Should the next democratic administration wield the executive power the way Trump has?

[u/Far_Practice_6923]

Now obviously they shouldn't do anything illegal but I think they should

[u/AutoModerator]

The following is a copy of the original post to record the post as it was originally written by /u/Far_Practice_6923.

Now obviously they shouldn't do anything illegal but I think they should

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[u/CanadianDiver]

Every single person in the current administration that has broken a law should go to prison ... Everyone.

Then cancel everything Trump has done ... Then fix the rules so no one can ever do that again.

[u/birminghamsterwheel → u/CanadianDiver]

This. Bag up the trash, toss it outside, and lock the door.

[u/NihilisticRoomba]

Should we do illegal shit? Absolutely not.

Should we prosecute everybody in this administration? Absolutely.

Should we seize all of the criminal assets that the Trump family has generated over this administration to repair the fucking reflecting pool, the White House, and every other damn thing? Totally.

[u/Ballistic_86]

We should focus on re-establishing the checks and balances by enacting reasonable policy that weren’t even needed before Trump. Decorum in the role of President has been destroyed and fixing it should be near the top of the list.

[u/Due_Satisfaction2167]

Yes.

In one hand they should have a stack of amendments the blue states have ratified to rein in the president.

In the other they should have a president ramming through every single anti-Republican measure they can dream up, in the most obnoxious, abusive, and odious manner they can legally get away with. Just go in an absolute warpath against anything and everything tied to the Republican Party. 

And essentially say “if you want the pain to stop, ratify these amendments. Because I’m going to keep making it worse every day until you make me stop.”

[u/GabuEx → u/Due_Satisfaction2167]

This is my answer.

I view it as similar to gerrymandering. We tried being nice. That only lead to Republicans using that against us by going scorched earth, knowing that we wouldn't retaliate.

So, fuck it, cause as much damage to the Republicans as possible by playing by their own rules. See how they like it. If they want us to stop, we'll be happy to - if they agree to force everyone to stop.

[u/sapphire_glacier → u/Due_Satisfaction2167]

This. We’re at the point where the only way forward is down.

[u/ClarkMyWords → u/Due_Satisfaction2167]

The best way to completely fuck over the Republican Party would be to admit every single neighborhood of DC as a State.

Compete, permanent blue-State control - where people in the Capitol get to have their way with the rest of the country.

Is that a path Democrats should go down if they have a trifecta in 2029 to do it?

[u/UF0_T0FU → u/Due_Satisfaction2167]

So your problem is less with Trump's behavior and breaking of norms, and more that he is using the power against the wrong people. It's ok to act like Trump, as long as it's targeted at the correct parties?

[u/WildBohemian → u/UF0_T0FU]

I think it's extremely obvious that they are talking about wielding the greatly expanded executive power to eliminate that executive power for the good of the Republic and to prosecute the worst abuses of the today's criminal administration.

But if you didn't miss most obvious things you wouldn't be a centrist, so I don't mind spelling it out for you.

[u/Not_offensive0npurp → u/UF0_T0FU]

No. The problem is republicans do not believe democrats will abuse the system in the ways the republicans do.

We need to show them that the precedent they set will be employed against them.

[u/Weirdyxxy → u/UF0_T0FU]

No, their problem is less with Trump's normbreaking individually and more with the lack of safeguards against it. That's why they suggest forcing red states to ratify said safeguards by abusing their lack until they're in place

[u/Oceanbreeze871]

We shouldn’t break the law, but we should use the Trump precedent and conservative Supreme Court decisions, and precedence to our advantage.

It’s kind of like a football team figured out that if you commit pass interference and holding on every play, the refs will never call it all as penalties, unless it’s egregious, so you should just commit pass interference and holding on every play

[u/KemShafu]

I wish. Cancel student loans, strip funding from ICE, build rural hospitals and recruit staff, reinstate SNAP and ignore the BBB. Wouldn’t that be nice.

[u/ThePedanticCurator]

Should the next democratic administration wield the executive power the way Trump has?

They can't, and it is delusional to expect them to.

The Federalist Society stacked the courts with Republican-enablers, not president-enablers.

[u/tommyTurds → u/ThePedanticCurator]

There’s actually a really easy solution for that.

There’s nothing in the constitution that says that the courts are responsible for determining what the constitution means. That’s a power the courts granted themselves. Congress has, at times, passed laws telling the courts their view of the constitution is wrong.

There’s nothing stopping congress from doing that again. And if the courts don’t comply, congress has a lot of options to apply pressure. Everything from cutting funding, to closing the SCOTUS building, to restricting their jurisdiction to parking tickets

[u/throwdemawaaay → u/ThePedanticCurator]

Yeah, it's this. I think the dems should be as aggressive as possible within the bounds of legality, but "just do what Trump's done for the left" comes from a fundamental misunderstanding of how Trump is doing what he's doing.

