Mario H. Lopez is president of the Hispanic Leadership Fund, an advocacy organization that promotes liberty, opportunity, and prosperity for all in public policy. The interview is part of a collaboration between Bridge Alliance and CityBiz entitled Repairing America's Broken Democracy.
U.S. President Donald Trump on May 22, 2026 in Suffern, New York.
Let us set aside, for a moment, the fact that in suing the IRS, Donald Trump initiated a lawsuit that was meritless, frivolous, and a blatant conflict of interest…in his own words, “I am supposed to work out a settlement with myself.” Let us further acknowledge, but look past the fact, that the settlement is filled with “illegal cookies” like his effort to exempt himself and his family members or family-controlled companies, from past or future IRS audits or any future obligations to ever pay federal taxes.
Please appreciate, but set aside for a moment, that this is the most corrupt administration in modern US history. Further, I would like to ignore the fact that this appears to be an effort to finance a private militia that has violently sought to undermine the US Government and the electoral capacity of the vote of the people of the United States of America.
I would like to focus on the ill-conceived notion that the perpetrators of the January 6 assault on the US Capitol were victims of “weaponization and lawfare” by the Department of Justice.
It was the Biden Department of Justice that initiated the prosecution of the government contractor who was convicted of leaking President Trump's tax returns. Notwithstanding that, every other president since Watergate has voluntarily disclosed their returns, and Donald Trump, as a candidate, vowed to release his returns upon completion of his audit.
Conversely, the January 6 rioters, several of whom attacked Capitol Police officers and members of the District of Columbia police, were duly arrested, tried, and either convicted or pleaded guilty to actual crimes before they were pardoned or granted clemency by the president. It is now the claim of the president that they should be entitled to compensation because, in the view of the president and the attorney general, “they were targeted for political, personal or ideological reasons.”
The cruel and debased hypocrisy of this malfeasance is contrasted by the intentional aggressive and illegal weaponization by the Department of Justice and the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement which have engaged in widespread human rights violations including, but not limited to, abusive treatment, cruel and unusual punishment in detention facilities, failure to provide adequate medical care in detention centers, illegal detention, denial of due process, illegal deportations, family separations, multiple deaths and para-military assaults in US cities such as Chicago, Portland, Minneapolis and Los Angeles.
It is worth noting that the Constitution of the United States entitles all persons the right to “be secure in their persons, houses…against unreasonable searches and seizures…and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause…(Fourth Amendment)
And further No Person shall be held to answer for…infamous crime …nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law…(Fifth Amendment) and:
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial…and have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense. (Sixth Amendment).
What is clear is that the Constitution plainly distinguishes between citizens and persons. Further, all persons are entitled to fundamental constitutional protections. Yet the Trump Administration has called for the deportation of both legal and illegal immigrants who have never been charged with crimes, people under Temporary Protected Status, green card applicants, green card holders, as well as suggesting that he would denaturalize naturalized citizens and revoke citizenship from naturally born US Citizens.
One is astonished to compare the abuses of process that Trump claims for the “victims” of the January 6 prosecutions who were duly arrested for cause, tried and convicted for their misdeeds and the people largely but not exclusively of color who have been detained often violently without warrants, notice, access to counsel or any due process, separated from their families from months on end and then often returned to unstable countries or even third party countries where they have no affinity whatsoever.
Empathy has never been one of the President’s strong suits. Cruelty has been a fairly consistent trait. So, he has a perverse perspective on the rule of law. Trump whines when he and his few friends do not get their way. Justice for all has never been his mantra. Advantage for him at others' expense has always been his goal.
We have not seen a president with such a blatant proclivity for utilizing the levers of government primarily to achieve personal wealth and vengeance against not only his enemies, but classes of people who he considers to be an inconvenience to have live in the United States. In England during the Windrush era, the British Prime Minister Theresa May specifically developed what she referred to as a “hostile environment policy”. It is an appropriate description of Trump’s actual intent.
