Judge Napolitano - The Myth of Emergency Powers

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Here's your Channel nine first morning weather volcast. Winter Weather
Advisor in effect until eleven this morning. Some flurries out there,
roads are slicky. Very careful. I have forty today done
to twenty nine tonight with rain and mostly cloudy sky's
tomorrow rain tapering off early morning. To want to sigh
thirty two with an open agle of fourteen and clear skys.
Clear skies on Valentine's Day with a high of thirty

(00:22):
seven thirty two degrees. Right now, Chuck Ingram, what's going
on out there? It didn't fire? Ghost to the machine,
Judge Edita Politano. Sorry, he may very well have recorded

(00:42):
the traffic and kind words or compliments or goofy sentiments
relating to you, but we didn't get the recording audio,
So sorry about that. It's usually a comical start to
our conversation, Judge and Polatona.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Is this another colossal oohs that he's pulled off on us?

Speaker 1 (01:02):
It could be. Hey, listen, man, I started out the
morning show yesterday five Am. Joe's got great guests lined
up all throughout the morning. Like today with you. The
phones aren't working. People are calling in to have comments.
None of the audio is coming through we can't communicate
with anybody, and I'm like, oh Lord Almighty, that means
that I'm going to have to fill up four solid
hours by myself, which to me is an anxiety the

(01:26):
inducing experience. So finally got the phones fixed, but we
had to deal with Chicago to do that or something.
It's crazy, Eddie, what a.

Speaker 2 (01:33):
Great conversation you just had with Congressman Massy. Everybody should
hear that. Everybody in the Congress should hear that the
President of the United States, the federal Judiciary, everybody should
hear that he is the only person I am aware
of that has a full, unbridled, intellectually honest, constitutionally faithful

(01:57):
grasp on the excesses of today.

Speaker 3 (02:00):
Simply marvelous and courageous and.

Speaker 1 (02:03):
Well craigous in the sense that he's calling out his
own fellow Republicans. I mean, he's more libertarian, but they're
the problem.

Speaker 2 (02:10):
I mean, he doesn't have to worry about re election
because his constituents appreciate him, but calling out his fellow
Republicans is what is deeply, deeply and profoundly needed.

Speaker 1 (02:24):
Yeah, I mean, and after all this work, to say
what you want about Elon musk. But at least he's
bringing it to our attention the just ridiculous expenditures of
money which are indefensible that they would refund USA to
the forty billion dollars are currently getting. I mean that
that is even within the realm of possibility is mind
blowing to me.

Speaker 3 (02:45):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:46):
Well, you know one of the lessons I learned when
I was on the bench, like, why are we doing this? Well, judge,
it's been done this way in this courthouse since before
you were born. Well, that's no reason keep doing it.
It's not authorized by the statute.

Speaker 3 (03:02):
I don't remember what it was, but that is a
habit in government.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
The engines of government are run by people that are unseen,
and they're the ones that do things just because it's
always been done that way. Congress ban Messy is almost
shoveling against the tide when he attempts.

Speaker 3 (03:23):
To resist that.

Speaker 1 (03:24):
Sissiphis I always say to that, right, anyway, you roll that.

Speaker 3 (03:30):
Rock to the top of the hill. As soon as
you get up there, it rolls.

Speaker 1 (03:32):
Back down exactly. Well, the exercise is, you know what
he's doing. It's it's the the revealing to the world.
And yet faced with even fellow Republicans who can't grasp
a fiscal responsibility, who don't care that we are spending
trillions of dollars beyond what is even taken into our debt.
Service bill is bigger than that ridiculous eight hundred and
fifty billion dollar defense bill, which we know is filled

(03:55):
with all kinds of fraud, waste, and abuse. It's just
I don't know. It's almost as if they want the
ship to crash or they want the plane.

Speaker 2 (04:02):
I have often argued, and you've heard me say this,
that we don't have two parties.

Speaker 3 (04:06):
We have one party. It's the Big Government Party.

Speaker 2 (04:08):
It has a Democratic wing which prefers to spend money
one way, and a Republican wing, which prefers to spend.

Speaker 3 (04:16):
Money another way. But they each prefer.

Speaker 2 (04:18):
To spend money that we don't have. They both do
things to keep themselves in power, and there's very little
difference between them. They pretend there's a difference between them,
but they have collectively wrapped up nearly thirty six trillion
in debt and there doesn't seem to be any stopping them.

