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Constitution

Trump Is Provoking A Constitutional Crisis

February 14, 2025 Marjorie Cohn, Truthout. , , ,
States, public interest organizations, schools, doctors, unions, immigrants, federal workers and individuals have filed more than 60 lawsuits challenging Trump’s legal authority to take these actions. At least nine judges throughout the country have temporarily halted several of them. Courts have put temporary holds on Trump’s attempts to: end birthright citizenship for children of undocumented immigrants, freeze billions of dollars in federal spending appropriated by Congress, transfer incarcerated transgender women to men’s prisons, remove scientific data from the websites of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration, give his de facto co-president Elon Musk unfettered access to sensitive Treasury Department records, and put 2,200 United States Agency for International Development (USAID) employees on leave.

Border Deployment To Insurrection Act: Trump’s Illegal Military Plans

January 31, 2025 Mike Prysner, Empire Files. , , , ,
The current deployment of soldiers and Marines to the US-Mexico border is illegal and immoral. The looming possibility of Trump invoking the Insurrection Act, in an attempt to paper it over, actually raises more danger of unconstitutional orders. We have just spent 20 years being used as cannon fodder for hapless debacles in Iraq and Afghanistan. Today, soldiers and Marines are being used as propaganda fodder for the oldest Commander-in-Chief ever, taking office with the worst approval rating in modern history. Conventional, active-duty units from the 82nd Airborne Division and the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force have been the first to the border under US Northern Command.

Trump’s Blitz On Immigration Aimed To Overwhelm

January 24, 2025 Marjorie Cohn, Truthout. , , ,
Pandering to his nativist base, Donald Trump made the central pledge of his 2024 presidential campaign a threat to “carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in American history.” On January 20, 2025, he began to fulfill that promise. On Inauguration Day, repeating the words spoken by Chief Justice John Roberts, Trump swore to uphold the U.S. Constitution. Setting aside the issue of whether he purposely refrained from placing his hand on the Bible his wife was holding, the oath Trump swore triggered the “Take Care Clause” of the Constitution. Article II imposes on the president the duty to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”

ACLU Sues Trump Over Birthright Citizenship Executive Order

January 22, 2025 Chris Walker, Truthout. , , , , ,
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), along with several other pro-immigrant groups, is suing the Trump administration after President Donald Trump signed an executive order that seeks to end the constitutionally recognized right of birthright citizenship. The 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution states in its first sentence that: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. Yet on Monday, his first day back in the White House, Trump falsely asserted that he had the presidential right to unilaterally change the interpretation of the amendment.

Protests Erupt In Indonesia Over Attempts To Bypass Constitution

August 25, 2024 Abdul Rahman, People's Dispatch. , , , ,
Large-scale protests erupted across Indonesia on Thursday, August 22, in response to the government’s attempt to revise the regional election (Pilkada) law. Protesters demanded that the government and the House of Representatives (DPR) immediately halt the revision process, arguing that it violates the constitution. In several instances, the police fired tear gas at the protesters, causing injuries. In central Java, students stormed the office of the Regional House of Representatives (DPRD) after the police arrested one of the protesters, Kompas reported. Protesters in Jakarta were joined by leading intellectuals, academics and celebrities, who expressed concerns about the revisions being carried out without any public consultation.

US Postal Service’s Attack On Privacy

June 29, 2024 John Kiriakou, Consortium News. , , ,
I've written in the past about the U.S. Postal Service’s so-called Mail Cover Program.   It allows postal employees to photograph and send to federal law enforcement organizations (F.B.I., Department of Homeland Security, Secret Service, etc.) the front and back of every piece of mail the Post Office processes. It also retains the information digitally and provides it to any government agency that wants it — without a warrant.  I’m not an attorney, of course.  But I’m also not an idiot.  And that policy strikes me as a violation of Americans’ civil liberties. The Mail Cover Program has been known publicly for quite some time. 

Kenya Ignores Court Order To Join Occupation Of Haiti

February 7, 2024 Rezo Nodwes, Black Agenda Report. , , , , ,
The New England Human Rights Organization (NEHRO) reaffirms its commitment to promoting human rights wherever violations might occur. Therefore, the organization adopts a holistic approach to human rights, encompassing the right to life and liberty; freedom from slavery and torture; freedom of opinion and expression; as well as the right to work and education, to name a few. According to the United Nations, « everyone is entitled to these rights, without discrimination. » On January 26, 2024, Kenya’s High Court Judge Enock Chacha Mwita ruled that « any decision by any state organ or state officer to deploy police officers to Haiti… contravenes the constitution and the law and is therefore unconstitutional, illegal, and invalid. ».