Trump’s goal is to make life in the USA for immigrants (legal and illegal) from countries he despises (regardless of how legitimate their presence is under the law), as well as people of color, so difficult and unbearable that they have no choice but to leave the USA. The difference between Prime Minister May’s government (despite several human rights and other legal protections provided in the UK) is that in the UK, there is no birthright to citizenship as articulated in the 14th Amendment; no bill of rights or written Constitution guaranteeing ALL PEOPLE rights to dignity and due process (regardless of how they got here) and nothing in the Constitution bestows upon the President the ability to abuse anyone under the jurisdiction of the United States Government without due process.
Walter H. White, Jr. is a lawyer living in London. He is a Board member of Lawyers Defending American Democracy, a founding director and later chair of the ABA Center for Human Rights, and a past chair of the ABA Civil Rights & Social Justice Section.
Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche testifies during a Senate Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies hearing in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on May 19, 2026 in Washington, D.C. The hearing was held to examine the Department of Justice's proposed FY2027 budget estimate.
There was a time the Republican Party believed in policies and principles. Conservatives genuinely believed in democracy and America, and not the cynical new version that requires its citizens to hate each other. And they believed in a contest of ideas.
The concept of competing for the soul of the nation with intellectually rigorous ideas and admittedly populist rhetoric became foundational to American politics and in particular movement conservatism later on in that century.
In a speech at CPAC in 1985, President Ronald Reagan boasted of the right’s recent dominance as a result of that competition. “Now, we’re not in power now because [the left] failed to gain electoral support over the past 50 years. They did win support. And the result was chaos, weakness, and drift,” he said. “Ultimately, though…we are where we are because we’re winning the contest of ideas. In fact, in the past decade, all of a sudden, quietly, mysteriously, the Republican Party has become the party of ideas…. All of a sudden, Republicans were not defenders of the status quo but creators of the future.”
And it was this way for some time, when conservatives believed that if given the opportunity, they could win over the country on the power of their ideas.
But in the era of Donald Trump, Republicans have decided competing is no longer useful or necessary, and they’re out of good ideas.
In some ways, they’re not wrong. Polling for any number of Trump’s “ideas,” from the Iran war to tariffs to burying the Epstein files are wildly unpopular and Republicans would lose that competition if judged solely on their merits.
But rather than even bother persuading, they’ve opted for other less democratic and more cynical pursuits to win elections.
The latest is Trump’s $1.8 billion slush fund, which will award allies and Trump supporters “compensation” for what the Trump DOJ is calling weaponized lawfare against them.
That means, presumably, that Jan. 6 insurrectionists, some of whom committed crimes at the Capitol, including assaulting police officers, could apply for and win taxpayer dollars as a form of political reparation.
One way to view these payoffs is that they’re a blatant bribe to buy MAGA support at a time when Trump is unpopular and making unpopular decisions that are impacting his own voters.
The GOP redistricting orgy is another example of Republicans simply giving up on winning voters over. Trump and his cronies in Congress love to boast about how America is now the “hottest” country, thanks to him, but if that were the case, wouldn’t they just go out and sell that to voters before the midterms? Instead, they’ve spent millions carving out new districts all over the South. That’s hardly a reflection of a party that’s confident in their ideas and their message — rather, it’s a party admitting, we can’t win it unless we rig it.
Trump’s media fights are about more than just his fragile ego, too. They’re another tell. In trying to coerce new Trump-friendly mergers, to get detractors fired from Fox and elsewhere, to sue media outlets for critical coverage, Trump isn’t just telegraphing his deep insecurities, he’s tacitly admitting he can’t win with a free and fair press.
Trump, the consummate salesman, isn’t even bothering to sell voters on his economy or his war anymore. He’s just lying about both, and hoping loyalty to him will be enough. But just in case it isn’t, Republicans are doing every craven thing they can to tip the scales and go around the voters.
It’s sad to watch how far the party of Reagan has fallen, but today’s Republican Party has unequivocally waved the white flag in the contest of ideas, and they’re just hoping we’re all too stupid to notice they’re no longer even asking for our vote.
GOP Waves White Flag in Contest of Ideas was originally published by The Tribune Content Agency and is republished with permission.
