Photo courtesy of Flickr
By Brian McKay
Our POTUS decided that Friday was a great time to ban transgender individuals from joining the military and issue a pardon for Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio. While the country focused on the potential devastation to the state of Texas that might be wrought by the first category 4 hurricane since 2006, Trump threatened the very nature of the Constitution. This is nothing new for a POTUS that has probably never even read the Constitution and has no issues with running roughshod all over it, but in this instance, someone was put above the law.
It paid for Arpaio to pander to Trump. During the election, Arpaio was a big Trump supporter, reaffirming his anti-immigration policies. Previously, Arpaio had even dedicated resources of his office to send a deputy to Hawaii to research and reaffirm Trump’s birtherism. Arpaio was a self-promoter more than a sheriff and Trump benefitted it as the sheriff appealed to xenophobic and totalitarian leaning Trump supporters.
Arpaio’s record of complete assholery is extensive and well known. Feel free to check it out and realize this man doesn’t deserve any early release whatsoever. This isn’t about that though.
Arpaio was jailed for 6 months in July due to being in contempt of court as he violated a judge’s order from 2011. The order was to discontinue jailing people merely on the basis that they “might be” illegal immigrants. The self-professed “toughest sheriff in America”, had simply violated the law of the land as he had done throughout his entire time in office.
In the pardon, Trump went against Justice Department rules in granting a pardon. Those included that Arpaio’s conviction wasn’t 5 years old, he showed no remorse and he hadn’t even applied for any clemency. No one can rule against this pardon though as Presidents have absolute power in this capacity.
While rare in how the pardon was granted, it is more important in what it violated in its very nature. Arpaio was jailed for violating an order of the court. Most presidential pardons are for those that have served their sentences long enough, shown benefit to society and been remorseful. Of the highest importance is that those pardons are for those that have been convicted of a crime. Arpaio was not convicted of a crime, rather in contempt.
This pardon made the statement that the courts don’t matter. Don’t want to obey a court order? Well that’s fine, the President can put you above the law. Now anyone that can make it into the President’s inner circle can be assumed to no longer be subject to the judicial branch of our democracy. Judges orders may as well be worthless.
If the orders of the courts can be so easily dismissed by the executive branch, Trump has succeeded in negating the courts, as he has continuously wanted to do.
Arpaio got a favor for his perverse loyalty to a walking ego, Trump supporters got their rally cries and reality show and the Constitution got the shaft. The POTUS of this country just showed that a judge’s order never mattered and that the judicial branch might not matter as an extension.
This President is constantly threatening the U.S. Constitution while unable to even govern effectively. For him it is about power and not the traditional institutions, people and history of this country. This Presidency cannot end soon enough.
#resist
