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‘Cower Before a Mad King’: GOP Moves to ‘Surrender’ Congress’ Power Over Trump’s Tariffs
Facing a midnight Friday deadline to prevent a federal government shutdown if no budget is passed, the Republican Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, insists he has the votes to secure a continuing resolution, a “CR,” and without any help from Democrats. Democrats have vowed to oppose the measure, citing its spending cuts to health care and veterans’ benefits, as well as the inclusion of controversial policy provisions — despite Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole’s specific claim to the contrary.
Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries on Monday wrote: “House Republicans want to gut Medicaid. Hard pass.”
Mike Johnson: “We’ll have the votes. We’re gonna pass the CR. We can do it on our own.”
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) March 11, 2025 at 10:28 AM
“The 99 page bill continues funding levels for federal agencies through September 30, 2025,” NPR reports. “GOP leaders argued the bill was largely a ‘clean’ continuation of current funding levels, but it does include a boost for immigration enforcement and a boost for defense programs.”
It also includes a little-noticed provision, however, that, according to one longtime congressional staffer, “preemptively surrenders” Congress’s constitutional authority to block President Donald Trump’s highly controversial and unpredictable tariffs, which he appears to be imposing and rescinding on a whim.
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Here’s how one noted economist explained President Trump’s tariffs on Tuesday:
“Tariffs are on/off/paused, and are targeted/universal, applied to our friends/foes/everyone, starting sooner/later. They’ll be in place for the short/long run because they are a useful policy/bargaining chip, and will solve our problem with fentanyl/deficits/manufacturing/revenue,” wrote Justin Wolfers a professor of economics and public policy.
Meanwhile, that provision House Republicans quietly inserted into the bill that at least temporarily would revoke their authority is now getting some attention.
“Republicans snuck a provision into the rule for the CR that would preemptively surrender congressional authority to block tariffs,” observes Aaron Fritschner, deputy chief of staff to U.S. Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA). “When House Republicans vote for this rule today, they will also be voting to support Trump’s tariffs and all the resulting damage to the US economy.”
Congressman Beyer, in a joint statement with U.S. Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-WA), blasted the rule:
“”Every House Republican who votes for this measure is voting to give Trump expanded powers to raise taxes on American households through tariffs with full knowledge of how he is using those powers, and every Republican will own the economic consequences of that vote. It speaks volumes that Republicans are sneaking this provision into a procedural measure hidden from the American people.”
“While [Trump] babbles about making Canada the 51st state, your groceries and housing are getting more expensive and your retirement accounts are getting crushed- and House Republicans are supporting him every step of the way.”
The provision might be able to be removed if the House voted to do so after the CR is passed, but chances of that happening — voting to oppose a core tenet of Trump’s agenda — are slim if the GOP holds the House majority. Trump would also have to sign the bill, or the House would have to overturn a veto.
Some House Democrats are explaining their opposition to other provisions in the continuing resolution, which one of them, U.S. Rep. Sean Casten (D-IL), appears to compare to an exercise in bondage.
“I don’t know whether the GOP will get the votes on their disaster of a bill this week. But I do know that majorities of Republicans voted against similar bills for all of the last 2 years. So what is making them strap on the ball gag and climb into Trump’s dungeon now?” Congressman Casten wrote on social media.
Noting that “Congress has the Constitutional power of the purse and has reaffirmed it through multiple laws (Impoundment Control Act, Anti-Rescission Act) that are being used by multiple courts to block the WH’s over-reach,” Casten warns that the CR “has language that would weaken those cases.”
“This is what you do to cower before a mad king. It is not what you do if you are defending a constitutional democracy,” he declares.
And continuing his explanation for opposing the bill — and continuing his ribald language, Casten notes that the bill “would cut ~$28 billion in funding we passed under the PACT Act to make sure veterans who were exposed to Agent Orange and toxic burn pits get healthcare coverage. Pissing on US veterans is a choice.”
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There’s more.
“It would slash funding for USDA food inspectors. You know, the people who go into monitor the spread of avian flu, or to make sure you don’t have E. Coli in your lettuce,” he writes.
“It gives the White House much more discretion over public-private partnerships, essentially allowing them to prioritize infrastructure projects (highways, rail, etc.) only in their political supporters communities. That is anti-American, in the purest sense,” says Casten.
“It cuts rent subsidies for low-income folks. Which means a whole lot of landlords are going to find themselves forced to evict some ~32,000 families. If you think your community needs more homelessness, that’s a good idea. Otherwise… really f’ing dumb.”
Congressman Casten concludes, “Here’s the bottom line. When faced with a constitutional crisis, some members of Congress are fighting back. Others are strapping on the ball gag, climbing into Trump’s dungeon and assuming the American people share their masochistic fetish.”
Casten also includes in his analogy Fritschner’s observation about stopping their ability to block Trump’s tariff’s. He responds: “This is how you legislatively mandate the ball gag.”
See the video above or at this link.
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Image via Reuters
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Maine Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Graham Platner is under fire after releasing a video declaring that new allegations against him are false, yet he is “taking time to reflect” on a path forward.
Politico on Monday afternoon reported that a woman who dated Platner, Jenny Racicot, “says he forced her to have sex with him nearly five years ago despite her repeated objections, an allegation Platner denies.”
“Racicot said she had an on-and-off relationship with Platner,” Politico reported, “for more than two years before he entered her rural Maine home uninvited one night in late 2021, deeply intoxicated, and forced himself on her while she repeatedly told him to stop. She said she cut off contact with him after telling him the encounter was not consensual.”
