Checks & Balances

Insurrection Act reform: Congressional authorization required within 72 hours of any domestic military deployment; 30-day sunset; private right of action

This rule reforms the Insurrection Act to require Congressional authorization before the President can deploy military forces to handle domestic unrest except in the most extreme emergencies.

The Insurrection Act (10 U.S.C. §§ 251–255) must be reformed to require: (1) the President must notify Congress within 24 hours of invoking Insurrection Act authority, specifying the geographic scope, commanding unit, and statutory basis; (2) Congress must affirmatively authorize the deployment by majority vote of both chambers within 72 hours or the deployment must cease immediately; (3) any authorized Insurrection Act deployment must sunset after 30 days unless Congress reauthorizes by majority vote; (4) the Act may not be invoked to suppress lawful protest, peaceful assembly, or First Amendment activity — any deployment that a court finds was directed at constitutionally protected conduct is void and must terminate; and (5) individuals subjected to military force deployed under the Act have a private right of action against the United States for damages, including injunctive relief and attorney's fees, without requiring exhaustion of administrative remedies.

The Insurrection Act grants the President sweeping authority to deploy active-duty military forces domestically without prior congressional authorization. The Trump administration's 2020 threat to invoke the Act against Black Lives Matter protesters — and actual deployment of active-duty troops near the Capitol — demonstrated the statute's potential as a tool of political suppression. The Act has not been substantially amended since 1871. Requiring congressional authorization within 72 hours creates accountability without preventing genuine emergency response: Congress can authorize immediately when a real insurrection threatens federal authority, but cannot be bypassed when the "emergency" is political dissent. The private right of action ensures that unlawful deployments produce legal consequences, not merely political criticism.

No entity may exercise federal executive power without congressional authorization by statute and Senate-confirmed leadership

This rule prevents shadow government by requiring Senate confirmation for anyone exercising significant executive power, not just titles.

No entity — whether styled as an advisory body, efficiency commission, task force, working group, inter-agency team, or private contractor — may exercise federal executive power, access federal personnel systems, direct federal expenditures, or issue directives to federal agencies or employees without: (1) explicit congressional authorization by statute; (2) Senate-confirmed leadership accountable to Congress through the confirmation and oversight processes; and (3) full compliance with the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), the Federal Records Act, and the Freedom of Information Act.^[1]

The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) — operated from January 2025 onward by Elon Musk and associates without Senate confirmation, without congressional authorization by statute, and with access to federal payment systems, personnel records, and agency data — represents the paradigmatic violation of this principle. An advisory body that cannot be subpoenaed, whose records are not subject to FOIA, whose leadership has not been confirmed by the Senate, and which operates without any statutory mandate is not a government body — it is a private actor exercising government power without constitutional authorization. The Appointments Clause requires that officers exercising significant executive authority be nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate;^[2] entities that exercise such authority without confirmation cannot lawfully do so. This must be prohibited by statute, with criminal penalties for federal employees who facilitate unauthorized access to federal systems, personnel records, or payment infrastructure by entities without statutory authorization.

1. Federal Advisory Committee Act, Pub. L. No. 92-463, 86 Stat. 770 (1972). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-86/pdf/STATUTE-86-Pg770.pdf ↩
2. Appointments Clause, U.S. Const. art. II, § 2, cl. 2. https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/article-2/section-2/ ↩

Access to federal payment systems, personnel databases, and agency data requires statutory authorization and Inspector General oversight

This rule ensures only properly appointed officials have access to federal payment systems, personnel records, and classified information, preventing unauthorized shadow officials.

