Trump Admin Invents Magical Article II Authority To Ignore The Appointments Clause

Maybe he meant Two Corinthians?

Photo credit: Chip Somodevilla via Shutterstock

In 2019, President Trump claimed a power that was functionally limitless.

“I have an Article II, where I have the right to do whatever I want as president," he babbled to the rapturous crowd at a rally held by Turning Point USA, Charlie Kirk’s rightwing brainwashing shop.

Article II of the Constitution did not give him the right to do whatever he wanted as president, and it still doesn’t. But the Justice Department is making that argument in private, and may well do it in court today to defend the illegal takeover of a tiny government agency that supports African development.

USADF

The United States African Development Foundation (USADF) is an independent agency established by Congress in 1980 to “invest directly in African grassroots enterprises and social entrepreneurs” and “increase incomes, revenues, and jobs by promoting self-reliance and market-based solutions to poverty.” Projects from 2024 include construction of a date sorting and packaging facility in Mauritania, upgrading production of honey and pineapple juice in Benin to meet export standards, and purchasing an industrial sewing machine for a small clothing manufacturer in Zambia.

It is exactly the kind of pro-capitalist, “teach a man to fish” program that conservatives purport to like. Plus it’s cheap, helping tens of thousands of people every year, for almost nothing: Congress appropriated just $45 million for the agency in 2024.

And yet, on February 19, Trump signed an executive order calling USADF and the Presidio Trust, the Inter-American Foundation, and the United States Institute of Peace “unnecessary” and purporting to shut them down.