How presidents do what they please

 Axios - There's basically a three-step process now established for presidents to do as they please:

1. Unilaterally declare an emergency. Trump does this a lot, most notably by arguing that fentanyl trafficking is a clear and present national emergency worthy of using the military to kill people without war authorization in the Caribbean. The power to kill, without meaningful oversight or explanation, is about as absolute as you can get. He has also usurped congressional power to levy tariffs. Trump is hardly the first president to stretch the bounds of emergency authority: President George W. Bush's administration relied on post-9/11 powers to wiretap Americans without a warrant. President Obama invoked 9/11-era powers to set new precedents for drone strikes. President Biden tried to rely on emergency powers to forgive student debt, but the Supreme Court stopped him.
2. Claim full power to determine the legality of their own actions. This is a new and dramatic twist. Trump says this often, though he insists he would comply with any court rulings challenging his power. So far, he has. But Trump doesn't hide his belief in limitless power. He has "told executive branch lawyers that they may not question any legal judgment that he — or Attorney General Pam Bondi, subject to his 'supervision and control' — already decided," the N.Y. Times' Charlie Savage reports. Trump declared in an executive order in February: "The President and the Attorney General's opinions on questions of law are controlling on all employees in the conduct of their official duties." Simply put, he alone judges legality.
3. Assert full, unilateral power to unleash the military, overseas and domestically, to enforce his will. Trump is pushing this piece by piece at home, in cities he deems overrun by crime, and abroad in the Caribbean, where the U.S. military has killed dozens of alleged drug smugglers without any proof of imminent threat. Domestically, Trump hasn't taken the step of using troops for law enforcement or direct crowd control. But taken in total, the precedent is clear: The commander-in-chief has sole discretion on what constitutes threats and appropriate military responses, at home and abroad.

There are only two big possible brakes:

• The only way for Congress to truly intervene would be to impeach and remove the president. But the latter requires a supermajority vote — nearly impossible in a 50-50 country. It's a long process and only practical when the opposing party holds large majorities, especially in the Senate, where it takes two-thirds to convict.
• The Supreme Court, in theory, holds more immediate power: It can rule presidential actions illegal and hope the president abides by the ruling. But the court really has no way to actually force the president to comply because the president alone controls the military — an uncomfortable, if never wholly tested, design quirk of our Constitution. The 6-3 court has signed off on almost all of Trump's most sweeping claims of executive power: The justices have allowed him to fire just about every government worker he has tried to fire, deport people to countries they've never set foot in, and unilaterally slash billions in federal spending. They even ruled that presidents can commit certain crimes without fear of prosecution.

The bottom line: Trump, building on 25+ years of ever-expanding presidential power, has set the precedent for once-unthinkable scenarios. This applies not just to him but to all presidents going forward. That's why precedents matter.  MORE