A sweeping executive action sowing confusion across the nation. The cry of “Wait, he can’t do that!” from constitutional lawyers and the political opposition. A swift ruling from a federal judge temporarily restoring trillions of dollars in federal assistance programs that have now been thrust into legal limbo.
Welcome to a Tuesday in the new Trump administration.
Early indications are that this is a feature, not a bug, of the new conservatism Donald Trump has ushered into the White House. Observers of the opening weeks of the new administration see a singular focus on flooding federal dockets with arguments that one man has the power to decide how things work in America — potentially in spite of specific measures put in place to prevent that from being the case.