U.S. President Donald Trump (L) speaks to White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles as he oversees "Operation Epic Fury" at Mar-a-Lago on February 28, 2026, in Palm Beach, Florida.
Why has Donald Trump transformed his foreign policy from isolationist to interventionist?
He doesn’t have some newfound curiosity in foreign affairs. Nor does he now deeply care about the global order. He’s shifted his focus for a different reason entirely: because his domestic agenda keeps getting stymied by checks and balances.
Unlike at home, Trump has few restraints on the global stage. He likes that environment much more.
He’s a bull who needs his China shop.
America’s domestic political system is resisting Trump more than many think. Sure, he’s gotten things done and caused lots of trouble. And to the victims of his abuses, the restraints on his power are far too weak.
But Trump’s domestic agenda has been muddled and underwhelming, especially for a president whose party controls Congress.
This is true even when the noise is screeching. Take DOGE, Trump’s partnership with Elon Musk. Remember how it was supposed to dramatically reduce federal spending?
For all its sound and fury, DOGE was largely negated by the very president who authorized it. About Trump's 2025 spending bill, Musk asked: “What’s the point of DOGE if the government’s just going to add $5 trillion more in debt?”
Moreover, while many Republicans slavishly acquiesce to Trump, not all of them do. Republican senators are rejecting his demand to end the filibuster. House Republicans are investigating the Epstein files.
The courts, for their part, rule against Trump regularly, including striking down his signature tariffs policy. His effort to undo birthright citizenship will likely soon meet the same fate.
State and local governments are likewise resisting Trump. Just look at California’s and Virginia’s broad gerrymanders in response to his (and his fellow Republicans’) election machinations.
The media–traditional and independent alike–have been fierce, notwithstanding Trump’s threats (and lawsuits). And the people in the streets, like in Minnesota, have made their voices heard.
Polling data suggests that Democrats will take the House in November. If they do, Trump will likely be impeached (again), and his legislative agenda will be in tatters.
Indeed, Trump has worthy opponents across American society thwarting his domestic ambitions.
Every single day.
But foreign policy, alas, is different. These checks don’t work internationally. A simple comparison illustrates the point: The same president who can’t get his political rival, Adam Schiff, indicted can unleash the might of America’s military on a whim.
Trump can largely do what he wants globally–including blowing up suspicious ships, taking out heads of state, invading sovereign nations, and threatening to end a civilization on social media.
It’s not supposed to work this way. The United States Constitution is ambiguous in numerous respects. But with declaring war, it’s clear: Article 1, Section 8 grants to Congress, not the president, “The power to declare war.”
“Only Congress can declare war,” Republican Senator Rand Paul said in March while protesting the Iran invasion. “That’s not my opinion. That's Article 1 of the Constitution … History will not be kind to a Congress that gave away its most solemn responsibility.”
As Trump's supporters emphasize, multiple presidents have initiated hostilities without congressional support. But numerous others have gone to Congress, as George W. Bush did in 2002 before the Iraq war.
One virtue of working with Congress before declaring war is that the public debate is more robust. Today, the American people are left to guess why Trump invaded Iran.
When he did so, without first seeking congressional authorization, he violated Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution.
It’s that simple. Yet there was no practical way to stop him.
Congress moves far too slowly to block an aggressive commander-in-chief. And the courts can only do so much. Judges can force Trump to refund his tariffs, for example, but they can’t unwind the invasion of another country.
Ultimately, the person in the Oval Office is what matters most. As John Adams put it long ago, “We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality … [which] would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net.”
Trump’s global ambitions flow from his domestic frustrations. The way to restrain him should be to follow the Constitution. That is, unfortunately, like trying to catch a whale with a fishing net.
Edward Larson is a Pulitzer Prize-winning legal historian, and William Cooper is an attorney and author. They cohost the podcast How Our Constitution Works And Why It Doesn't.
President Donald Trump at the White House on Oct. 14, 2025, in Washington, D.C.
