I have not a lot of knowledge how American politics work, but isn't this for congress to decide? how is Trump so powerful? (sorry for my daft question)
this post was submitted on 04 Mar 2025
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The president was always able to stop aid under certain conditions. Trump is just going to certify that one of those conditions exist no matter how ridiculous it is.
It isn't daft. The Republicans since Reagan have pushed a fringe legal theory called the Unitary Executive Theory. Basically, they want the president to fully control the executive branch and military such that theirs is the only voice that matters for much of the government. Not unlike a king, but partially checked by congress and the courts. They have been taking (illegal) actions to try to get sued, and also have been suing others/other branches of government, to try to get the Supreme Court to hear cases that will support this fringe legal theory so that it becomes the law of the land.
I am not a lawyer, but this is possibly something Trump can legally do since he is Commander in Chief of the armed forces. However, this seems more like an apportionment thing, which is Congress' responsibility. Congress has allocated funds to send military aid to Ukraine. So, even if Trump as Commander in Chief could say "no more weapons to ukraine", it seems doubtful to me that he could (legally) stop weapons shipments currently en route.
But, by the time whatever government office sues the office of the president to get a judge to enjoin them to send the agreed upon weapons that were already apportioned, it will already have hurt Ukraine somewhat. Trump often weaponizes inefficiency. And these sort of illegal acts aren't crimes per se - they're just procedural breaches - the legal remedy is just to reverse the action.
So, probably not legal. But Trump gets to weaponize his administration's incompetence (or feigned incompetence) to at least delay aid. More competent people may support these actions, knowing they're illegal, to try and strengthen the president's role even further.
Wow! Thanks so much for this reply! this is very helpful, thnx a lot
The answer is simpler than that: the "checks and balances" system is a facade created to prevent meaningful progressive policy from passing. There's a reason why Trump can modify a billion laws from day 1, but poor Biden couldn't possibly do anything to codify abortion as a right or prevent the bombing of children in Gaza.
This isn't quite right. Trump didn't really modify laws. That isn't even something he can claim to do since he is the head of the Executive branch, not the Legislative one. He issued executive orders, many of which were illegal, and he had some cronies who enacted some of them anyway - others did not enact some of these. He did rescind many policies, but he can't just make laws go away on his own. There are literally hundreds of court cases currently challenging these executive orders - seeing as how the judiciary is the primary check on the executive branch, that is the system working to check presidential power.
However, I am not a liberal, I am a socialist and do not think this is working well - there are many problems here. The highest levels of the judiciary have been largely captured by far-right judges, many of whom are specifically aligned with Trump's goals and support the unitary executive theory. Also, this method of checking presidential power is extremely slow. For every illegal action Trump's administration takes, a court case has to be crafted, filed, heard, and adjudicated. Every one. And invariably, some will not reach the correct outcome and others will never actually be taken to court - there are just too many.
Basically, the administration is using the fact that they control every branch of government to dismantle or capture core government agencies and to provide cover for various illegal actions - forcing them through if only temporarily for various political and structural ends. A soft coup, basically. So yeah, the fact that something like this is possible is proof of the flaws inherent in this system of government.
That's a lot of words to say that I'm right in practice even if not in principle lmao.
I'm a commie too, BTW. You're way too charitable to the US institutions IMO.
Republicans hold the majority in congress, so they're refusing to push back and are just allowing him to usurp power from them.
Thnx for your reply! i understand that, but it seems nothing goes via congress?!
Congress is a check and balance to executive power, just like the judicial.
They are not checking or balancing his power. So they are in effect, impotent.
And they don't care because the White House is occupied by someone on their team. This country fucking sickens me.
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I would love to see everyone just start ignoring Trump and everything he says and just keeps doing their job.
The way it should be
Doesn't really matter most European tech is way ahead of the US anyway, it's just they the US pay stupid amounts to their own companies. I kinda feel most US tech is a super expensive in comparison honestly.
I feel a cupholder on a US jet would be valued at something like 50,000. I'd honestly be really curious how a Rafale fared against say a f-35 I suspect it would win
My suspicion is an European jets would own and devestate an American ones while being a small fraction of the price.
Yes I am honestly saying while America spends stupid amount off Defense they don't hold the slightest advantage tech wise.
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The US wouldn’t stop military aid to Israel while the IDF destroyed hospitals and killed children and journalists among many other war crimes. They will freeze aid to Ukraine as it defends itself in a war of conquest. Evidence suggests the USA would rather align with criminals like Putin and Netanyahu than war victims.
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https://www.itamilradar.com/2025/03/04/look-who-we-have-here/
"The ambiguous American behavior continues: on the one hand, they (verbally) threaten to withdraw support for Ukraine, including intelligence assistance, while on the other hand, they are increasing SIGINT flights over the Black Sea."
Who says those SIGNT flights are for Ukraine anymore?
At best they won't share, at worst it's for russia
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Each time I read "Trump orders", "Trump does X", I always ask myself: "Wait, can he do that? Congress? House? Judiciary? Cheks? Balances? Hellooooooooooo...?"...
... but this is still the first few months of his second term. At this pace, he will be a literal king in a few more months.
A scary prospect to say the least, and I hope it's not too late for America to do something about this. This should not be normalized. This cannot be normalized.
The average us citizen doesn’t have a solid grasps of how our government actually works.
Defunding education and gutting curriculum and removing civics education has … been impactful.
I'd say the average republican does have a solid grasp of how the government works, seeing the extremely high activity of Trump's government. Turns out the "checks and balances" and the "branches of government" and all of that shit only serves to slow down progressive policy. When it's about bombing brown kids or defending healthcare, policy can speed through the fucking system
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Laws only have value as long as someone is willing to enforce them. It's all a social construct.
I'm not from the US and am far from being a legal expert, but your country appears to be close to being lawless (or is getting there at an accelerated pace).
I mean it's really not close to lawless, it's just we've decided one man is king and can't do anything illegal
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until Trump determines that Ukrainian leaders are making a genuine effort toward peace.
They are literally shooting every Russian they spot on their soil, how is that not making a genuine effort toward peace?
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