States Supreme Court decision ruling that the President has the exclusive power to remove executive branch officials, and does not need the approval of the Senate or any other legislative body.”
If your question is whether the “independent” agencies are Constitutional, the answer is yes. Congress makes the laws and the laws can constrain the behavior of the President. If the law says the President cannot fire someone, or interfere in an agency’s work, then the President cannot.
So who are such agencies accountable to? Congress. Just like the president is accountable to Congress.
This is just flatly incorrect. Humphrey's Executor (which may not be long for this world as precedent, anyway) lays out specific cases where "for cause" requirements on termination are Constitutional, but otherwise the President's power to dismiss subordinate officers of the executive branch is absolute.
The Court distinguished between executive officers and quasi-legislative or quasi-judicial officers. The Court held that the latter may be removed only with procedures consistent with statutory conditions enacted by Congress, but the former serve at the pleasure of the President and may be removed at his discretion. The Court ruled that the Federal Trade Commission was a quasi-legislative body because it adjudicated cases and promulgated rules. Thus, the President could not fire a member solely for political reasons. Therefore, Humphrey's firing was improper.
“If the law says the President cannot fire someone, or interfere in an agency’s work, then the President cannot.”
This is, indeed, flatly incorrect. Congress cannot pass a law requiring that the Secretary of State or Defense or Treasury be fired only for cause. The SCOTUS case knocking it down would likely be 9-0.
“Congress writes the laws and can make them say whatever they want” totally ignores separation-of-powers concerns that the Constitution and its guardians in Article III courts take very seriously.
> Congress cannot pass a law requiring that the Secretary of State or Defense or Treasury be fired only for cause. The SCOTUS case knocking it down would likely be 9-0.
No one is saying Congress can restrict the President from firing political appointees or his Cabinet.
We're talking about the quasi-legislative or quasi-judicial agencies here. In the case you cite, Humphrey was on the FTC, and Roosevelt tried to fire him. The Court said the President couldn't him because Congress wrote it in the law. That's exactly what the other poster was saying, so how are they flatly incorrect?
The quote I was referring to as “flatly wrong” is repeated above. Nowhere there or in the original post are the phrases “quasi-legislative” or “quasi-judicial”. Instead a much more general claim is made that the Congress’ power to constrain acts of the Executive is unlimited because they write the laws. That’s not at all how our system works.
The oral arguments in Selia Law v. CFPB may be enlightening here:
Just stop. The sentence before the one you said is flatly wrong mentions “independent agencies” — those are the “quasi-legislative” agencies like the FTC.
The other poster was right and you posted case law proving their point.
You’re begging the question: What makes an agency “independent”? The answer given by the original poster was “because Congress says so, and they can”. That is, again, flatly wrong.
Congress can’t reorganize the Treasury as an independent agency. Why not? Making the sole director of the CFPB dismissible only for cause was ruled unconstitutional. Why?
Taking the claim made by the original poster as accurate would lead you to get both of these important questions wrong.
Your comment is way too vague to be declaring anything as flat out wrong. At any rate, federal employees have numerous protections from being fired arbitrarily as laid out by the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978, a law passed precisely to limit arbitrary firing of federal employees, especially for politically motivated reasons.
They are part of the executive branch, but the law governs and constrains the behavior of the executive in managing them.
You can’t even say that Congress is solely the source of those constraints since the laws creating and governing these agencies were signed by… the president!
Most of these agencies have already been challenged in court and the Constitutionality of their structure and governance affirmed.
I agree. Taking trump to court for not carrying out existing law is a winning case. Saying he can’t replace X person because they are in an independent branch is not going to hold up. And I suspect they know that and want the court to rule on it.
Unless someone can make an argument that they actually report to congress.
Part of the executive power in the US is that the president influences the judicial branch, and ultimately the judicial branch is going to determine who gets to do what. They do this in many ways, a big one being they can prioritize any case they want, and simply decline to even hear certain ones. So if the president wants to do something, congress pushes back and challenges it and it goes to court, the president can effectively “get away with it” as long as the judiciary is fine with it
The president influences the judicial branch by appointing its members. There are now lots of federal judges, and several Supreme Court justices, appointed by Trump during his first term, who seem happy to allow Trump to do whatever he wants to do.
Certainly that's not universal. Some Trump appointees will likely balk when Trump goes too far in their estimation. But this is what happens when the GOP politicizes their judicial appointments.
