GOP Senator and Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley of Iowa has gotten a deluge of calls on President Trump’s government overhaul effort and insists Trump can’t go around the courts.
“A lot of calls, maybe four or five hundred on this whole process.”
That’s Senator Grassley on farmers’ concerns over spending freezes and ‘deferred resignation’ buyouts paused by federal judges, but that could still hit farm payments, contracts, and services.
Is President Trump mounting a ‘wholesale’ remaking of the federal government?
“You can’t use that word now. Maybe when this is all done, you can use that word. But remember, for instance, if you want to do away with the Department of Education, you can’t do that without Congress doing it. You can restructure, maybe, within the Department of Education, but you aren’t going to do away with this.”
The Judiciary Chairman says the president can’t ignore the courts, either, despite hints by Vice President Vance that Trump could do so in some instances. Grassley on one president’s tangle with a Supreme Court Chief Justice.
“Only one other president has said one time. Andrew Jackson said Marshall made a decision, so let Marshall enforce it. I don’t think this president would go that far, and if he did, I would disagree with his going that far.”
But President Trump has in the past and could be expected again to appeal lower court decisions to the Supreme Court.
