Grapevine has it that when Donald Trump first came to the Oval Office in 2017 after a shock victory over Hillary Clinton, he asked his top aide, what all could he do as the President. “Anything you want, Sir,” he was told.
A bit hesitantly and tentatively at first he signed a few orders to build his “big beautiful wall” to keep illegal Mexicans out and a chaotic “Muslim travel ban” to contain “Islamic terrorism,” facing resistance at every step.
But this time around, he came prepared to test the theory, knowing full well how to operate the levers of power, and armed with a well-oiled machine honed by four years in office and another four in exile.
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Starting with the first hour, he unleashed a blitz of executive orders, some purposeful, some retributive, others somewhat quirky and unfathomable.
With little resistance on the streets and an opposition in total disarray, he began a firing spree to send tens of thousands of “disloyal” bureaucrats packing, among them the head of the Office of Government Ethics.
“You are fired,” the “Apprentice” TV show host turned real life POTUS told the official who was only confirmed in his post late last year.
“You’re un-fired,” retorted a judge asking the Trump administration to let the official return to his job for at least a few days while he reviews the case.
But another judge refused to immediately reinstate at least a dozen other Inspectors General in various government departments. Yet another judge in Boston cleared the way for Trump to shrink the size and cost of government denying a workers union request to block a massive buyout offer for federal workers.
Declaring victory, Trump quickly ended the “Fork in the Road” initiative that offered buyouts to two million federal workers. About 65,000 federal employees who had already accepted the offer will get eight months of pay and benefits without work, leaving the rest at the mercy of the boss.
By the New York Times’ count more than 70 lawsuits have been filed against the Trump administration, including at least ten over the crackdown on immigration — both legal and illegal. And judges have issued at least 14 orders blocking actions to tear apart the federal government.
But Trump clearly is following a strategy of lose some and win lots more counting on the fact that “while the executive branch is entrusted with the capacity for swift, decisive action, the judiciary is slow by design,” as the Times put it. “Any legal opposition may struggle to keep up with Trump’s fire hose of legal disruption.”
Like when a federal judge for the first time declared that White House has defied his order to release billions of dollars in federal grants, the administration lawyers turned to an appellate court to pause the order to keep federal funds flowing.
Defiantly claiming that “every action of the Trump-Vance administration is completely lawful,” a White House spokesman suggested, “Any legal challenge against it is nothing more than an attempt to undermine the will of the American people.”
Vice President JD Vance went a step further claiming that “judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power,” leading media legal eagles to warn of a brewing constitutional crisis.
Trump himself was unapologetic about his high handed acts arguing he’s simply doing what the country wants. “I have high approval ratings because I’m using common sense,” Trump said with a new CBS News poll showing him at 53%.
Allaying fears that he may defy courts, the POTUS assured he’ll comply with court rulings saying, “Well, I always abide by the courts, and then I’ll have to appeal it – but then what he’s done is he’s slowed down the momentum, and it gives crooked people more time to cover up the books.”
Meanwhile, with 4-year-old ‘Lil X’ perched on his shoulders, the billionaire owner of X, Elon Musk, standing next to the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office dilated for 30 minutes on his efforts to drastically overhaul the federal bureaucracy.
The goal is to “restore democracy,” said the first buddy asking “If the bureaucracy’s in charge, then what meaning does democracy actually have?” as “father figure” Trump indulgently chimed in approval.
Claiming that he had uncovered waste and fraud across the bureaucracy, Musk alleged that some officials at the now-gutted U.S. Agency for International Development had been taking “kick-backs” and “quite a few people” had “managed to accrue tens of millions of dollars in net worth while they were in that position.”
As a judge restrained Musk’s team of 20 something enforcers with black backpacks wreaking havoc across agencies, Trump by another executive order, made clear that DOGE will have continuing oversight of the Civil Service.
In yet another quirky order, Trump put the brakes on a law that forbids U.S. companies from bribing foreign officials to win business as the Justice Department draws up “revised, reasonable enforcement guidelines” that won’t hamper U.S. firms competing abroad!
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Trump also showed who is the boss in other ways too. When Associated Press journalists declined to call the Gulf of Mexico — oops, America — by its new name, the White House promptly limited their access and barred them from Air Force One.
And even as Sonia Sotomayor, dissenting U.S. Supreme Court justice in its 6-3 decisions affording Trump broad immunity, found fault with the rulings allowing president to become a “king above the law,” Trump once again teased with the idea of staying in office for a third term, past the constitutional limits.
“They say I can’t run again. That’s the expression. ‘Sir…’ Then somebody said, ‘I don’t think you can.’ Oooh…” he said cryptically at the National Prayer Breakfast — with Politico suggesting four ways he could do it. No kidding — two terms are not enough to Make America Great Again!