CPK Applauds Court Ruling Against Kenyan Police Deployment In Haiti

February 2, 2024 Booker Omole, Black Agenda Report. , , , ,
The International Department of the Central Organizing Committee of the Communist Party of Kenya issued this statement in staunch solidarity with the January 26th, 2024 High Court ruling in Nairobi, declaring the deployment of National Police Services (NPS) officers to Haiti unconstitutional. Judge Chacha Mwita's articulate decision represents a crucial victory for constitutional principles and sovereignty. The acknowledgment that the National Security Council and NPS lack authority to deploy police beyond Kenya underscores the imperative of upholding the constitutional framework governing our government's actions.

The Real Border Crisis: Texas Vs. The Constitution

February 1, 2024 Ari Paul, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting. , , , ,
The United States is on the verge of a constitutional crisis, one that enlivens the nationalist fervor of Trump America and that centers on a violent, racist closed-border policy. In January, the Supreme Court, with a five-vote majority that included both Republican and Democratic appointees, ruled that federal agents can “remove the razor wire that Texas state officials have set up along some sections of the US/Mexico border” to make immigration more dangerous (CBS, 1/23/24). The state’s extreme border policy is not merely immoral as an idea, but has proven to be deadly and torturous in practice (USA Today, 8/3/23; NBC, 1/14/24; Texas Observer, 1/17/24).

Lessons From One Unequal Society To Another

December 19, 2023 Liam Crisan, Inequality.org. , , , ,
This past Sunday, Chileans voted once again on a new constitution, opting to reject — for the second time in two years — an attempt at constitutional revision. Rejecting a highly conservative text, voters chose to keep the dictatorship-era constitution for the time being. A political saga that began amid immense hope has now devolved into a dismal disarray that’s left countless Chileans tired and frustrated. Here in the United States, we face an equally bleak political outlook. According to a recent Pew Research Center report, 25 percent of U.S. adults feel that neither of the nation’s two major parties represents them adequately enough. Some 63 percent of Americans express little to no confidence in the future of our political system.

Chile’s Proposed New Constitution Threatens Women’s Rights

October 28, 2023 Alejandra Hayon, Orinoco Tribune. , , ,
Chilean society is once again at the culmination of a transformative constitutional process. This pivotal juncture will decide whether the constitution drafted by a legislature dominated by conservative and right-wing parties will replace the current constitution which was established during Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship. After a first failed attempt to establish a new constitution, this new draft introduces stricter measures concerning irregular migration, firmly entrenches the existing pension and healthcare systems—both subjects of substantial critique. It additionally introduces provisions that pose significant threats to sexual and reproductive rights, specifically through the establishment of “rights for those who are about to be born” and the legalization of “conscientious objection” regarding the provision of goods and services.

Deploying Kenyan Police In Haiti Is Unconstitutional

October 3, 2023 Willy Mutunga, Black Agenda Report. , , ,
The matter of Kenya sending 1000 police women and men to Haiti is but one of the many decisions our government is taking without our participation and consent. The Constitution is very clear that our foreign policy has to comply with the decrees of the Constitution. Foreign policy decisions by the government are unconstitutional when they violate any of the provisions of the Constitution. Article 1 of our Constitution decrees that all sovereign power belongs to us, the Kenyan people. Indeed, sovereign power is delegated to the national executive and can be exercised directly by the Kenyan people themselves.

The Far Right Has Hijacked Chile’s New Constitutional Process

September 20, 2023 Nick MacWilliam, The Real News Network. , , , , ,
In 2019 the nation of Chile was shaken by a mass protest movement that has come to be known as the Social Explosion. A central demand of the Social Explosion was the abolition of the current constitution drafted in 1980 under US-backed fascist dictator Augusto Pinochet. In 2020, Chileans overwhelmingly voted for a new constitutional process in a referendum. However, just two years later, a plebiscite overwhelmingly rejected a new proposed constitution. Since then, the far right has hijacked the process by stacking the constituents to create another constitutional draft with their own representatives.

Argentina: Protests Continue, Indigenous Communities Demand Repeal Of Constitutional Reform

July 7, 2023 Pagina 12, Orinoco Tribune. , , ,
Raúl Choquevilca—the president of the indigenous community of Ocumazo, in Humahuaca, Jujuy province of Argentina, and member of the Assembly of the Third Malón de la Paz—confirmed on a local radio interview that a new day of protests was beginning in Jujuy against the express and unconsented regional constitutional reform, promoted by Gerardo Morales, the governor of Jujuy province. In a communiqué released this Thursday, July 6, Choquevilca informed that all roads will be blocked and that no traffic will be allowed “until the constitutional reform is repealed,” although they clarified that they will allow the transit of essential services.

Thousands Rally Across Australia In Support Of Indigenous Reform

July 2, 2023 Al Jazeera. , , ,
Thousands of people have rallied in cities and towns across Australia to back a campaign to recognise the country’s Indigenous people in the constitution in advance of a referendum later this year. The gatherings on Sunday, organised by the Yes23 campaign, were part of a nationwide “day of action” to rally the public after a recent dip in support for the constitutional change. The proposal, which will be put up for a referendum between October and December, seeks to establish an advisory body – the Indigenous Voice to Parliament – to give Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people a direct say in policies that affect them.
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