Not Endorsing Executive Lawlessness

Last week, a Supreme Court order allowed the Trump administration to proceed with its effort to reduce the size of the civilian federal workforce (consisting of about 3 million). In NRO, Andrew McCarthy advises, notwithstanding the media-Democrat complex “garment rending,” that NRO followers not read more into it than there is. The justices are curbing judicial activism, he clarifies, not endorsing executive lawlessness.

All the Court has done is nullify an injunction that a judge had no basis to issue. The judge had assumed that the administration would act lawlessly even though it had not yet taken any concrete steps.

The justices, with only the progressive ideologue Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissenting, took pains to say they were ruling not on any action the administration might take, just that the judiciary had no business placing a prior restraint on such action.

Despite hysterical reporting, Trump’s EO explicitly instructed that the Constitution and laws be followed. On this score, the president’s objective is completely consistent with congressional law, according to Andrew McCarthy.

McCarthy explains that the justices are trying to get a crucial point across to the lower courts:

“Federal courts do not exercise general oversight of the Executive Branch,” even if the president is one whom progressive activists suspect of unconstitutional motives and malevolent designs.

President Trump deserves to receive the benefit of the doubt. This is not a judgment on his worthiness. Rather, it acknowledges that the American people elected him. Should Donald Trump break the law, he would then face just punishment, but not before.