May27

electoral-vote.com

Dem 51

   

GOP 49

Trump Has a Three-Part Plan for Dismantling America

Donald Trump has already told everyone what he wants to do if he is elected. Many people are not taking him seriously, but Donald Moynihan, a professor of public policy at Georgetown and an expert on the administrative state, is. He's scared. He thinks Trump's plans can be divided into three parts, as follows:

• Appoint only loyalists to the Cabinet: In Trump v1.0, many of Trump's cabinet choices were conservative, but also reasonably competent. Think: Rex Tillerson at State, Jim Mattis at Defense, John Kelly at Homeland Security, Nikki Haley at the U.N., Dan Coats as DNI, and Mike Pompeo at the CIA. Trump is not going to make that mistake again. All the Trump v2.0 cabinet appointees (well, except maybe Haley if Trump strikes a deal with her) will be chosen for one quality, and one quality only: blind loyalty to Donald J. Trump. Competence and ideology will not be relevant as long as the appointee kowtows to Trump and carries out his every wish, legal or otherwise, with no hesitation. If Republicans control the Senate, probably all of them will be rubber-stamped. If, somehow, Trump wins the White House but Democrats miraculously control the Senate (which would require holding all their own seats except West Virginia and picking up Texas or Florida), Trump may try to populate the cabinet with temporary appointees and hope that the Supreme Court goes along.
  
  
• Gut the civil service: Trump is planning to introduce his version of Schedule F, which would replace about 50,000 top civil servants with his own toadies. This would basically gut the merit-based civil service system created by the Pendleton Act of 1883 and go back to the spoils system that flourished under Andrew Jackson. In his term, Trump discovered that even when cabinet officials gave marching orders to the top civil servants, many of them decided not to march, especially if the orders were illegal. This frustrated him enormously. His solution is to reach deep into the civil service and replace everyone with loyalists. The Heritage Foundation is busy vetting candidates for all positions and will present him with a list of 50,000 replacements on Inauguration Day, so all he has to do is approve the list. This would be a catastrophe for the government and country. The FDA would approve or reject drugs based on Trump's whim of the day, rather than whether they were safe and effective. The EPA would stop enforcing all environmental laws. The Fed would lower interest rates to zero, because that is good for the real estate business. Trump would then blame the explosion in house prices on Biden.
  
  
• Legalize authoritarianism: The third part of the blueprint is about finding an AG, and DoJ lawyers, who will deem every illegal thing Trump does to be legal. His authoritarian impulses could run wild. Of course, he will pardon himself, all the Jan. 6 rioters, and all his friends and associates who are under indictment. He might also invoke the Insurrection Act and then order the Army to shoot protesters. His AG would no doubt rule that as legal under the Act.
  

Would he create a full-blown fascist dictatorship? Probably not, depending on which party controlled the House and Senate, but he would probably try to go as far as his friends on the Supreme Court will allow. If Trump really pushes the envelope, the demonstrations are likely to make Bleeding Kansas look like a Sunday School picnic. There could be a huge backlash and Republicans would probably get trounced in the 2026 midterms, but a lot of damage could be inflicted on the country before then. (V)