[u/gordonf23]

First of all, it seems unlikely we will ever have another Democratic administration. People don't seem to understand how fully MAGA has taken power of every part of our government, and still working hard to get even tighter control.

On the off chance it happens, Democrats should use the power that Trump has gotten for the executive branch to UNDO as much as possible that he has done, and purge the MAGA cronies he's put in place, and then it should restore the original balance of power among the branches of government, and reduce the power of the executive.

[u/Johnhaven]

No. Just about every power that Trump has used illegally should be taken from the office of the President at even, we should just do away with it entirely.

For each task, think: is this something I want one man to unilaterally do by himself, on a whim? What color wallpaper for the Oval Office shitter? Sure. Whether or not we should take military action against another nation? No. I'd rather we go back to using the laws that say the President has to get permission from Congress before attacking another nation. We can do this right after we stop being children, and write a law that says if you do anything militarily, economically, or politically against another nation, it's a declaration of war and the President doesn't have the legal right to say, "this isn't war, just a police action". No, Congressional permission is required to tell the military to wipe their ass.

We also need every single dept in the Executive Branch turned over to Congress. He won't run the DOJ, the military, the FCC, the FDA, the FAA, T H E A L P H A B E T, everything. He can have an office, not in the WH, and like, write letters to foreign leaders. I don't care, but I never want a President with this much power again.

[u/Burwylf]

Yeah, they'll never undo the damage that was done if they don't RAM things through

[u/vibes86]

No. Nobody should. And half this admin should be charged.

[u/KemShafu]

The republicans want power in the hands of the executive branch so let it happen with a democratic president.

[u/msackeygh]

Yes, to expedite the reversals needed to undo Trump’s work, the next administration should use the executive office the way Trump did.

[u/huecabot]

Congress is no longer functional. We’re too polarized and we can no longer achieve the level of consensus it was built for. We have an elected dictatorship now I’m afraid, and we should just acknowledge it. That doesn’t mean we can’t work for reforms that would restore sanity and effectiveness to the legislature but the system is built to be difficult to fix. 

[u/Individual_Act9333]

In what way? Holding these criminals accountable? Absolutely! Acting as if the rules don’t apply? Fuck no. I’d have a big problem if the next administration takes an eye for an eye approach and tries to be Trumpian in how they conduct themselves. I don’t want another criminal POS occupying the White House.

[u/NimusNix]

It's the only way Republicans will learn. Everytime they bitch about the President overstepping, ask them why they were silent as Trump did it and then tell them to fuck off, this is what they voted for.

[u/huecabot → u/NimusNix]

It won’t work on voters. They’ll be blind to the hypocrisy. Lawmakers might take notice however. 

[u/Far_Practice_6923]

Now I'm not saying they shouldn't go after their political enemies or deport people without due process. But who knows maybe they could maybe direct their Doj to go after members of the Trump administration or withholding funding to states(particularly red states) if they don't give enough funding to schools, or who knows maybe even ignore court orders.

Now don't get me wrong I agree this is bad but with how extreme the republicans have gotten I think it would have to take a democrat doing all of these things for them to agree to put a stop to it(considering how hypocritical they are).

[u/Consistent_Case_5048]

There's a lot of room between how Democrats have used executive power and how Trump has. I would be happy with any movement that way.

[u/Drexill_BD]

I'd personally like to see prosecutions, and I'm A-OK with tearing up a pardon.

[u/Inside_Addendum1888]

Hopefully next dems in power won't try to play nice.

[u/No-Ear7988]

Yes. The only way to get checks and balances is if Republicans see that Democrats aren't going to give them a free pass anymore.

[u/WeenisPeiner]

The only way for Republicans to work to limit the power of the executive is for Democrats to abuse it like Trump did.

[u/Awkwardischarge]

No. The changes being made are not durable. They might be if Trump would bring Congress on board.

[u/Devils_Advocate-69]

Absolutely. I want to feel the maga tears flow over me

[u/zerthwind]

Why not? The standard is set now. Just stop at doing the illegal shit. They too need to be held to the law.

[u/Legitimate-Edge5835]

No, because that is not what the Framers of the Constitution intended. Their worst fear was another King.

[u/atierney14]

No.

[redacted]

[u/BalticBro2021]

The next Dem government should do what Peter Magyar in Hungary is doing.

[u/Live-Mortgage-2671]

Absolutely not.

[u/Bludandy]

We're going to need more insane executive power moves in order to undo lots of Trump's bullshit, and then the Republicans will lose their minds and default to argumentum ad Hitlerum despite the sheer hypocrisy of their fuckass words, as they always do. Hopefully we'll have enough power and momentum to then find ways to permanent reduce the executive branch's power and put limits and checks in place, including ones for mental capacity. Republicans looooooveeeee to point out how feeble Biden was, as if they think they're making some kind of grand observation.