Sure, in an ideal world. These folks all attend the same parties, and by many accounts seemingly think the same thoughts, which is pretty wild!
All three branches are now run by ideologues. There is no independent thought. There may be independence on paper, and on that we would agree. But the situation here in reality isn’t really related to what’s on paper. In fact these folks mean to ignore all the current laws and just do whatever the fuck they want and I’m not making that up. I’m reporting what I see.
They don't have to be part of any branch. The usual branches are descriptive concepts. (Or they can be part of the executive branch yet still not be part of the "unitary executive" part. The law allows for any kind of exemptions and special-casing.)
They're not "accountable to nobody". Assuming they have the votes, congress can revoke any law, at any time, for any reason. And typically laws specifying the appointment of specific people also have provisions for removing that person.
The reason for this is stability. Congress, businesses, international allies, and most US citizens typically don't want things to dramatically change every new presidential administration. And the primary way to ensure that stability is to make it so the same people are working in various government offices from administration to administration. And I think people are quickly learning why that stability is desirable, as the current administration attempts to dismantle it with no consideration for the consequences.
Friend, I think I see your concern, and I may have an answer. Most of the bureaucracy is apolitical. However, the heads and higher-ups of each agency are appointed by the currently in-office politicians.
So the upper management is composed of political appointments. And like any other organization, the upper management has considerable discretion in setting priorities.
re: "politically selective law enforcement" is not a good thing, because laws are one of the things that are supposed to constrain politicians.
Congress can only make laws if they don’t infringe on the constitution. If they want laws that aren’t constitutional, they have to make constitutional amendments, which is probably never going to happen ever again because of how dysfunctional they are and have been for decades.
The president has a lot of constitutional protection to run the executive branch, though obviously congress has ways to pass laws and influence that, too.
The president isn’t accountable to congress but there are checks and balances both ways
In a democracy the three branches are independent. Democracy is not just 'you get to elect the guy on top', it also attempts to preserve the rights of the population. If the population does not have rights, democracy soon becomes very fake. E.g., I don't like this or that party so I throw anyone in jail during election day if I know that they would vote for the wrong party. The general principle is that if a person/organization has too much power they will generally find a way to abuse it. The famous split-up in three branches is employed to a greater or lesser extend in all countries where the rights of the population are respected.
Congress has lots of power, it's a question of whether they do anything. Currently the Republicans are uniformity falling in line with the authoritarian executive orders, even those that abrogate well established congressional powers.
Remember we are still in the first 100 days. Congress typically falls in line for the first few months (not always 100 days, but it is a good round number). As the term goes on though congress tends to start looking to the next election and they start to opposed unpopular things because they will lose in 2 years. Trump is risking a democrat super majority in the house in 2 years if he is too unpopular, and 20 republicans are up for election in the senate, if even half of them turn that would be a majority for the democrats and a shot that the other republican senators (who want to win election in 2-4 more years) will pay attention to.
But we need to get through the first few months before any of this will play out. And after that there is still a long time before the 2026 elections.
I think this is a good point. I'm not convinced that we can take all that much for granted during this presidential term. Trump is all about violating norms, and now he has Musk flipping votes in Congress by threatening to fund primary challengers.
But the cynic in my knows that a big chunk of a legislator's job is figuring out how to get re-elected next term. If (when) Trump does things unpopular with regular Republicans, and legislators are seen to be doing nothing to help their constituents, they'll start to worry they won't get re-elected.
It'll be the same thing that's happened with Democrats: Republican voter turnout will suffer because the candidates in front of them aren't doing anything useful for them.
What on earth gave you the idea this administration will be anything like a previous one? I don’t think we can assume the rules will just stay the same.
So long as there are elections in 2026 the looming election will have an effect. I doubt Trump can get away with trying to stop elections or even manipulating them (much - there is always manipulation). As such congress will soon start behaving like elections matter and they might not be elected if they are unpopular.
True, but even in either party's most wildest predictions, a supermajority in the House or Senate is vanishingly unlikely.
I guess there's a chance Trump will do something so horribly unpopular that there will be extreme bipartisan support for limiting his power in some ways. But I'm not sure I'd rely on that either.
It’s astounding the regularity over the last 100 years that conservatives have used immigration narratives to fire up their base regardless of what statistical data shows.