To understand the current state of the American executive, one must look past the daily headlines and toward a deeper, more structural transformation. We are witnessing a presidency that has moved beyond the traditional "team of rivals" or even the "team of loyalists." Instead, the second Trump administration has become an exercise in "liquid governance," where the formal structures of the state are being hollowed out in favor of a highly personalized, informal power center.
The numbers alone are staggering. So far, the revolving door of the Cabinet has claimed high-profile figures with a frequency that would destabilize a mid-sized corporation, let alone a global superpower. The removal of Attorney General Pam Bondi, the exit of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, and the recent resignation of Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer represent more than just standard political turnover. They signal a fundamental rejection of the idea that a Cabinet secretary is an institution's steward. In this White House, a Cabinet post is a temporary lease, subject to immediate termination if the occupant’s personal loyalty or public performance deviates even slightly from the president’s internal barometer.
The volatility does not end with the pink slip. The recent civil contempt resolution filed by House Oversight Democrats against Bondi for defying subpoenas related to the Epstein investigation is a vivid illustration of the "liquid" model: an official is discarded the moment their utility expires, leaving the individual to navigate the institutional wreckage alone, while the administration simply flows toward the next loyalist.
The most consequential shift is occurring within the national security apparatus. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has moved with startling speed to reorganize the military hierarchy. By removing the Army’s top officer and the head of the Navy during a period of active friction in the Middle East, Hegseth is executing a mandate to "de-bureaucratize" the Pentagon. But the cost of this purge is the systematic removal of institutional memory. When you replace seasoned commanders with those whose primary qualification is ideological alignment, you make the military more brittle.
This focus on internal purging is particularly alarming given the current geopolitical climate. As the administration continues its high-stakes involvement in the Iran conflict, the lack of stable leadership at the top of the military branches creates a vacuum. In that vacuum, strategy is replaced by impulse.
The irony of the current moment is that as the official Cabinet becomes more volatile, the real power has consolidated in a "Shadow Cabinet" of unconfirmed advisors. Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff now operate as the primary envoys for America’s most sensitive diplomatic portfolios. From negotiating nuclear red lines with Tehran to managing the complex endgame in Ukraine, these two individuals—neither of whom holds a Senate-confirmed position—are the true architects of U.S. foreign policy.
This arrangement creates a dangerous disconnect. While the official Secretary of State or Secretary of War handles the administrative affairs of their departments, the real deals are made in private by men whose primary bond to the president is personal or commercial. This is a return to a pre-modern form of governance, one in which familial ties and personal trust outweigh professional expertise and public accountability.
The standard critique is that the president simply selects incompetent people. But this misses the point. The individuals being removed—like Bondi or Noem—were not outsiders; they were loyalists. Their failure to survive suggests that the problem is not a lack of competence, but a lack of clarity in what the job actually entails. If the job of a Cabinet secretary is to act as a decorative placeholder for a policy that is actually being run out of a private suite at Mar-a-Lago, then independent judgment, by definition, is seen as a form of resistance.
The result is a talent drain. The "best people" the president frequently cites are increasingly unwilling to serve in an environment where the professional risks are high and the actual authority is low. This leaves the administration with a narrowing circle of candidates: the true believers, the opportunists, and the relatives.
The world is watching this administrative volatility with growing unease. For decades, the stability of the American executive was the "anchor tenant" of global order. Allies and adversaries alike could rely on a certain degree of continuity in the State Department or the Pentagon. That continuity is now gone.
When a government is in a state of permanent reshuffling, it loses the ability to project long-term intent. Foreign capitals are no longer calling the State Department to understand American policy; they are trying to figure out who is currently "in" or "out" of the inner circle. This unpredictability might serve a real estate developer in a tactical negotiation, but it is a disastrous way to run a global superpower.
The tragedy of the second term is not that the president is changing his team; it is that he is effectively dismantling the idea of a "team" altogether. We are left with a government of one, assisted by an informal circle of associates, presiding over a bureaucracy that is increasingly paralyzed by its own instability. In the long run, the greatest threat to American power may not be a rising China or a belligerent Iran, but the steady erosion of the very institutions that were built to project and protect that power.
Imran Khalid is a physician, geostrategic analyst, and freelance writer.
