Speaker John Boehner applauded the passage of the Faithful Execution of the Law Act (H.R. 3973) yesterday, sponsored by Republican Representative Ron DeSantis of Florida. The Speaker was quite pleased with his caucus for passing an unconstitutional power grab in yet another effort to steal power from a rightful President. A hopeful Boehner claimed that the President has a “Constitutional obligation to enforce the law, whether he likes it or not.”
Boehner said in a statement, “The president has a Constitutional obligation to enforce the law, whether he likes it or not. From his numerous re-writes of the health care law to his administration’s attempt to seize private water rights, the willful disregard for the limits of executive power is astounding.”
“The bills passed by the House today will help rein in executive overreach by requiring more transparency from the administration when it refuses to enforce the law… I hope the Senate will approve these measures and send them to the president’s desk to remind this White House that we have a Constitution and the American people expect it to be followed.”
Yes, we do have a Constitution and we expect it to be followed. By everyone. Not just the White House.
The Act, which passed the House with 226 Republican and 18 Democratic votes, was introduced on January 29 of 2014. Its real intent is to make it easier for Congress to sue the President, as Dave Weigel noted yesterday in Slate about a companion bill, yet another attempt by House Republicans to limit executive power. The companion piece to yesterday’s bill is the “Stop Executive Overreach Act”, which is sponsored by the infamous Darrell Issa, among other Republicans.
Ironically, the Republican order to follow the Constitution also expands their Congressional powers and reduces the powers of the presidency, which is the opposite of following the Constitution.
The Congressional Research Service, a nonpartisan section of the Library of Congress, explains that the bill:
Expands the circumstances under which the Attorney General is required to report to Congress regarding the enforcement of laws to include any instance in which the Attorney General, an officer of the Department of Justice (DOJ), or any other federal officer establishes or implements a policy to refrain from:
(1) enforcing, applying, or administering any federal statute, rule, regulation, program, policy, or other law within the responsibility of the Attorney General or such officer; or
(2) adhering to, enforcing, applying, or complying with, a final decision of any court of jurisdiction respecting the application of the Constitution, any statute, rule, regulation, program, policy, or other law within the responsibility of the Attorney General or such officer.
(Currently, reports are not required with respect to the policies of other federal officers and reports concerning nonenforcement of a law are required only when the Attorney General or a DOJ officer refrains on grounds that the provision is unconstitutional.)
Requires such reports to state the grounds for policies of nonenforcement.
You’d think that with Republicans putting this much energy into changing the balance of powers, Obama must have really done something awful, something even Bush worthy. But in reality, no.
This is just another power grab by Republicans. The Executive Branch has the authority and responsibility to implement the law and to inform federal agencies under their purview how to implement the law. (If you want to read more in depth, Simon Lezarus did a great write up last year of the issues at hand at the Atlantic.) While we’re at it, one of the purposes of Congressional oversight is to improve the efficiency, economy, and effectiveness of governmental operations. Republicans are doing the opposite.
Basically this bill is House Republicans trying to take power away from the executive branch, and give their branch more power. As such, this bill actually represents a violation of the Constitutional separation of powers, and it is just one in a series of such bills Republicans are trying to put into law.
Can you imagine a country run by House Republicans? Scary as this is, if they win the Senate we are in for a rough ride.
This bill is just yet another attempt in a series of bills by House Republicans to take the power of the Presidency away from Barack Obama. Since he won two elections, the only way Republicans can diminish his power is to change the Constitutional balance of powers to reflect their inability to win the White House.
John Boehner applauded this act because he is very hopeful that he can distract the people with this sort of nonsense and no one will ask him what he is going to do about extending unemployment or immigration reform or jobs… In other words, this is yet another shiny ball distraction, but this one is also a Trojan Horse.
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