Speaker 1 (04:40):
I think it's going to have to collapse before anything
can be done about it. It's like broken.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
Well, it may very well collapse like the old Soviet
Union collapsed. I have attempted to put into the President's
ear through someone that I occasionally communicate with.

Speaker 3 (04:56):
Who has this year all the time. Maybe it's time
for a convention the States.

Speaker 2 (05:01):
Maybe it's time for a constitution that seriously limits the
federal government and allows you, as Ronald Reagan used to say,
to vote with your feet by moving to a state
where the laws are to your liking. Today everything is
regulated by the Feds. The states are bribed.

Speaker 3 (05:19):
By the Feds. Do what we want and what we
pave the highways for you.

Speaker 1 (05:24):
Well, I talked to the president of the Convention of
States group that is organizing it and pushing for it,
and more and more states are taking an interest in it.
I think sixteen or seventeen states have already approved it
passed legislation calling for a Convention of States. So that
idea may happen. It may happen, your honor, I hope
it happens in my lifetime. It will be things to
behold because part of the motivation is forcing the government

(05:46):
to live within its means and have a balanced budget.

Speaker 2 (05:49):
So, as I said at the end, of my column
coming out tonight. When the government destroys liberty and property,
according to Thomas jeff it is the right of the
people to alter or amashit.

Speaker 1 (06:04):
Yes, you hate to have to see it come to that,
but you're right.

Speaker 3 (06:08):
Let's you do you you do. Founding fathers did not
mince words in the things that they said, And of
course Jefferson was talking about violence. I'm not talking about violence.

Speaker 2 (06:22):
I'm talking about doing this, you know, lawfully and peacefully.

Speaker 1 (06:27):
Well, they did provide us some mechanism to do that
lawfully and peacefully. That's the Convention of States. It's better
that than a revolution.

Speaker 3 (06:34):
Right, right, right, exactly.

Speaker 1 (06:38):
Well, you and I are not fans of the imperial presidency.
As I pointed out with Congressman Mascy, we've been down
this road before. If Congress was functioning and able to
do something on behalf of the American people and not
on their own best interest, then something might get done
along the lines you heard congressom Mancy mentioned. Listen, for
every Doge recommendation, we should incorporate it into a reconciliation
bill that we could get past. But no, his colleagues

(06:59):
aren't interested in that. So beyond that your column the
myth of emergency powers. It's a brilliant column, as as
always point out. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. But it
does discuss the Ninth Amendment, and I just want to
give you, let you give my listeners a little insight
to your point on this so they can get a
copy of it when it comes out tonight.

Speaker 2 (07:18):
Well, presidents have often claimed, I mean, this goes back
to Abraham Lincoln and now Donald Trump. But Trump is
not the only one. FDR did this many many times,
that by declaring a national emergency, they somehow acquire powers
to do things from some source other than the Constitution,
which they ordinarily wouldn't be able to do. Both Lincoln

(07:43):
and FDR claimed they could arrest people without charges and
without bringing them before a judge, in Lincoln's case on
the basis of their criticism of him, and FDR's case
on the basis of their nationality.

Speaker 3 (07:57):
What provoked this was.

Speaker 2 (08:01):
President Trump saying he might declare an emergency at the
at the Texas Mexico border, and that would give him
more powers to arrest and use the military.

Speaker 3 (08:12):
Well, no, it wouldn't. This is a myth.

Speaker 2 (08:15):
That presidents have I'm not just picking on Donald Trump.
A lot of people listening to us, I know, agree
with what he wants to do on the border. A
lot of people listening to us now agree with what
he's dispatched elon must to do.

Speaker 3 (08:28):
But these things must be done lawfully.

Speaker 2 (08:31):
They can't just be done by the executive assuming powers
that the executive doesn't have, or powers.

Speaker 3 (08:37):
That belong to the Congress.

Speaker 2 (08:40):
If Donald Trump can rewrite the laws by saying, whoo,
there is no Department of Education, well then there's no stopping.

Speaker 3 (08:49):
Him or a future president from doing the same.

Speaker 2 (08:52):
I happen to think the Department of Education is unconstitutional, but.

Speaker 3 (08:56):
It's the law.

Speaker 2 (08:57):
It needs to be undone by Congress, not by the president.
In terms of this emergency nonsense, whenever the courts have
looked at it, they've said, there is no such thing
as emergency power. The only power the president has is
what's given to him.

