More Republican and Conservative Pushback against Trump and Trumpism

There continues to be more resistance to Donald Trump and Trumpism (the populist mix of protectionism, nativism, isolationism and imperialism) by Republicans and conservatives, including pushback from Republicans in Congress and state elected GOP officials, as I had posted previously, the latter of which I shall post about separately. These examples are in addition to the federal judiciary’s stiff resistance from demands by Trump and Trumpist officials and members of Congress for it to abandon its constitutional role of inerpreting the Constitution and law and to conduct judicial review of Executive Branch actions to let the Chief Executive rule as an autocrat. Trump’s anti-vaccine nominee for CDC Director was recently forced to withdraw because of opposition from non-Trumpist Republican Senators. The informal rejection of another Trump nominee maintains the Senate’s constitutional Advice and Consent power, which had been undermined by Trumpist demands for the Senate to approve every nominee, contrary to the point of the constitutional checks and balances between the Branches of government. The Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman, a Republican, and Ranking Member, a Democrat, jointly requested the Department of Defense’s acting Inspector General to conduct an inquiry into the Signal scandal, in which Trump’s most senior security and defense officials and the Vice President participated in discussions of attack plans against the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen who have been obstructing international shipping on a non-secure private platform and mistakenly included a journalist. The Committee letter was addressed to the acting IG because Trump had fired all the Inspectors General to diminish accountability. The Pentagon’s acting IG will conduct an inquiry into the Signal scandal. Four Republican Senators voted in favor of a Democratic-sponsored resolution to terminate Trump’s emergency declaration against ally and major trading partner Canada to justify the imposition of tariffs, a tax on imports paid by domestic importers and usually passed along to customers, on Canadian goods. The resolution passed. Another GOP Senator sponsored a bipartisan bill to reclaim congressional authority on tariffs, which has been delegated by the Legislative Branch to the Executive Branch. Trump has imposed tariffs not only on Canada, but on every ally, as well as many other foreign countries, because Americans prefer to buy more imports, either because they are less expensive than similar domestically produced goods, are not domestically produced, or are of better quality than domestic goods, not because of unfair trade practices by the foreign countries. Protectionism, the policy of imposing tariffs not for security or human rights reasons or as punishment for unfair trade practices, but to “protect” domestic production. This, protectionist tariffs are tax increases that limit economic freedom, discourage competition and thus efficiency and improvement of products, damage relations with foreign States and invite retaliatory tariffs from them, and decrease global prosperity. Congress has delegated authority to the President to declare emergencies to impose tariffs without express congressional authority, a power that has led to abuses by Trump in both terms of declaring emergencies on flimsy or non-existent grounds, even against close allies and trading partners. I shall continue to post about Republican and conservative pushback against Trump and Trumpism.