Mother Jones; Jacquelyn Martin/Pool/AP; Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP
President Donald Trump is demanding that the Justice Department transfer $230 million in taxpayer dollars into his own personal bank account. He can do this, because thanks to the Supreme Court’s recent decisions, the executive branch could accurately be described by King Louis XIV—L’état, c’est Trump.
When Trump says this is his decision to make, he’s probably right.
At first you might think, ‘Can he do that? Can he just shakedown the DOJ for roughly a quarter of a billion dollars?’ And then you think about the Supreme Court opinions under Chief Justice John Roberts, in which the court has shifted the fundamental structure of American government such that federal agencies, including the Justice Department, are mere extensions of the president’s will. Trump, always on the lookout for the next grift, understands the immense power this bestows on him.
The colossal cash transfer he is demanding is being described as compensation for investigations the department launched into Russia’s interventions in the 2016 election and Trump’s absconding with classified documents after his first term. Now that he’s back in the White House, Trump plans to make the government pay for its appropriate use of its ability to investigate and prosecute to safeguard our democracy. And he grasps the fact that he has the absolute power to do that.
“With the country, it’s interesting, because I’m the one that makes the decision,” Trump said Tuesday, responding to news of the impending payments. “That decision would have to go across my desk. And it’s awfully strange to make a decision where I’m paying myself.”
Strange indeed—especially since, technically, it is senior Justice Department officials who would officially sign off on the payments, not the president: Breaking the story on Tuesday, the New York Times framed the ethical conflict around the fact that several of the DOJ officials who could sign off on the payments were formerly Trump’s personal lawyers.
That’s corruption, of course, but in the old school way of putting cronies in a position to help you. But we’re in a new world now, and Trump himself gets this: He decides, because he effectively controls every decision made at every agency (with the possible exception of the Federal Reserve). If he doesn’t like a decision, he can fire the person responsible. Their desk is now his desk.
Don’t just take it from him: the Supreme Court said so. In a series of opinions, Chief Justice John Roberts has reinterpreted the Constitution to give Trump this power. This warping of our constitutional order is known as the unitary executive theory, and it posits that the framers gave the president complete control over the executive branch. Last summer, Roberts authored the infamous immunity decision, Trump’s forever Get Out of Jail Free card, which protected presidents from virtually all prosecution for official acts. That decision not only permitted Trump to break the law, it also gave him unfettered control over the investigative and prosecutorial functions of the DOJ—which presumably includes issuing payments to those he claims should be compensated for investigations gone awry. Which all is to say that when Trump says this is his decision to make, he’s probably right.
As Roberts has handed the presidency more and more power over every inch of the government, he has never copped to the fact that he was enabling corruption, theft, or autocracy. Absurdly, he claimed to be increasing democratic accountability. “The framers made the president the most democratic and politically accountable official in government,” he wrote in a 2020 decision, because “only the president (along with the vice president) is elected by the entire nation.” It’s hard to take this with a straight face; the electoral college allows a president to win fewer votes and still assume office, and a president in his second term will not face voters again. (Although Trump may try.)
Undeterred by these facts, Roberts wrote in a 2021 case that all executive branch decisions are ultimately the president’s to make: The executive power “acquires its legitimacy and accountability to the public through ‘a clear and effective chain of command’ down from the President, on whom all the people vote.”
The absurdity of Roberts’ decision was laid bare Tuesday: The president gets to pay himself hundreds of millions in taxpayer dollars, because he controls all executive branch personnel and all of their decisions, and there’s probably nothing anyone can do about it. It sure doesn’t feel like our democratic accountability has increased. Of course, Congress could and should pass a law prohibiting such payments, and dare the Supreme Court to strike it down—but this Congress is unlikely to do even that bare minimum in response.
What’s to stop Trump from paying allies the same way? Have them file a complaint with DOJ over some legal skirmish, and then order the department to pay them their reward. If Trump gains control of the Federal Reserve—as he is asking the Supreme Court to give him—he could similarly transform the country’s central bank into his own “bottomless slush fund,” as the Atlantic’s Rogé Karma reported last month. He could use the Fed to pay his businesses, his friends, and his donors. He could even keep ICE’s operations active by hiring private contractors during a government shutdown, Karma points out, circumventing Congress’ power of the purse.
If Trump will transfer a quarter billion dollars from the taxpayers to himself, it’s clear that he wouldn’t shy away from any of these uses—and probably find more ways to profit that we haven’t even dreamt.
Roberts can claim that he’s expanding democratic accountability. But at this point, we can all see the mess he’s created. A man who takes from the voters to line his pockets is not feeling all that accountable to anyone.