Obama may have deported lots of people, but Trump famously used the same institutions to detain and torture minors indefinitely... Which of those is "harder" against immigration?
It's the same issue that is happening now. Biden deported a lot more people, but he focused on people entering the US or caught doing something. Trump is deporting a low fewer people, but he randomly taking people from their homes, workplaces and schools. Which one do you think appears "harder" on TV?
So in other words his supporters are a bunch of sadistic idiots who would rather see kindergartners tortured than a cartel member deported into custody because it means a hard tough man is in charge!
Maybe it's more a case of rampant mathematical illiteracy all over the press and people paying more attention to extraordinary events. I really don't know.
I'm talking about the policy of deporting the parents and keeping children detained waiting for the result of "refugee" requests that were never even filled. And no, Biden stopped that really quickly.
The "cages" are the same whether you keep people there for a couple of days waiting for a flight back into their country or for months for no good reason.
The Administration is required to follow the law and to implement it with due care as the legislation intended.
The Legislature can impeach the Administration, it can hold it's officers in contempt, and it can pass laws constraining the Administration.
It's a simple problem: NO ONE IS DOING THEIR JOB. This is because they can get away with it and you don't actually have the power to vote them out. The media is part of the problem and is no longer serving the interests of the citizens. The monopolized corporations ensure you cannot use the Internet to meaningfully solve this problem. Look at this garbage thread. Look at all these garbage threads on here every time some political problem comes up. It's all compromised claptrap designed to appeal to corporate American but in no way to connect and govern in a modern fashion with each other.
Look at turn out on voting day when a presidential election is not slated. It's typically less than 25% of the voting age population that turns out. If you sit and think about this for one minute you will see why we are where we are.
The problem here is that if you impeach Trump, then you get Vance, who will do the same stuff Trump is doing. You impeach Vance, and you get Johnson, who will do the same stuff Trump is doing. And so on, down the line. Eventually you run out of people in the presidential line of succession, and then you have a real problem. I suppose eventually you get to the point where you have a president who doesn't feel like getting impeached? But by then the damage to the institution has been done.
> it can hold it's officers in contempt
Who is going to enforce any orders (fines, imprisonment) around those contempt rulings? Congress and federal courts don't really have much law enforcement personnel to speak of. Trump controls federal law enforcement, and he can instruct them to ignore contempt rulings.
I guess the House (for example) has the Sergeant at Arms, but their law enforcement staff is limited, and I don't think they're going to want to get into a conflict with, say, the Secret Service, if they go to arrest a cabinet member, but Trump says no.
> and it can pass laws constraining the Administration.
There are already laws constraining the administration, and Trump and Musk are running roughshod over them. Why would they obey new laws they don't like?
I think you’re right… impeachment is the main mechanism by which they can complain that he’s not enforcing the law. I’m struggling to think of what else they can do.
> But our government doesn’t have independent branches.
In theory it does, that is the whole idea and genius of the constitution.
In fact at the moment it does not, because Trump has so captured the Republican party that the legislature has almost no power to stand up to him. The Supreme Court has a long history of judges aligning with the political party that seated them, and Trump put 3 of them into their seat.
>To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.
So yes, Congress has wide leeway to create agencies to administer particular executions of laws passed by Congress and signed by the President.
Furthermore, we don't have untouchable officials. What does that hypothetical have to do with anything?
The heads of these agencies that Trump is removing are protected from being fired immediately, fired without Congressional notification, and from being fired without cause.
Rank-and-file civil servants are protected from being fired unrelated to performance precisely so we don't revert to the patronage systems of the 1800s.
No one says they get a lifetime claim, just that some cannot be legally fired without cause. Not sure why you are going to the extreme of "untouchable officials" and "lifetime claim" when no one has suggested that's the case.
If the law is that that an official cannot be fired without cause, then that's that, if there's no cause. Maybe they have a term of employment in that position, and when it ends, they leave. Maybe Congress can fire them via some other appropriate mechanism. But if the law says the president cannot fire them without cause, then that's just not a power the president has.
So which branches are these agencies under? Is it in the judicial, legislative, or executive - and if it’s in the executive why can’t the chief executive manage business?
On the other hand, one of the issues brought up in the Obama years was whether a president can choose not to enforce a law like immigration. If congres’s laws can be ignored than what power do they have?
Genuine question. Does anyone have a constitutional framing for the duties of the executive branch in prioritizing enforcement or implementation of law?