Trump Thinks He Has a Mandate to Break the Law

Did Trump make it clear on the campaign trail that he wants to be unrestrained by Congress or courts? Photo: Doug Mills/The New York Times/Redux

It’s pretty clear, and not especially surprising, that the second Trump administration has immediately launched a number of initiatives aimed at testing the outer limits of presidential power. This is a chief executive, lest we forget, who once said of the Constitution, “I have an Article II where I have the right to do whatever I want as president.” And you can’t really blame him since the U.S. Supreme Court he did so much to shape went pretty far down the road of freeing him from accountability for his deeds.

But as we wait for the U.S. Supreme Court to weigh in on his attempted “funding freeze” and other audacious exercises in imperial overreach, we’re hearing an unusual justification for Trump’s apparent belief that he can do whatever he pleases: The people have demanded it! It’s right there in the very beginning of the Office of Management and Budget memo imposing the funding freeze:

The American people elected Donald J. Trump to be President of the United States and gave him a mandate to increase the impact of every federal taxpayer dollar. In Fiscal Year 2024, of the nearly $10 trillion that the Federal Government spent, more than $3 trillion was Federal financial assistance, such as grants and loans. Career and political appointees in the Executive Branch have a duty to align Federal spending and action with the will of the American people as expressed through Presidential priorities. Financial assistance should be dedicated to advancing Administration priorities, focusing taxpayer dollars to advance a stronger and safer America, eliminating the financial burden of inflation for citizens, unleashing American energy and manufacturing, ending “wokeness” and the weaponization of government, promoting efficiency in government, and Making America Healthy Again.

First of all, the endlessly repeated assertion that Trump won by a landslide is simply wrong. His majority in the Electoral College (made possible by wins by less than two percent in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin) was smaller than Barack Obama’s in 2012 and about the same as Biden’s in 2020. Nobody called those elections “landslides.” In terms of the popular vote, Trump fell short of a majority, and won by 1.5 percent, significantly less than Biden’s 4.5 percent in 2020 and even less than Hillary’s Clinton’s 2.1 percent margin in her losing effort in 2016.

In terms of the “mandate” Trump earned, claims that voters demanded (or were even aware of) the sweeping agenda he is pushing right now are extremely dubious. I know people vote for a presidential candidate for a lot of reasons, but I’m fairly sure Trump won his narrow victory thanks to public anger about grocery and gasoline prices, fond if foggy memories of the economy during Trump 1.0, fears about the surge in migrants at the southern border, and concern about Biden’s age. But whatever: Let’s say for the sake of argument that a significant number of voters were also concerned about “wokeness,” MAHA, “efficiency in government,” and Trump’s claims about the “weaponization” of law enforcement. Did they also make it clear that they wanted Trump to ignore or demolish any resistance to his pursuit of these goals via assertions of federal power? I don’t think so.

Trump’s pick for OMB director, Russell Vought, offered a more specific example of this extreme view of the popular will. Vought is undoubtedly the thinker behind the funding freeze since the chapter he wrote for Project 2025’s manifesto basically called for it. At his confirmation hearings, when asked about his loudly expressed belief that the 1974 law restricting presidential impoundments of congressionally appropriated funds was unconstitutional, Vought pointed out that “the president has run on that issue … He believes it’s unconstitutional.” Did Trump make fiery speeches about impoundment at his campaign rallies? Did he run ads on it? Did it rank high in the exit polls on issues influencing votes? No, no, and no.

It’s becoming clear that Trump’s narcissism and his habit of ignoring actual election results may not be the only reasons he’s talked so incessantly (and inaccurately) about the incredible size of his 2024 election victory and his “unprecedented and powerful mandate.” He really doesn’t need to convince a lot of people that he has the right to make big changes in Washington. His party, which he rules like a personal fiefdom, controls Congress. He is in a position to enact pretty much whatever he wants owing to the budget reconciliation process that neutralizes Senate filibusters. Trump is in his last term of office and is not the sort of politician to worry a lot about his party’s future success. But what he apparently wants isn’t just legislation or conventional executive orders. He wants power unconstrained by Congress or the legal system; he wants the power to break laws and get away with it, just as he’s gotten away with so many other things that crossed the line between lawful and lawless behavior.

So it’s no wonder that Trump’s second Inaugural Address was full of so many over-the-top, cringeworthy assertions of the greatness of his mission, the depravity of his opponents, and the “new era” America is entering. Only this kind of self-exaltation can justify the sort of unrestrained power he clearly craves. The real mandate Trump claims is to be a law unto himself, and his loyal minions are working hard to lift him to that truly historic and unprecedented height.