{"id":128387,"date":"2025-03-02T01:46:33","date_gmt":"2025-03-02T01:46:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/trumps-moves-test-the-limits-of-presidential-power-and-the-resilience-of-us-democracy-the-associated-press\/"},"modified":"2025-03-02T01:46:33","modified_gmt":"2025-03-02T01:46:33","slug":"trumps-moves-test-the-limits-of-presidential-power-and-the-resilience-of-us-democracy-the-associated-press","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/trumps-moves-test-the-limits-of-presidential-power-and-the-resilience-of-us-democracy-the-associated-press\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump\u2019s moves test the limits of presidential power and the resilience of US democracy – The Associated Press"},"content":{"rendered":"

Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
People demonstrate during the Presidents Day protest Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, in Lincoln, Neb. (Justin Wan\/Lincoln Journal Star via AP)
Demonstrators rally during the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, on Capitol Hill in Washington Monday, Feb. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
People protest as part of the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, by the Capitol in Washington. The protest was organized by the 50501 Movement, which stands for 50 Protests 50 States 1 Movement. (AP Photo\/Jacquelyn Martin)
People take part in the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, by the Capitol in Washington. The protest was organized by the 50501 Movement, which stands for 50 Protests 50 States 1 Movement. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Vice President JD Vance, right, speaks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, left, as President Donald Trump listens in the Oval Office at the White House, Friday, Feb. 28, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo\/ Mystyslav Chernov)
Supporters of Ukraine\u2019s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy rally outside of the White House in Washington, Friday, Feb. 28, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators rally during the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, on Capitol Hill in Washington Monday, Feb. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
People demonstrate during the Presidents Day protest Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, in Lincoln, Neb. (Justin Wan\/Lincoln Journal Star via AP)
People demonstrate during the Presidents Day protest Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, in Lincoln, Neb. (Justin Wan\/Lincoln Journal Star via AP)
Demonstrators rally during the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, on Capitol Hill in Washington Monday, Feb. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators rally during the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, on Capitol Hill in Washington Monday, Feb. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
People protest as part of the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, by the Capitol in Washington. The protest was organized by the 50501 Movement, which stands for 50 Protests 50 States 1 Movement. (AP Photo\/Jacquelyn Martin)
People protest as part of the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, by the Capitol in Washington. The protest was organized by the 50501 Movement, which stands for 50 Protests 50 States 1 Movement. (AP Photo\/Jacquelyn Martin)
People take part in the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, by the Capitol in Washington. The protest was organized by the 50501 Movement, which stands for 50 Protests 50 States 1 Movement. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
People take part in the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, by the Capitol in Washington. The protest was organized by the 50501 Movement, which stands for 50 Protests 50 States 1 Movement. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Vice President JD Vance, right, speaks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, left, as President Donald Trump listens in the Oval Office at the White House, Friday, Feb. 28, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo\/ Mystyslav Chernov)
Vice President JD Vance, right, speaks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, left, as President Donald Trump listens in the Oval Office at the White House, Friday, Feb. 28, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo\/ Mystyslav Chernov)
Supporters of Ukraine\u2019s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy rally outside of the White House in Washington, Friday, Feb. 28, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Supporters of Ukraine\u2019s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy rally outside of the White House in Washington, Friday, Feb. 28, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators rally during the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, on Capitol Hill in Washington Monday, Feb. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators rally during the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, on Capitol Hill in Washington Monday, Feb. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
During his first six weeks in office, President Donald Trump<\/a><\/span> has embarked on a dizzying teardown of the federal government and attacks on long-standing institutions in an attempt to increase his own authority.
He has pardoned<\/a><\/span> those who attacked the U.S. Capitol<\/a><\/span> to overturn his 2020 election loss<\/a><\/span>, placed loyalists atop the FBI<\/a><\/span> and military<\/a><\/span>, and purged the Department of Justice<\/a><\/span>, which dropped investigations<\/a><\/span> against Trump allies<\/a><\/span>. He declared control<\/a><\/span> over independent agencies such as the Federal Election Commission, punished<\/a><\/span> media outlets for coverage<\/a><\/span> he dislikes and his allies suggested<\/a><\/span> he could defy court orders<\/a><\/span>.
