Judging Freedom - Biden - Will He Declare Emergencies_

Episode Date: July 20, 2022

Biden Faces Pressure to Declare Emergencies After Climate, Abortion Setbacks Some Democrats and activists want president to use executive powers to unlock more authority and funding; declarations would face criticism and legal challenges https://www.wsj.com/articles/biden-fa...#bidenSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Tuesday, July 20th, 2022. It's about 1045 in the morning here on the east coast of the United States. The president is at it again. So when he learned while he was in Saudi Arabia that Senator Joe Manchin would not support his climate change legislation, meaning they wouldn't have even 50 votes, much less 60, to accomplish what they need in the Senate, the president has threatened to sign executive orders and to address the climate on his own. Well, how the heck can he do that? I mean, in this country, we have the separation of powers. Congress writes the laws, the president enforces the laws, the judiciary

interprets the laws. How can the president of the United States write his own laws after Congress has declined to do so? Whether Congress is right or wrong, it is Congress. It is the only authority in the federal government that can write laws. Look, you heard me say this many times. Congress doesn't care about the Constitution. The President doesn't care about the Constitution. There are some judges and justices who do, but there are many who don't. Congress believes it can write any wrong and regulate any behavior and tax any event, and the president thinks he can write laws on his own. Well, what can he possibly do on his own? He plans to declare a climate emergency.

Now, an emergency is defined under federal law as a state of affairs, an acute state of affairs that cannot be addressed by the ordinary legislative process. An emergency would be an act of nature, an earthquake. There isn't time for Congress to legislate, to give money and material to the people whose homes and lives were shattered by the earthquake. An invasion would be considered an emergency. But the climate is with us every day, and it's been with us since day one, whenever that is or was. It's hardly an emergency. Presidents have used this emergency power 75 times

since the law allowing them to do so was enacted shortly after World War II. And some of those emergency declarations are still in existence. We don't even know what they are. That's how non-emergency they actually are. So there's two ways to look at this as I see it. One is common for politicians. Joe Biden doesn't give a damn about the Constitution. He probably doesn't even care about climate. He's only about to sign these executive declarations of emergency to gin up his base. And God knows his base needs ginning up.

It's shrinking every day. The other way to look at it is, and you've heard me say this many times, Congress has given too much power to the president. This began with FDR, but was accelerated under George W. Bush, where Republican Congresses repeatedly, over and over again, gave the president more and more power, power that under the Constitution belongs to the Congress. There's a Supreme Court opinion that says Congress can't give away its power, but yet the courts let Congress do that all the time. The answer to this is to elect someone who will respect the Constitution. We haven't had a president who respected the Constitution since Grover Cleveland. The Constitution gives 16 discrete authorities to the federal government and no more. But the feds think, as I said earlier, they can right any wrong and regulate any behavior and fight any foe and torture any adversary and tell any lie and steal any property and do anything they want

as long as they can get away with it politically. If Joe Biden thinks that by declaring a climate emergency and moving around federal funds from one budget to another, he can get away with it, he'll do it. If he thinks it will improve the climate, he's crazy. If he thinks it'll have a long-term political effect, he's probably wrong. If he thinks it's constitutional, he needs to go back to law school. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom.