Trump, Democracy and the U.S. Constitution

By Jan Lundius
STOCKHOLM, Sweden, Mar 14 2025 – In these turbulent and sad times, it is hard to keep quiet about abuses and violations of human rights taking place around the world; in eastern DR Congo, South Sudan, Ukraine, and Gaza. Among the most egregious examples of incomprehensible stances on such abuses is the behaviour displayed by the Trump Administration, not least the President’s behaviour against the lawfully elected president of Ukraine. Trump’s doubts about the validity of a nation’s desperate struggle against the forces of a dictatorial regime, which destroys their country and aims at taking over its richest territory.

A stance that may be considered in connection with USA’s bold declaration of being “the world’s greatest democracy”. A belief ingrained in most US citizens, who steadfast believe that this democracy is guaranteed by a rock-solid Constitution.

Former president Joseph (Joe) Biden has been among these believers, thought his faith has begun to waver:

We are still, at our core, a democracy. And yet history tells us that blind loyalty to a single leader and a willingness to engage in political violence is fatal to democracy. For a long time, we’ve told ourselves that American democracy is guaranteed, but it’s not. We have to defend it, protect it, stand up for it — each and every one of us.

Nevertheless, while trying to defend American democracy and oppose the dictatorial behaviour of the nation’s current president, it might be worthwhile to ask whether the US Constitution really will be able to defend democracy and human rights?

The venerated Fathers of the Nation, who in the summer of 1787 assembled in Philadelphia to write a constitution (ratified in 1789) actually assumed that the United States could not become a pure democracy. Just how democratic the nation should be was during this revolutionary era a deeply controversial issue, and it remains so today.

In those days the president, senate, and judiciary would be chosen by representatives, rather than the people. Only the House of Representatives would be directly elected, but those allowed to vote were only “property-owning adult, white men”. However, one crucial feature of the Constitution was that it could be “amended” and over the years more democratic features were included. In the two centuries following the Constitution’s ratification the original document has been “amended” 27 times. For example, it was in 1868 further “democratized” when a 14th amendment granted citizenship to all persons “born or naturalized in the United States”, including formerly enslaved people. The amendment provided all citizens with “equal protection under the laws.” In 1870, a 15th amendment established that the right to vote could not be denied by race. In 1913, a 17th amendment gave voters, rather than state legislatures, the power to choose their state’s senators, and in 1920, a 19th amendment granted women the right to vote. Only one amendment, the 18th, which established prohibition of alcohol, has been repealed by the united states.

A proposed amendment must be passed by two-thirds of the Congress, and then ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the states. The same rule is applicable for the removal of an amendment. However, there are a number of legal deceptions that may be used to avoid applying a constitutional amendment. Famously did the US Supreme Court in 1883 allow southern states to ratify racist, discriminatory laws by declaring that the14th and 15th amendments only dealt with discrimination by the states, not by individuals. A judgement that was not overturned until, the applications of a Civil Rights Act in 1964 and a Voting Right Act in 1965.

Until then, several state legislations had denied Native Americans, Asians and others from human- as well as voting rights. This is just one example of how the US Constitution can be ignored through legal chicaneries, in particular if the Supreme Court’s objectivity has been thwarted by political affiliations.

Since taking office, Trump’s views of presidential authority appear to be far less restrained than those of his predecessors. He is trying to impede law suits against him personally, at the same time as he seeks to restrict birthright citizenship, withhold funding appropriated by Congress, and removing heads of independent federal agencies. It appears as if the current US President is counting upon a Supreme Court, which will not use the Constitution to hinder his irregular ventures.

The first ten amendments to the US Constitution are called the Bill of Rights and were ratified in 1791. The 1st amendment reads

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

A right that recently has been questioned, or “moderated”, by the current administration. Trump has over several decades threatened and sued his critics over comments made about him and has on several occasions referred to journalists as the “enemy of the people”, suing the CNN, ABC News, CBS News, and the publisher Simon & Schuster, for spreading, what he considers to be, lies about him.

Such behaviour has after Trump’s elevation to the presidency become the order of the day. The White House press team lately decided to determine who gets to enjoy access to press conferences, banning among others the global news agencies Reuters and Associated Press (AP). The announcement came a day after the Trump administration won a temporary ruling allowing it to bar the AP in retaliation for the outlet’s decision to resist Trump’s demand to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America”.

Another attempt at infringement of “free speech” has been when President Trump on the 4th of March stated that he plans to stop all federal funding for colleges and schools allowing “illegal” protests and that “agitators” would be imprisoned, or sent back to the country they came from, while “American students will be permanently expelled or, depending on the crime, arrested.”

Meanwhile, Elon Musk’s politically motivated Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is planning to, or already has shut down the CFPB, a federal regulatory agency enforcing financial consumer protection laws, the U.S. Agency for International Development (UASAID) and the Department of Education. DOGE has also announced drastic personnel layoffs at the Federal Aviation Administration, which in September 2024 fined Musk’s SpaceX, with over USD 600,000 for failing to follow license requirements for two rocket launches.

DOGE has so far been instrumental in firing personnel from the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Internal Revenue Service, while proposing to drastically limit funding to Medicare, as well as the National Institute of Health, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the Treasury Department.

Job-seekers hoping to join the Trump administration are facing a series of loyalty tests. White House screening teams are fanning out to government agencies to check for “Make America Great Again” bona fides and carefully checking applicants’ social media posts. Candidates are asked about the result of the 2020 election and the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol, two issues Trump consider to be tests of loyalty.

Such efforts bring to mind Joseph (Joe) McCarthy, who in the early 1950s went on the road for the Republican Party with a speech about alleged communists working secretly deep in the State Department and elsewhere in the federal establishment, stating that there were 205 communist “card-carrying members” within the State Department. Pressed for a list, McCarthy never produced one.

Press attention blew up McCarthy’s unsubstantiated claims and he soon became a thorn in the side of the Democratic party President Harry Truman. Even if McCarthy never discovered any communists in crucial roles, he and his allies destroyed the reputations of thousands of civil servants, academics and journalists. Some never recovered professionally, a few even committed suicide. To begin with, not many Republicans opposed McCarthy and his lies. One exception was the senator Margaret Chase Smith, who declared:

It is high time that we all stopped being tools and victims of totalitarian techniques – techniques that, if continued here unchecked, will surely end what we have come to cherish as the American way of life.

Many Republicans, eager to regain power, assumed that McCarthy and his accusations were crucial for an election win. However, the Republican 1952 presidential nominee and war hero Dwight Eisenhower did not need McCarthy’s lies to gain popularity. Nevertheless, after his victory Eisenhower made the mistake to grant McCarthy the chairmanship of a key Senate investigation subcommittee, paving the way for his height of power, fame and falsehoods. McCarthy’s crusade culminated two years later in a clash with the Defense Department over the promotion of a leftist Army dentist. A TVdebate concerning this issue exposed McCarthy as a compulsive liar and made him withdraw from public view. He died three years later, at the age of 48.

A recent movie, The Apprentice, shed some light on the role of legendary lawyer Roy Cohn, who for years was legal adviser, personal friend and promoter of Donald J. Trump. Roy Cohn began his career as an influential investigator for McCarthy’s subcommittee. Trump has often spoken of Cohn as his ideal of an attorney, utterly devoted to him, while teaching him to be concerned with nothing but winning.

Will Trump’s apparent abuse of the Constitution stir up any opposition within his own party? Why are Democrats, and so many others who confess their faith in the omnipotence of the Constitution, not perceiving their President as a threat to what it stands for? Not only the fate of the U.S. depends on this, but also the fate of so many other places, if not the entire world.

IPS UN Bureau

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