Those who monitor democracy across the globe had warned that a second Trump term could endanger America\u2019s 240-year experiment with democracy. His opening weeks in office have done nothing to dispel those concerns.
\u201cTrump is using the classic elected authoritarian playbook,\u201d said Brendan Nyhan of Dartmouth College, who joined more than 800 other political scientists in signing a letter warning that Trump is undermining the rule of law and the basic constitutional principle of checks and balances. \u201cIt\u2019s almost embarrassing how crude it is.\u201d
Demonstrators rally during the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, on Capitol Hill in Washington Monday, Feb. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators rally during the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, on Capitol Hill in Washington Monday, Feb. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Nyhan said some of Trump\u2019s moves echo those made by others who won democratic elections and then moved to centralize control, such as Hungary\u2019s Viktor Orban<\/a><\/span>. Those who have resisted authoritarians in other countries say they are alarmed by what is happening in the United States.
\u201cI feel like I\u2019m living through this twice,\u201d said Maria Ressa, a journalist who won a Nobel Prize after being prosecuted by the government of former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte in 2019, on a call last week about the threat of Trump to democracy.
\u201cWhat you\u2019re seeing is exactly that \u2014 think about it as death by a thousand cuts,\u201d she said. \u201cYou\u2019re bleeding so much that, at some point, the body politic dies.\u201d
Trump has certainly embraced the image of a strongman.
The president declared, \u201cwe are the federal law\u201d<\/a><\/span> and posted on his social media site that \u201cHe who saves his country does not violate any law\u201d \u2014 a quote often attributed to Napolean Bonaparte. The official White House account posted on the social media site X an image of a smiling, crowned Trump with the words \u201cLONG LIVE THE KING.\u201d
Trump\u2019s supporters say he actually is trying to preserve American democracy by giving voters what they want \u2014 a strong president. How strong Trump can become is in question. Courts have paused several of his executive orders<\/a><\/span>, including ones seeking to eliminate agencies created by Congress and ending birthright citizenship<\/a><\/span> for the children of parents who are in the U.S. illegally.
Trump campaigned last year promising to dismantle what he contends is a corrupt government bureaucracy, which he blames for failures during his first term and his subsequent prosecution. On his first day in office<\/a><\/span>, the new president told reporters his goal was to \u201cgive the people back their faith, their wealth, their democracy and indeed their freedom.\u201d
Speaking to reporters<\/a><\/span> in the Oval Office in February, billionaire Elon Musk, who Trump tapped to spearhead cuts to the federal government, claimed he is the one trying to \u201crestore democracy.\u201d Some of the lawsuits seeking to stop Musk\u2019s actions have been unsuccessful<\/a><\/span>, allowing him to proceed.
People protest as part of the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, by the Capitol in Washington. The protest was organized by the 50501 Movement, which stands for 50 Protests 50 States 1 Movement. (AP Photo\/Jacquelyn Martin)
People protest as part of the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, by the Capitol in Washington. The protest was organized by the 50501 Movement, which stands for 50 Protests 50 States 1 Movement. (AP Photo\/Jacquelyn Martin)
\u201cThe people voted for major government reform and that\u2019s what the people are going to get,\u201d Musk told reporters. \u201cThat\u2019s what democracy is all about.\u201d
But many who track democracy warn that Musk\u2019s conception is incomplete.
\u201cThe power you gain through the ballot box is not unlimited power. That\u2019s the essence of liberal democracy,\u201d said Kevin Casas-Zamora, secretary general of the Stockholm-based pro-democracy group International IDEA.
On the world stage, Trump and his administration have alarmed longtime allies in Europe<\/a><\/span> over whether the U.S. remains committed to NATO and his siding with Russia<\/a><\/span> in talks to end<\/a><\/span> the war in Ukraine, a country the Kremlin invaded three years ago, and at the United Nations<\/a><\/span> last month.