In a video posted to social media eleven minutes after the Politico story dropped, Platner says, “I wanted to directly address the troubling, serious, and false allegations against me. Any accusation of nonconsensual behavior is categorically false.”
He said he and his supporters “were united in a love of Maine, a belief that our politics must change, in a focus on defeating Susan Collins.”
“So, regardless of the inaccuracy of the reporting, but mindful the political reality will inflict, we are taking the time to reflect on the best path forward for the state that I love, the people that I love, the movement I belong to, and the goal of defeating Susan Collins.”
“Those were the goals when we launched this campaign. And they remain my goals today.”
“Throughout it all, you never turned your back on me. And I will not turn my back on you now. Every one of you deserves to see that vision come to fruition and see Susan Collins defeated. And we will use every tool at our disposal to do so.”
The Bulwark’s Tim Miller, a political commentator who served as the communications director for the Jeb Bush 2016 presidential campaign, blasted Platner.
“I’m sorry but ‘we are taking time to reflect on the best path forward’ is not an option on the table,” Miller wrote. “Either it’s false and you campaign with vigor or it’s true and you get out / apologize to everyone you let down.”
Journalist Ryan Grim, commenting on Platner’s video, noted that Platner “strongly suggests he is considering dropping out. Already Troy Jackson and Chellie Pingree, both gubernatorial candidates, are being kicked around in Maine circles as potential replacements.”
Several others, including Puck News’ Peter Hamby, predicted Platner will be dropping out.
Platner had postponed several campaign events before the Politico story was published.
— Graham Platner for Senate (@grahamformaine) July 6, 2026
President Donald Trump is facing backlash after posting a video of children — including showing their unblurred faces — graduating from kindergarten, with some of the girls purportedly wearing hijabs.
“President Trump posted a captionless video of graduating kindergarteners on Truth Social on Monday, goading his supporters into verbally attacking little children simply for being Muslim,” The New Republic reported. “The clip is from Gateway STEM Academy, a majority-Black K-8 public charter school in St. Paul, Minnesota. It shows about 21 children in caps and gowns on stage singing a song together. Most of the girls are wearing hijabs.”
The original post of the video which Trump reposted reads: “Public school in St. Paul, Minnesota. Every girl is in a hijab … in kindergarten.”
Trump did not add any comments. TNR called the post “Islamophobic, weird, and creepy,” while noting that the comments section of Trump’s post was filled with calls “by racist, xenophobic MAGA supporters” to “deport the children and ban hijabs.”
TNR also noted that it “should come as no surprise that Trump isn’t above attacking children who just learned how to read, but this post is still particularly discomforting—and will certainly contribute to the already potent level of anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. and in Minnesota.”
Critics blasted Trump.
“There is something deeply unsettling about the president of the United States—the most powerful person in the world—going after kindergarten schoolchildren in Minnesota because they wore hijabs, as Trump has done this morning on his website,” The Bulwark’s Sam Stein wrote.
One social media commentator wrote, “Trump posted an unblurred video of more than a dozen Muslim kindergartners to Truth Social, exposing the children’s faces while targeting them for their religion.”
Another added, “Trump is a bigot. The president took to Truth Social to attack kindergarteners in hijabs. These are little kids. The president isn’t just a bigot, he’s also a coward.”
The original video was posted to the X social media platform in June.
U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) at the time commented, “If you are in a public school in America, you should be speaking english.”
Image via Reuters
President Donald Trump’s apparent efforts to delay releasing the $5.8 million civil judgment to E. Jean Carroll are being met with a warning by the journalist’s legal team, who suggest there could be a legal maneuver for Trump to employ to forgo paying the judgment in either of the two cases he lost.
According to The Guardian, on July 4, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered Trump to release the $5.8 million judgment, which is in escrow, to Carroll by this coming Tuesday — or explain why he would not do so.
Carroll’s attorneys think Trump may be trying to buy time to mount another legal strategy, telling the judge that Trump’s request for an extension “appears to be little more than yet another play for time.”
“The case is separate from Trump’s appeal of a Manhattan civil jury’s 2024 award of $83.3m to Carroll for defamation,” The Guardian explains. “But her lawyers have suggested a legal scenario in which the president might seek to conjoin the cases and further delay payment of both.”
Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan (no relation to the judge) wrote, “We can only assume that defendant is seeking … to buy time so he can try to concoct some new basis to put off paying plaintiff presumably in connection with his forthcoming petition and motion for a rehearing.”
Trump’s former attorney, Justin Smith, in one of his final acts, wrote to the Supreme Court suggesting that his client would be appealing the $83.3 million civil judgment.
Smith argued that the Supreme Court “may wish to consider the petitions together,” given they involve the same parties.
The larger judgment case involves possible questions of presidential immunity, and that has Carroll’s attorneys concerned.
“A conjoined case, Carroll’s lawyers fear, could result in both judgments being wiped out,” The Guardian reports.
The president has also made clear he is no fan of Judge Kaplan, after the jurist made several rulings that “angered” Trump.
“What else can you expect from a Trump Hating, Clinton appointed judge, who went out of his way to make sure that the result was as negative as it could possible be,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in 2023, “speaking to, and in control of, a jury from an anti-Trump area which is probably the worst place in the US for me to get a fair ‘trial’.”
Image via Reuters
Platner Scorched Over ‘Taking Time’ Video After New Accusation
Trump Sparks Fury Online After Posting Unblurred Video of Muslim Kindergartners in Hijabs
One Legal Maneuver Threatens to Undo Everything E. Jean Carroll Won
Inside the Group Helping MAGA Voters Walk Away — And What Finally Pushed Them
