In a stunning display of hypocrisy, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer recently delivered a speech on the Senate floor in which he blasted President Donald Trump for his alleged “scorched earth campaign” against the rule of law.
Schumer, citing recent court rulings by leftist judges against Trump and his administration basically ignoring them, proclaimed, “Now, we all know Donald Trump, of course, won the election last November. And as we all know, he campaigned on a platform to cut back large parts of the government. But nothing, nothing in the Constitution, nothing in our grand tradition of American separation of powers allows Donald Trump to break the law in order to achieve those goals.”
Can anyone name a single law Trump has broken? Even Schumer can’t — and if he could, you’d better believe he’d be shouting it from the rooftops. Instead, he vaguely cites “separation of powers,” which is peak irony when rogue judges are actively claiming that Trump has no authority to run the very branch he was elected to lead.
“Donald Trump campaigned on cutting back the government, that's true,” Schumer noted. “But he is not allowed — not allowed — to break the law to achieve those goals. That is not how America works. You campaign, you put your ideas forward. In this case, Donald Trump won, but he did not campaign on breaking the law. And the American people don't want him to break the law.”
Again, what laws has he broken? It’s not so much that the Trump administration has broken any laws; it’s that left-wing attorneys general and organizations have filed lawsuits and found left-wing judges willing to sign off on their baseless claims.
And he thinks Trump should just obey them.
According to Schumer, “The issue here isn't the courts trying to control the president. It's the president trying to control the law.” Schumer argues that Trump “wants to decide for himself what the laws are, which one should be applied, which one shouldn't, and what they mean.”
.@SenSchumer: "Donald Trump is not free to bulldoze his way through the rule of law. He is an executive, not a monarch. He swore an oath faithfully to execute the duties of his office. When the courts speak, Donald Trump must accept their judgements and honor the Constitution." pic.twitter.com/A1l6qqM0yi
— CSPAN (@cspan) February 11, 2025
There really isn’t any need to quote Schumer further because he is the last person to be lecturing anyone about this. For one thing, where was Schumer when Joe Biden defied the Supreme Court and started canceling billions in student loan debt? Not only did Schumer not criticize Biden for defying the highest court in the country, but he also urged him to do more.
Related: A Constitutional Crisis Looms but Not for the Reason the Left Thinks
“Although the Supreme Court has chosen to stand in the way of your initial student debt relief plan, we recognize that as President of the United States, you have additional tools to provide relief,” a group of 90 Democrats, including Schumer, wrote to Biden back in 2023. “Working and middle-class families need this relief to come as soon as possible. We urge you to continually find ways to use your authority to bring down student debt, address the rising cost of college, and make postsecondary education affordable for all students who choose that path.”
There is zero reason to take Schumer’s criticism of Trump seriously when he previously encouraged Biden’s lawlessness.
Schumer also lacks any moral authority when it comes to respecting the ruling of the courts because back in 2022, Schumer threatened Supreme Court Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch that they would “pay the price” if they didn’t rule the way he wanted them to on abortion.
"I want to tell you, Gorsuch, I want to tell you, Kavanaugh, you have released the whirlwind and you will pay the price," Schumer said at the time. "You won't know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions."
If Schumer really believed in the sanctity of legal institutions, why did he engage in such violent rhetoric aimed at the very judges tasked with interpreting the law?
Schumer is now under federal investigation for his remarks.
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