Last weekend, I signed a petition calling on Sen. Dan Sullivan to honor his oath of office. It specifically addressed Congress’s constitutional “power to determine annual federal spending” and reminds him that after Congress passes an appropriation bill and the sitting president signs it into law, “it is illegal for another president to overrule that law.”
Or any law for that matter.
President Donald Trump doesn’t think so. “He who saves his Country does not violate any Law,” he wrote on his parody of the truth called “Truth Social.” Tossed out the window with that Napoleonic screed is Article 2, Section 3 of the Constitution which states the president “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”
Trump isn’t the first president to issue executive orders that violate the Constitution or the nation’s laws. But no one before him did so with such blatant recklessness and speed. He’s been in office a mere eight weeks and there’s already been 199 lawsuits filed against his administration. The complaints range from violating the 14th Amendment and the Refugee Act of 1980, to laws prohibiting the disclosure of personal and financial information.
Several lawsuits involve the dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). For half a century, it was funded by Congress with overwhelming bipartisan support. It was the first agency targeted by Trump’s newly formed Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which itself is a dubious entity. The Supreme Court ruled 30 years ago that the authority to create executive branch departments rests with Congress.
DOGE’s attack on USAID effectively shut down the International Republican Institute (IRI). According to its website, which has been disabled, “IRI’s mission is to advance freedom and democracy worldwide and stand up against an axis of autocracies — including China, Cuba, North Korea, Iran, Russia — who are working together against American interests.”
Sullivan, who has been IRI’s chairman since 2018, made no noise about its loss of funding. Perhaps he’s that’s because doing so contradicts Trump’s appeasement overtures to Putin, which is an issue Sullivan has also avoided addressing.
Back to the question of oaths. Although congressional staffers aren’t part of the executive branch under Trump, they are still federal employees. As such, they were required by law to take an oath that reminds them their allegiance is to the Constitution, not to the senator or representative they serve, or to the president. And like every other federal employee, they have a responsibility to question any directive that they understand to be in violation of the law.
Standing by while Sullivan violates his oath suggests his staffers don’t theirs seriously either.
Sooner or later that lawless attitude is bound to trickle down to the citizenry that makes our justice system one of the best in the world.
Sullivan has already undermined its credibility. While being thousands of miles away from the courtroom, he referred to Trump’s criminal trial in Manhattan last May as “eerily similar to the show trials Stalin launched against his political opponents.”
That statement violated another oath he took. As a lawyer and Alaska’s attorney general, he swore to “uphold the honor and maintain the dignity of the profession.”
Imagine the effect that violating that and his oath as a senator could have on some witnesses in a criminal or civil trial. They take an oath to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. But some might decide giving false testimony is acceptable based on the political activities of the defendant.
Every juror also takes an oath. They affirm that they will do impartial justice by hearing the case and rendering a verdict “based solely on the evidence introduced and the instructions of the court.” If individual jurors violate that by considering which presidential candidate a defendant supported as evidence of their innocence or guilt, we’ll wind up with the kind of justice system Trump promoted when he pardoned everyone convicted of violating the law during the Jan. 6 insurrection.
Honoring the oath of the high office should serve as an example of moral behavior for others, which in turn helps build and sustain a virtuous society. By violating theirs, Trump and Sullivan are doing the opposite. And that makes them lousy role models for Americans and aspiring democracies around the world.
• Rich Moniak is a Juneau resident and retired civil engineer with more than 25 years of experience working in the public sector. Columns, My Turns and Letters to the Editor represent the view of the author, not the view of the Juneau Empire. Have something to say? Here’s how to submit a My Turn or letter.
