Jeanne Sheehan Zaino, Ph.D. is professor of Political Science. Follow her on Twitter @JeanneZaino or visit https://jeannesheehanzaino.net/ to learn more.
We hear a lot these days about the American government being in crisis. And it is, although not necessarily for the reasons the media is talking about. The crisis predates the events of Jan. 6, 2021, the 2020 presidential election and the issues that prompted the Biden administration to host the “Summit for Democracy” late last year.
The crisis goes back to the Founding and is rooted in something much more fundamental — the structure of the American state. The Madisonian system of government was built for “inaction and deadlock,” and it was designed that way for an important reason — to protect liberty.
Since the system has changed structurally very little since the late 18th century, it is still working largely the way it was designed. This reality has led to the crisis in the American state, an almost consistent inability on the part of the government to address the needs of its people and the crises of the day (i.e., immigration, gun violence, infrastructure, the high cost of pharmaceuticals, etc.). In those cases when it does finally act, it does so only after years of delay, obfuscation, stalemate, discussion and cries for help. Case in point:, health care reform, which was achieved after almost a century of calls and, even then, to the satisfaction of almost no one involved. We are often told this is the result of incompetent leadership, polarization, institutional disarray and the like. While all these things may be true, they miss the root cause of the problem — it’s the system.
President Biden has repeatedly said that if the United States is going to meet the key challenge of the 21st century, the battle between autocracy and democracy, we need to “prove that democracy can deliver.” That is not possible unless we follow the advice of people like Saul Alinsky, Irving Zola and the late great Rev. Desmond Tutu and “go upstream” to examine the root of the problems we are confronting: how the Framers designed the system, why they did it that way and what the ramifications are for us today. Only after we understand this can we have a much-needed and public conversation about whether the system should be modified and, if so, how.
This short video series by Jeanne Sheehan Zaino is designed to help move us in that direction.
Additional videos in the series will be published in The Fulcrum in the coming days.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a“ Steel Across America” event ahead of the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11th attacks on the Ellipse near the White House on Sept. 8, 2026 in Washington, D.C. President Trump welcomed 9/ 11 first responders to the Tunnel to Towers Foundation’ s“ Steel Across America” event featuring a 16,900- pound, 21- foot steel beam recovered.
For Trump, even 9/11 is an opportunity
There was a reason organizers of the 9/11 ceremony in Manhattan told President Trump he could not speak at this year’s memorial service.
A good one, it turns out.
Because in a speech he gave on Tuesday in Washington, he did exactly what they were presumably worried about — he made it about himself.
According to The New York Times, Trump had wanted a speaking role at the service, but the National Sept. 11 Memorial and Museum, which oversees the site, said no, as they’ve maintained for the past decade-plus that the venue and event should be nonpartisan.
Trump has long used awful tragedies to either puff himself up, trash political opponents, or sell lies to the American people.
He blamed a deadly plane crash at Washington National Airport last year on diversity, equity and inclusion policies. He blamed Puerto Ricans for the devastation they endured after Hurricane Maria in 2017. He reportedly considered withholding disaster relief after the California wildfires based on the way affected regions voted. In an interview on Fox News meant to commemorate the 75th anniversary of D-Day in Normandy, he used the occasion to slam former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi…with graves of the dead behind him.
And now, as we approach the 25th anniversary of what many New Yorkers consider the darkest day in modern history, Trump has done it again.
He told a rambling, nonsensical story — one he’s told before — about going to Ground Zero just after terrorists flew two commercial jets into the twin towers. In the story, which no one has been able to verify, despite multiple attempts, he says firefighters had to carry him out of One Liberty Plaza, also known as the U.S. Steel Building, because they thought it was about to collapse.
As CNN fact checker Daniel Dale notes, there’s no evidence Trump went into this building, especially at a time when NYPD and NYFD had locked down the area. There’s no evidence that building was collapsing — in fact, it was deemed structurally sound and reopened within two months of the attacks. There’s no evidence he was carried out of it by firefighters.
But the lie isn’t even the worst part. Pretend it was all true — why would the leader of our country, and a New Yorker, decide to make that tragic day about himself?
Because that’s who Donald Trump is. He’s a malignant narcissist.
He’s also, incidentally, a terrible and ineffectual president, who’s made ill-fated decisions that he has to keep defending, and there’s nothing he won’t do to make himself look and feel better.
Within the first two minutes of his speech, he was cravenly using 9/11 to justify and promote his dumb war in Iran — two events separated by 25 years and 6,000 miles.
“And I will tell you, we’re right now fighting because we have a certain nation that wanted a nuclear weapon, they were very close to getting it, and now they have no chance at getting it. They will never have a nuclear weapon. Iran will not have a nuclear weapon. And they’ve been punished greatly. As you know, we’ve really taken it to them.”
As a New Yorker who lived through 9/11, still one of the worst days of my life, I’m utterly sickened by Trump’s crass, political, and self-promotional framing of that awful day.
And I’m relieved he won’t be given a platform to do it again on Friday’s anniversary in lower Manhattan.
Because for Trump, everything is his for the taking, and absolutely nothing is sacred.
S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.