An article of faith of the Project 2025 crowd and other small government purists is that the regulatory agencies have effectively become an unconstitutional fourth branch of government. This view romanticizes the early days of the nation -- when we were a narrow band of virtually independent states composed mostly of farmers, merchants and tradesmen. We didn't even have a standing army worthy of the name. The country, in both population and land area has grown exponentially in two centuries. A framework needed to be created to deal with the increasing complexity of life. Lessons learned from the Great Depression as well as a push to build protections for ordinary Americans from the rich and powerful led to the creation of many of the regulatory agencies that populate the executive branch.
One of the least understood aspects of governing is that laws are not self-executing or self-enforcing. An example that affects most people is speeding laws. A law can be passed to create a maximum speed on our highways, but what then? Who puts up the signs to alert drivers to the limit? Who enforces it? What are the fines or other penalties? What infrastructure must be put in place to make sure it all happens according to the new law? If there are fines, where do they go? In this example, the local police enforce the speed limit and local courts exact the penalties. But what other powers do the police have? What discretion do the courts have? Who's paying for all of this?
Legislative bodies pass bills that, with the assent of the executive, become law. But more often than not the laws do not address the on-the-ground, nitty-gritty, details of how these laws will be implemented. This is where the regulatory agencies come in. The agencies write regulations intended to execute and enforce the laws that Congress has passed. They clear up ambiguities in the original statute, address exceptions, and as a division of the executive branch, execute the will of the people as expressed through Congress. Departments and agencies propose a budget each year which is included as part of the president's budget that he sends to Congress. Congress then makes any changes, and sends it back to the president for his signature, upon which it becomes, effectively, the law of the land. (I am aware that in recent years this process has not been followed and "continuing resolutions" become the rule) Once that budget is in place, the agencies have a framework with which to guide their actions over the next year. They have been authorized to spend money on the projects and priorities that Congress approved and are now tasked with working out the details and delegating them to the appropriate staff.
The president, as the head of the executive branch of government, has authority over the departments and agencies within the executive branch. Congress, however, has limited that authority by legislating that some bodies would be functionally independent, with the president appointing an agency head and the Senate confirming, but limiting the president's ability to dismiss the department head. Other departments, notably the Department of Justice, are traditionally non-partisan and independent, but there is no law mandating that this is the case. The Department of Defense, though constitutionally under the direct authority of the president as Commander-in-Chief, traditionally does not take partisan sides. Even in the parts of the executive branch where the president's authority isn't limited, he still does not have the authority to ignore or circumvent the law.
In recent years Congress has ceded a great portion of it's power and authority to the president. It seems like every year we're at the same place where it can't agree on a budget and the threat of a government shutdown looms. A crisis is averted time and time again by passing a so-called continuing resolution, i.e. funding the government at previously approved levels. Presidents of both parties have taken advantage of Congressional dithering by attempting to govern by executive order. The problem with executive orders is that they aren't laws. They can be, and are, reversed when a president of the opposing party is elected. Even in situations more "normal" that what we're seeing now, one of the first things a newly inaugurated president does is overturn some of a previous president's executive orders. Executive orders can be overturned, or affirmed, by Congress. What ends up happening though is that the order ends up being challenged in court, Congress once again choosing to give up its constitutional authority.
Trump has illegally delegated to Elon Musk the task of rooting out waste, fraud, and corruption in government. But how have they defined "waste"? They haven't. I would define it as " inefficiency" -- which ties into the "...of government efficiency" that Musk's illegal operation is supposedly trying to implement. Nebraska Senator John Peter Ricketts recently gushed about meeting Musk, bragging about instituting "Lean Six Sigma", a process improvement framework, in Nebraska State government (which his successor, Jim Pillen, axed) This program critically examined various processes, looking for ways to streamline them, cutting out unnecessary handoffs and redundant steps. It looked at organizational structure to determine whether certain positions were sited in the right divisions. It was overseen by someone appointed by the governor, but implemented by people in the departments who knew the details of the work being done, not by outsiders who had no idea of how government worked, or what the public sectors employees were actually doing.
Musk's illegal operation, unconstitutionally delegated to him by Trump, is not looking for inefficiencies. They have no idea what an efficiently run agency would look like and don't appear to have any desire to find out. They are not even pretending to look for waste, fraud or corruption, and even when they say they've found some, it has generally meant that they have misunderstood or misrepresented the data. What they are doing is targeting any agency that has any regulatory or oversight authority that might interfere with his own government contracts by illegally closing them down, sometimes locking employees out of their offices. (Trump's executive order eliminating any position that has any connection to what he thinks is "woke" seems to be separate) Additionally they are firing thousands of employees who are in probationary status, allegedly for poor performance, even when they have not received any negative performance reviews.
Not only is all of this illegal, but it is being done without any thought for the consequences.
As for fraud and corruption, if there was any, wouldn't Trump being subjecting the corrupt officials and fraudsters to perp walks and tweeting about it nonstop?
I'm all for rooting out government waste. But let's do it right. Get some auditors in there. Review the processes. Really look for inefficiencies.
But that's not going to happen...that's not what the goal is.
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