Speaker 3 (09:13):
Or her in the Constitution.

Speaker 2 (09:16):
We had a terrible example of this in New Jersey
during COVID, and then when COVID was over, turned out
that the governor was still the governor of New Jersey,
but in his last year and he's term limited thanks.

Speaker 3 (09:28):
To be to God.

Speaker 2 (09:28):
Phil Murphy decided he enjoyed emergency powers so much he
didn't want to give him up, even though COVID was
over and life had returned to normally recently did give
them up. By the way, this is the same Phil
Murphy who said, if my housekeeper were an illegal alien,

(09:51):
I would hide her in the governor's mansion and defy
ice to find her. What a crazy thing for a
person responsible for the laws to say. Whereupon Tom Homan said,
what's your address, Governor, We're coming over. Well, you can't

(10:11):
make this stuff up. So all these things were going
through my head. I'm sorry I'm talking so much, Brian
as I decided to coalesceent around the myth of emergency powers,
the belief that the public has that the Congress accepts
that the presidents have articulated that by declaring an emergency,
they somehow, from somewhere, from some source not the Constitution,

(10:34):
acquire more power and it's somehow lawful.

Speaker 1 (10:37):
Blonney Well, same along the lines. Comparable anyway to waging
war when there's been no declaration of war nothing.

Speaker 3 (10:47):
That's another thing.

Speaker 2 (10:48):
The Congress looks the other way when presidents start wars
when Barack Obama used the CIA so that he didn't
have to report this under the War Powers Better Resolution
to bomb Libya. Congressman knowingly look the other way. I
happened to be interviewing than Harlem Congressman, longtime Harlem Congressman

(11:10):
Charlie Wrangele on Fox News.

Speaker 3 (11:12):
I said, Congressman Wrangell, how can you allow this to happen?

Speaker 2 (11:16):
Oh wow, Judge, if it fails, we don't want to
have anything to do with it.

Speaker 3 (11:21):
And if it succeeds, we'll say we gave him the
power to do it. That is nonsense.

Speaker 2 (11:26):
That is a failure to uphold his oath, which is
to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution.

Speaker 1 (11:35):
Wow. Well, you know, between you and Congressman Massy, it's
rather a bit of a downer couple of conversations. It
is what's going on.

Speaker 3 (11:46):
Say, Constitution of the States. My dream would be to
be the chair of it.

Speaker 2 (11:53):
Oh wow, to be personally involved in rewriting the Constitution.
Congressman Massy knows that this is my dream. But we'll
see what happens. I happen to think that the President
of the United States, whatever you think of him, would favor.

Speaker 1 (12:07):
This yeah, I agree with you. I think he's not
picking or choosing any specific action and not analyzing it
from a constitutional perspective as you and you and I
might do. I think what he is offering and trying
to accomplish through his executive actions is in the best
interests of America, like getting rid of fraud, waste, and

(12:30):
abuse and get ready eradicating the departments that shouldn't exist anyway.
There's already forty nine lawsuits that have been filed against
his executive actions, so ultimately, the third branch of government,
the legal system, will definitely be resolving these issues, and
it may maybe take a while, but maybe we can
restore some constitutional order in all of this. Judge Andrew Neapolitano,
we always end on judging freedom, your podcasts and your conversations.

(12:53):
Who are going to be hearing today, Phil Giraldi.

Speaker 2 (12:56):
And Pepe Escobar, two of my superstars, and along with
Aaron Monte, who's a young investigative journalist, one of the
best in the business, who keeps coming up with more waste, fraud,
and abuse that the foreign policy establishment does not want
us to know about.

Speaker 1 (13:17):
Wonderful. We'll look forward to those conversations and I'll look
forward to next Wednesday, another great conversation with you, sir.

Speaker 3 (13:23):
Thank you. A great day.

Speaker 2 (13:24):
Starting out by listening to you and Congressman Messi has
been a treat for me, and of course being with
you is always a treat.

Speaker 3 (13:30):
Thank you, Brian.

Speaker 1 (13:30):
I'm blessed to have the opportunity to speak with you.
Man I really truly am God bless you, sir. We'll
talk next Wednesday, coming up at eight forty three here
at fifty five KRC.

Speaker 3 (13:40):
The talk station fifty five KRCY