The Rule of Law, Trump Version

Have you noticed how often Trump and the Republicans are invoking the "rule of law" lately? Remember that Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III claimed to have "restored" it in his craven resignation letter. They make a lot of noise about it, but this is what it means to them -- to the Trump wing of the party, at least, which is pretty much the whole thing. This story is from a couple of weeks ago:

After Wednesday, elected officials in the Republican Party should have no doubt that Donald Trump will force them to choose in coming days, weeks, and months between loyalty to him and loyalty to the rule of law, between the public’s right to the truth and Trump’s efforts to hide it.

The president began the day with an extraordinary threat on Twitter: “If the Democrats think they are going to waste Taxpayer Money investigating us at the House level,” he wrote, “then we will likewise be forced to consider investigating them for all of the leaks of Classified Information, and much else, at the Senate level. Two can play that game!”

(Side note: So all those hearings on Benghazi!!1! and Her E-Mails!1!! were a game in Trump's eyes.)

There's been token resistance (Can you say "Jeff Flake"?), but they've pretty much fallen into line, from the illegal detention of migrant children while not allowing their parents to request asylum (which is a direct violation of American law, not to mention international treaties) on down the line.

And now we have another couple of examples. It's been obvious for a while that Trump considers the Dempartment of Justice, which has historically been a quasi-independent branch of the executive, to be his personal enforcers, but this takes it up a notch:

The New York Times reports:

President Trump told the White House counsel in the spring that he wanted to order the Justice Department to prosecute two of his political adversaries: his 2016 challenger, Hillary Clinton, and the former F.B.I. director James B. Comey, according to two people familiar with the conversation.

No investigation, no evidence, just prosecute. Sound like a couple of twentieth-century dictators we could name?

Here's another little tidbit:

Trump administration officials have privately discussed the possibility that in the future census information could be shared with law enforcement, according to documents filed in a legal challenge over plans for a new citizenship question on the 2020 survey.

The subject came up after a Democratic lawmaker asked whether responses to the survey could ever be shared with law enforcement agencies, something that has been strictly illegal according to federal law governing the census.

After a congressional hearing in May about the citizenship question, Rep. Jimmy Gomez (D-Calif.) submitted a written query about whether the Justice Department agreed with a memo it had issued in 2010 saying the USA Patriot Act could not override the confidentiality of the census.

In a June 12 email, department officials discussed among themselves how to answer Gomez’s question in a way that left the answer open. Justice Department attorney Ben Aguinaga suggested to acting assistant attorney general John Gore that they not say “too much” in response to Gomez’s question, in case the issue were to “come up later for renewed debate.”

The confidentiality of census responses is not up for debate -- it's a matter of law.

Of course, Trump and the Republicans (sounds like a garage band, doesn't it?) think that "rule of law" means that the law is what they say it is. Well, no:

The ACLU and others had filed suit to stop the Trump administration from implementing rules that would prevent the migrant caravan from entering the United States and filing claims for asylum.

CNN:

In an order laced with language accusing President Donald Trump of attempting to rewrite immigration laws, a federal judge based in San Francisco temporarily blocked the government late Monday night from denying asylum to those crossing over the southern border between ports of entry.

Judge Jon S. Tigar of the US District Court for the Northern District of California said that a policy announced November 9 barring asylum for immigrants who enter outside a legal check point '"irreconcilably conflicts" with immigration law and the "expressed intent of Congress."

"Whatever the scope of the President's authority, he may not rewrite the immigration laws to impose a condition that Congress has expressly forbidden," Tigar wrote, adding that asylum seekers would be put at "increased risk of violence and other harms at the border" if the administration's rule is allowed to go into effect.

He really wants to rule by proclamation.

And lest you think I'm unfairly tarring the GOP because of Trump, read this post from Digby. It's not just Trump -- it's a Republican thing.

Thanks to commenter JCF at Joe.My.God., here is, I think, the image that perfectly captures what Trump and the GOP think of the rule of law: