Longstanding Republican Hypocrisy On Executive Orders
The Republicans have long been contemptible hypocrites on executive orders. During the Bush43 Administration, the Republicans supported everyone of these illegal executive orders:
- Under the warrantless surveillance/wiretapping program, the NSA was authorized to monitor, without a warrant, the phone calls, internet activity, text messages and other communication involving any party believed by the NSA to be outside the U.S., even if the other end of the communication lay within the U.S.
- The torture program which violated the federal anti-torture laws and the Geneva Convention.
- The special tribunal system Bush set up by executive fiat to try terrorist suspects. Congress clearly has the exclusive authority to set up a court system.
On the other hand, when Obama was POTUS, the GOP opposition to the DACA program was vitriolic.
Jeff Fortenberry: “President Obama’s plan for executive amnesty is divisive and abusive of his power. It is unacceptable, unreasonable, and unnecessary. The President’s Constitutional duty is to ‘faithfully’ execute the law, not recklessly abrogate the law.”
Ben Sasse; “So how did we get to the place where so many giant legislative decisions are now made inside 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue & in the dozens of alphabet soup agencies?”
Deb Fischer: “. Our constitution was not meant to be altered by an exercise of presidential prerogative; it can only be done by the will of the people. I will fight this flagrant expansion of executive power “
Now Trump has declared a phony “national emergency” to appropriate money by executive fiat to build a wall that was rejected by Congress. Moreover, Trump promised over 200 times that Mexico would pay for the wall.
I predict that virtually every Republican in Congress will vote for the phony “national emergency” and a handful of those Trump supporters will post sad tweets.