On Friday, Trump berated<\/a><\/span> Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the Oval Office. Russian officials and many Trump allies expressed glee; European nations reacted in horror.
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said the close relations between the Trump administration and Russian President Vladimir Putin\u2019s government<\/a><\/span> amounted to an existential threat. \u201cThis Putin-Trump alliance means abandoning our allies, supporting authoritarianism and undermining our democratic traditions,\u201d he said in a social media post.
The common theme throughout Trump\u2019s moves is about expanding his personal power, said Josh Chafetz, a Georgetown law professor.
\u201cIt\u2019s not even clear what it\u2019s power in service of,\u201d he added, noting that Trump has few strong ideological convictions.
Demonstrators rally during the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, on Capitol Hill in Washington Monday, Feb. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators rally during the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, on Capitol Hill in Washington Monday, Feb. 17, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Despite concerns that the administration would disregard the judiciary<\/a><\/span>, Trump and Musk said it would obey court rulings<\/a><\/span> and eventually seek congressional approval for the changes they are making. Still, Musk and some other Republicans have also called for impeaching judges who rule against<\/a><\/span> the administration.
There are plenty of other warning signs, chiefly the aggressive use of the Department of Justice to promote Trump\u2019s political interests.
The department directed prosecutors<\/a><\/span> to dismiss corruption charges against New York City Mayor Eric Adams, citing his cooperation with the administration\u2019s immigration crackdown. That led to several senior Justice Department officials<\/a><\/span> resigning after saying such a deal was dangerous and some former top prosecutors warning about the risks to the rule of law.<\/a><\/span>
Trump\u2019s pick to be U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, Ed Martin, represented some defendants who attacked the U.S. Capitol<\/a><\/span> on Jan. 6, 2021. Martin, in his interim post as the top federal prosecution in the nation\u2019s capital, contacted at least two congressional Democrats,<\/a><\/span> including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, to \u201cinvestigate\u201d previous statements they had made. One statement related to Musk and another dealt with the conservative Supreme Court justices who were in the majority ruling that ended the constitutional right to abortion.
\u201cThis notion that you can use your power to reward your friends and punish your enemies \u2014 it reminds me of something that has long been a staple of Latin American politics,\u201d said Casas-Zamora, who is from Costa Rica.
Supporters of Ukraine\u2019s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy rally outside of the White House in Washington, Friday, Feb. 28, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Supporters of Ukraine\u2019s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy rally outside of the White House in Washington, Friday, Feb. 28, 2025. (AP Photo\/Jose Luis Magana)
Trump has escalated attacks on media outlets whose coverage he dislikes, kicking them out<\/a><\/span> of their Pentagon workspace or barring them<\/a><\/span> from the Oval Office and Air Force One and picking<\/a><\/span> which will be allowed to cover<\/a><\/span> his events. His appointee to head the Federal Communications Commission is investigating PBS and National Public Radio<\/a><\/span>, which receive federal money.
Trump also issued an executive order<\/a><\/span> to take control of independent agencies such as the FCC, Federal Election Commission and Securities and Exchange Commission.
Some leading Democrats have used striking analogies in warning about Trump\u2019s actions. In a State of the State address last month that ended with a scathing assessment of Trump\u2019s actions, Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker, who is Jewish, implored lawmakers to remember what gave rise to Nazism in Germany nearly a century ago.
\u201cIf we don\u2019t want to repeat history,\u201d Pritzker said, \u201cthen for God\u2019s sake in this moment we better be strong enough to learn from it.\u201d
This version corrects the name of the Federal Election Commission.
Associated Press writers John O\u2019Connor in Springfield, Illinois, and Didi Tang in Washington contributed to this report.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n

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Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.People demonstrate during the Presidents Day protest Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, in Lincoln, Neb. (Justin Wan\/Lincoln Journal Star via AP)Demonstrators rally during the \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d protest on Presidents Day in Washington, in support of federal workers and against recent actions by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":128388,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-128387","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-us","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128387"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128387\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}