Donald Trump’s unconstitutional, inconsistent, unprincipled but entirely predictable first day

I know I said I was going to focus on the war in Ukraine and that I haven’t written one of these for a few weeks. But here we are. I want to highlight just a few of the many executive order Trump rolled out on his first day in office. I especially want to concentrate on the ones that are unconstitutional and reveal the inconsistency in Trump’s positions and those of his followers.

First off, one that not many people have discussed is the executive order to pause U.S. foreign aid for 90 days for “assessment of programmatic efficiencies and consistency with U.S. foreign policy”. Trump wants to make sure that the foreign aid aligns with his own views and/or use the pause as leverage against other countries. Either way, it likely has nothing to do with efficiency and consistency.

I am pretty sure (not confident) this is unconstitutional. The president is charged with faithfully executing the laws of the U.S., those laws and policies passed by Congress including the disbursement of money passed in budgets. Congress said that this money should be spent for these purposes...the president cannot simply ignore that.

But this is the minor point related to this executive order. Out of all the ones issued yesterday, this one may result in the greatest human cost. U.S. foreign aid provides food, clean water, medicine, emergency relief and so on to countless people around the world. If the aid is really cut off for 3 months, those people will suffer. The order does not include military aid to Ukraine but likely includes humanitarian and other types of assistance to Ukraine. The result will be suffering to simply score symbolic political points...it is unbelievable cruelty.

And here is the part that really bothers me. The executive order contains the following sentence referencing the “foreign aid industry”. “They serve to destabilize world peace by promoting ideas in foreign countries that are directly inverse to harmonious and stable relations internal to and among countries.”

Putin himself could not have written it any better. Putin, and other leaders like Xi and Orban, have long argued that U.S. aid is just a front for the CIA to spread anti-Russian propaganda inside of Russia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Georgia and so on. The goal of the aid, according to Putin, is to sow dissension and start revolutions against the government. This is what he thinks, or at least says he thinks, happened in Ukraine in 2004 and 2014.

Now, I don’t think Trump is a puppet of Putin and Putin actually wrote the sentence above. I think the reality is even more troubling. I think Trump actually believes this. His worldview is much closer to that of Putin’s than to American presidents before him. The idea that it is bad for the U.S. to promote democracy and freedom (those are the destabilizing ideas Trump is referring to) around the world...that seems un-American, no? From a human cost and what it reveals about Trump’s thinking, this executive order may be the worst.

Ah, but there are so many contenders. How about the executive order attempting to end birthright citizenship. It is clearly unconstitutional for the president to unilaterally change the Constitution. That is not how it works. Here is the relevant language of the 14^th amendment. “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

That seems pretty clear to me. Trump’s executive order states, in confusing language, that if your mother and father are not U.S. citizens and are here illegally or on a temporary visa, then you are not a citizen. Even if you think this is a necessary change to our current citizenship law, that still has to follow the Constitutional amendment process laid out in the Constitution. That is not something the president or Congress can change.

Again, look at the plain words of the Constitution. Look at the original intent and meaning of the language and the historical context of the 14^th amendment. All of it points to simple birthright citizenship. There is no other objective way to interpret it. If you are a person who values the Constitution and thinks that it should be interpreted literally, with just the words on the page and what the people who wrote it believed, then there is no argument for you here. Republicans used to say this is what they thought and would attack Democrats for promoting a living Constitution that changes with the times to fit their political desires. Trump seems okay with that. And many of his supporters seem ok with that as long as it serves the ends they desire. This is unconstitutional, inconsistent and unprincipled.

Speaking of unconstitutional, inconsistent and unprincipled, next we have the executive order to stop the TikTok ban from going into place. I don’t have a strong opinion on the actual issue one way or another. The issue of free speech and government regulation on social media platforms is a complicated one. What is not complicated is the fact that the president of the U.S. cannot simply ignore a law passed by Congress. Think it’s a bad law and want to get rid of it? Pass another law to overturn it. That’s how it’s done. The president unilaterally saying, eh, let’s wait 75 days to see what happens is not how you do it. Especially when the language of the law includes a very specific timeline that the president’s order violates.

But the real fun of the TikTok ban is the inconsistent and unprincipled part. Of course, a few months ago Trump was all for the TikTok ban. It was Republicans in Congress after all that passed the bill because of the concern of the effect of Chinese propaganda, especially on young people, and the ability of China to collect data. Yesterday, Trump said...ah no big deal. What made Trump change his mind? He started to use it and saw that it benefited him. Once he saw that, the national security concerns and effect on the young people didn’t matter. In a word, unprincipled.

Trump also seems to want the U.S. to own 50% of TikTok. TikTok must sell and Trump wants to be a part of that. The government nationalizing a company? Sounds pretty socialist to me. Of course, Trump’s good friend Elon Musk could also buy TikTok. Or perhaps Zuckerberg or Bezos. The government using its power to determine winners and losers in the market? Sounds pretty socialist to me. Trump’s obsession with tariffs also gives the government more power in the economy, allowing them to waive tariffs for politically connected companies. For a political movement that is so fearful of socialism coming to the U.S., it appears their worst fears have come true.

There are so many more to write about but alas, my day job is calling. So, where does this leave us? Here is the pessimistic take. As someone who mostly studies authoritarian countries, or quasi-democratic countries, Trump’s actions on the first day are familiar. The blatant disrespect for the rule of law, the unprincipled actions clearly connected to personal political and financial gain, the freeing of violent criminals claiming they are political prisoners, the targeting and blaming of minority groups, the talk of territorial expansion. All of these can be seen in Russia, Turkey, India, and Venezuela. Many of these can be seen in places like Hungary and Poland. Political science calls this democratic backsliding, and I have been hesitant to view the U.S. through this lens, not wanting to be an alarmist. But it is difficult to avoid after Trump’s campaign, his election, the rewriting of January 6 and his actions on his first day in office. If everything he wants to happen actually happens, then the U.S. moves into democratic backsliding territory.

The optimistic view? Yesterday may have been the peak of Trump’s presidency. In all likelihood, he will only get less popular. Especially when the consequences of some of his policies take shape. The one consistent aspect of American politics over the last decade or so is that Americans don’t like the party in power, whoever it is. Republicans have a slim majority in Congress and Democrats will likely win back the House in 2026. After 2026, Trump will be a very lame duck president, and Republicans will focus on determining the nominee for 2028. The optimism rests on normal American politics taking hold and reducing the dangers of Trump. Included in that is a court system and a media environment that will not normalize blatantly unconstitutional actions. Of course, this is what happens when countries backslide democratically, so this is why the whole thing is precarious.

I switch, hour to hour, between these two views. The only thing I know for certain is that if you are a Republican who complained about Obama’s use of executive orders, Biden’s unconstitutional acts, the Biden family using its power for personal gain, foreign policy adventurism of previous administration, the threat of China, and socialism coming to the United States...then yesterday was a bad day for you.