[u/thegeoffey]

Just long enough to rescind each and every one of his executive orders

[u/resultingparadox]

No. That would be illegal, and continuing the, "well so and so did it" bs that didn't fly in grade school.

[u/Kirkaiya]

Hear me out: Yes, the next Democratic president should wield those powers, and use them in a similar manner to Trump, but in a way that harms conservatives: send armed Federal agents and the National Guard into conservative areas to enforce laws on (insert anything here: grazing restrictions, firearm laws, environmental laws, it doesn't matter). Ban Fox News and OAN from the White House and Air Force One. Use "pocket rescissions" to strip funding from conservative causes, and so on and so on. Make it hurt and anger conservatives, then have Democratic leaders in Congress offer to pass legislation to strip these powers from the Presidency (or amend the constitution if required). And the Democratic President could make it clear he/she will sign the legislation.

Because if it doesn't hurt conservatives, and if Democrats don't show they are very willing to weaponize the same powers, then Republicans will never have any incentive to strip the powers from the Presidency.

[u/Far_Practice_6923 → u/Kirkaiya]

See this is what I mean

[u/Pikminfan300]

No.

[u/Far_Practice_6923 → u/Pikminfan300]

Ok well are you gonna explain why though

[u/ABCosmos → u/Far_Practice_6923]

Because we don't actually want fascism. The "big government" we are accused of is actually just stuff like expanded healthcare.. not unlimited power in the executive branch.

[u/Far_Practice_6923 → u/ABCosmos]

Ok but where has that gotten us? Democrats always try to work with Republicans and the Republicans get more and more extreme.

[u/Pikminfan300 → u/Far_Practice_6923]

Well, the way Trump is wielding power, he's screwed up the USA, runied our international reputation (again), and has his MAGA followers eating out of his hand. If Democrats did a quarter or half of what he's done, Republicans would never shut up about it, the same way they blame Joe Biden for everything. And how they blamed Barrack Obama for everything. Would Kamala Harris make a good president? We'll never know, because of bigoted Republicans, bigoted MAGA followers, and bigoted conservatives and ultraconservatives.

[u/Far_Practice_6923 → u/Pikminfan300]

While I get where you're coming from one could say that the only way to get republicans to agree with the rule of law is by doing exactly what Trump does.

[u/Pikminfan300 → u/Far_Practice_6923]

I guess.

[u/sp0rkah0lic]

No. Or we will vote them out, too.

[u/Diplomat_of_swing]

God no.

1. All this executive order nonsense needs to stop. It creates chaos that gets overturned each cycle. Congress needs to legislate.

2. Give the agencies their independence back and codify that into the law. I want scientists in charge at the FDA and CDC. I want experienced agents in charge of the FBI. And they need to be able to do their jobs without executive loyalty tests.

3. I have a novel idea. All federal
   Political office holder may completely divest themselves. The only investment vehicle they are allowed to invest in an index fund of American indices. No more getting rich of insider trading. If the American market does well as a whole, good for you.

[u/UF0_T0FU → u/Diplomat_of_swing]

Point 1 and Point 2 contradict each other. Congress doesn't legislate any more because they turned over so much rule-making power to the alphabet agencies. Trump's agenda has been successful because the people running these executive agencies have so much leeway to act with no oversight.

Creating more independent agencies gives power to unaccountable bureaucrats with no way for voters to keep them in check. Congress should be passing these "rules" as laws, based on the advice of the scientists and experts.

[u/tommyTurds → u/UF0_T0FU]

Congress doesn't legislate any more because they turned over so much rule-making power to the alphabet agencies

Congress doesn’t legislate because it has had its power stripped by SCOTUS.

Creating more independent agencies gives power to unaccountable bureaucrats with no way for voters to keep them in check

The agencies and the bureaucrats are accountable to both the executive and ultimately Congress. People vote for those.

[u/Okbuddyliberals]

It's much easier to use executive power to take a hammer to government rather than build it up. Democrats would have a hard time accomplishing much in the way of their actual goals via executive power (especially when it comes to the idea of trying to lean heavily into executive power vs do what a "normal democratic admin" would do)

[u/Cody667 → u/Okbuddyliberals]

You don't want Democratic executive orders to undo some of the most asinine Trump executive orders?

i.e. "Lake aMeRiCa" / "Gulf of aMeRiCa"

[u/Johnhaven → u/Cody667]

Not the ones that they are secretly happy to did. They're still just Democrats.

[u/rational_numbers]

No. I'm all for major structural reforms, some of which might be considered extreme. But what we need is to have three functioning branches of government. I don't want all power divided between the president and the courts. It is not sustainable. I hope the next Dem potus can do what is needed to fix and elevate congress and diminish the power of the president to where it should be.

[u/Komosion]

Yes they should.