Could the blue states just ignore orders from the white house? Like if he orders them to round up illegal aliens? What could trump do about it?
Could the blue states just ignore orders from the white house? Like if he orders them to round up illegal aliens? What could trump do about it?
The president controls a lot of funds that are sent to state and local governments. When they want to play hardball, they sometimes threaten to cut off funding. However, courts can sometimes restore the funds.
And Trump being Trump, he might try to trump up federal charges (see what I did there?) against his opponents.
Trump has never really cared much for laws, or reality, if either happen to get in the way of what he wants. The danger if Trump wins this year is that he’ll do exactly what he has said he will and go full fascist. We’re talking Hitler/Stalin style rounding up political opposition or anyone he deems undesirable and sending them off to gulags/concentration camps or just plain having them executed.
In that regard it’s not a question of if the law allows Trump to do something, it’s a question of if anyone will be willing to stand up to stop him after he’s seized full control of the federal executive and judicial branches and has his GOP allies in control of the legislative.
Worst case scenario it might come down to the military to stage an intervention and restore order, although at that point we’re effectively looking at a military coup even if the ultimate goal is restoring democratic rule and upholding the constitution which is a whole can and a half of worms better left unopened.
That is where I wonder. Who would do his bidding. He can take control of all the courts and heads of things like the FBI, but would the rank and file follow clearly illegal orders. Like would they pull the trigger on an illegal execution? I kind of doubt it. Witholding funding seems like something people would do at his order. But many of the blue states tend to have higher populations, or higher costs of living that make me assume they give more money to the feds in taxes than the feds give back. Could they somehow intercept that and use it to replace the missing funds?
Many psychological experiments have shown that most people when ordered to do something by a person they perceive as an authority will follow those instructions even in cases where they feel the instructions are wrong. Most people just want to keep their head down and do their jobs. So yes, if Trump ordered them to, most rank and file would commit illegal actions. While I’d like to think most wouldn’t be willing to murder someone, we’ve seen ample evidence that there are enough that follow Trump that would be more than willing to for someone to do it, and most would be unwilling to stop them even if they weren’t willing to do it themselves.
We have seen all this before. Hitler didn’t start off by committing genocide, Stalin didn’t start by sending people to gulags. They start small with the things people are willing to do even if they feel it’s wrong and slowly escalate. Stripping rights turns into imprisoning, which turns into murdering, and each step of the way everyone either says “I’m not doing it myself, I’m not responsible” or “They deserve it because they’re a <minority> and I’m not”.
I don’t think trump has the patience to start slowly. I also think that the brass,not the rank and file will be the one to find excuses to not do what is ordered. Not out of the goodness of their hearts, but out of self preservation. They don’t want to end up as the fall guy.