Attacks on judiciary, universities, media companies and law firms have been successful
Victor Lacombe – about six months after the return of power in the United States, analysts and law scholars evaluate that the president coordinates a collapse of democracy – and that there are few institutions with capacity or willingness to restrict republican actions in Campos such as immigration, budget, public service reform and commerce.
Attacks to the judiciary, universities, media companies and law firms have been successful, to the surprise of experts who once saw solidity in the centenary US institutions.
And most of these investers were succeeded by a series of internal victories for Trump. One of them concerns the agreements signed with some of the country’s most traditional law firms ensuring the provision of free legal services in favor of causes supported by the president who, otherwise, would cost US $ 940 million to the government.
Another victory was the capitulation of elite universities such as Columbia in New York. The institution agreed to make changes in its Middle Eastern Studies Department, expel students involved in the Pro-Palestinian protests and pay a fine of US $ 200 million (R $ 1.1 billion) to try to recover federal federal funds by Trump.
To achieve these goals, the president had no problem using all the federal government’s economic, regulatory and legal power and forcing institutions to give in.
“In his first term, Trump still operated according to American constitutional norms,” says Ryan Enos, a political scientist and professor at Harvard University. “What we see now is a complete realignment of the power of the executive, the legislature and the judiciary, with serious results for the constitutional order and the protection of freedoms in the US.”
For Ens, the country is already experiencing a situation that could be classified as “competitive authoritarianism”, similar to countries such as Hungary and Turkey.
“What this means is that unless something very drastic happens, we will have elections in the US. And they will happen in a way that will be apparently fair. But in fact, internal conditions will be deteriorated in such a way that opposition will have difficulty operating. The question is whether this state of affairs will consolidate or if it is possible to reversing it.”
In attacks against media and universities, including the institution in which he teaches, the Harvard teacher sees an attempt to silence or at least make criticism of the government difficult. The onslaught against law firms and judges would be intended to get legal questions out of the executive’s actions.
“What happens in authoritarian systems is that those who are in power have access to many means of punishing rivals and reward allies. This creates a collective problem: isolated, each institution evaluates that the simplest would be capitulating, which helps the authoritarian leader to consolidate power – in this case, it happened very quickly.”
For Jamal Greene, law professor at Columbia University and former Justice Department employee in Joe Biden government, US institutions are not doing very well. “Trump’s strategy has been very similar to what was used elsewhere in the world, such as Hungary, by Viktor Orbán, and in Brazil, by Jair Bolsonaro.”
Greene quotes agreements signed between the White House and large media groups, such as Paramount, which controls the CBS News, and Disney, owner of ABC News. In either case, the companies gave in to the Republican after a series of pressures. “What explains these capitulations is the fact that these are large federal government companies in various ways, including for regulatory approvals.”
In addition to pressures against companies and universities, there is also a view that in some decisions Trump has violated the Constitution-and the Supreme Court do little to contain it.
“The federal government makes thousands and thousands of decisions every day. If it does not operate in good faith, and if he does not believe he needs to obey the law, then we are in constitutional crisis-then we have not seen the worst version of this, which is when the government says it will not comply with judicial decisions because they think they are illegitimate,” argues Greene.
The maximum body of the US Judiciary suspended acts of lower instances contradicting Trump through the provisional decision system issued during the recess of the Supreme Court. In this mode, the decisions of the majority, which is conservative, are published without the legal basis to be clarified. Experts heard by the report who preferred not to identify to avoid reprisals say that the practice makes it difficult to assess whether or not the court is right in its decisions.
For Brandon Garrett, professor of constitutional law at Duke University, practices such as this contribute to a scenario of legal instability that, in turn, encourages attempts to change constitutional precepts through the Supreme Court – a vicious circle. “If constitutional law is more stable, the parties avoid bringing certain cases to justice because they know they will lose. But if it is unstable, there is the assessment that even if the precedent exists, perhaps this time it changes.”
In Garrett’s opinion, it is early to tell if US institutions have failed the test to which they are being submitted. “I think the test is not over, but this is a global phenomenon. Democracy is being tested around the world in new ways.” He also avoids talking about a constitutional crisis in the US, stating that the Trump government has not yet challenged an order from the Supreme Court openly – there is the fear that the executive failed to comply with orders from lower instances.
“When it comes to constitutional crisis, the idea is that two or more powers of the Republic cannot understand each other, and the Constitution is being violated because of it. So far, we have not seen the legislature, the judiciary or the executive being prevented from doing their work. We are not seeing a complete failure of the democratic order,” says Garrett.
He sees the situation in another way: “For all purposes, there are no brakes to Trump’s power at this time. The Supreme Court seems not to be willing to impose restrictions, and has actually authorized the expansion of its power. Congress as well.”
“The only real brake, and the only thing that can save American democracy, if it can actually be saved, is the strength of civil society – if institutions may or may not get up and resist, because US political order does not seem to be able to do that.”