Access to the federal government's payment processing systems — including Treasury's Bureau of the Fiscal Service payment infrastructure — the Office of Personnel Management personnel databases, Social Security Administration beneficiary records, IRS taxpayer data, and other sensitive federal data systems must be authorized by statute for each category of authorized user, subject to Inspector General oversight, and logged with complete audit trails accessible to relevant congressional oversight committees. The statutory authorization requirement means that access by entities without specific congressional authorization — regardless of whether they operate under a presidential directive or executive order — is unlawful. No presidential directive can substitute for the statutory authorization that federal law requires for access to these systems.^[1]

The DOGE access to Treasury payment systems and OPM personnel records in early 2025 — carried out by individuals without Senate confirmation, without statutory authorization, and without Inspector General oversight — demonstrated that existing access controls were inadequate to prevent unauthorized actors from obtaining operational visibility into critical federal systems. Congress must: (1) require statutory authorization for any access to Treasury payment systems beyond operational processing staff; (2) require Inspector General audit and advance notification for all access to OPM personnel records by parties outside the agency's authorized workforce; (3) require real-time logging of federal data system access with mandatory reporting to the relevant congressional committees; and (4) establish that access obtained without statutory authorization is void and that any actions taken on the basis of such access have no legal force.^[2]

1. 31 U.S.C. § 3321 (designation of depositaries and financial agents). https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid:USC-prelim-title31-section3321 ↩
2. Inspector General Act of 1978, Pub. L. No. 95-452, 92 Stat. 1101 (1978). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-92/pdf/STATUTE-92-Pg1101.pdf ↩

Inspectors General may be removed only for cause with written findings and a 30-day congressional notice period, enforceable by expedited judicial review

This rule protects inspectors general from being fired except for serious misconduct, with written explanation required, ensuring independent oversight can't be silenced.

Inspectors General serve as the primary internal oversight mechanism for federal agencies. Their independence from the agencies they oversee — and from the executive branch generally — is essential to their function: an Inspector General who can be removed at presidential will for any reason provides no structural protection against the misconduct it is their statutory duty to detect and report. Congress addressed this structural vulnerability in 2022 with the IG Independence and Empowerment Act, which codified a 30-day congressional notice requirement before any IG removal.^[1] The Trump administration violated this requirement directly in January 2025, firing 17 Inspectors General without notice or stated cause in a single overnight action — an act that a federal court found likely violated the statute.^[2]

Congress must strengthen these protections beyond the notice requirement. Legislation must: (1) codify that Inspectors General may be removed only for cause — neglect of duty, malfeasance in office, or conviction of a felony — with written findings specifying the grounds, provided to both Congress and the public; (2) require Senate confirmation of any IG successor before an IG vacancy created by removal may be filled on other than a temporary acting basis; (3) provide dismissed IGs with standing to challenge removal in federal court with expedited review and a presumption in favor of reinstatement pending final adjudication; and (4) establish that any agency whose IG has been improperly removed is subject to heightened congressional oversight and mandatory GAO audit until a Senate-confirmed replacement is in place. Oversight that can be switched off by the entities it oversees is not oversight.

1. IG Independence and Empowerment Act, Pub. L. No. 117-263, § 5901, 136 Stat. 2395 (2022). https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/2662/text ↩
2. Inspector General Reform Act of 2008, Pub. L. No. 110-409, 122 Stat. 4302 (2008). https://www.congress.gov/bill/110th-congress/senate-bill/2324/text ↩

Federal employees have an affirmative duty to refuse directives from unauthorized entities and are protected from retaliation for lawfully refusing

This rule requires federal employees to refuse illegal orders and protects them from retaliation for refusing, preventing them from being forced to break the law.

Federal employees who refuse to comply with directives from entities not authorized by statute to direct federal agency operations are exercising their constitutional duty, not committing insubordination. When an unauthorized entity purports to direct federal agency operations — issuing orders about staffing decisions, data access, system configurations, expenditures, or agency enforcement priorities — federal employees who refuse to carry out those orders are acting lawfully. The civil service exists to implement law as passed by Congress and signed by the President, not directives issued by private actors who have assumed operational roles without statutory authorization. An employee ordered to grant data access to an entity without statutory authorization who refuses is not insubordinate — they are complying with federal law as it actually exists.

Congress must codify this protection with enforceable teeth: (1) federal employees have no legal duty to comply with directives from entities without statutory authority over their agency, and no disciplinary action may be taken against an employee solely for refusing such directives; (2) robust whistleblower protection for employees who report unauthorized access attempts, unauthorized directives, or unauthorized exercises of agency authority — with personal civil liability for supervisors who retaliate; (3) an expedited adjudicatory process at the Merit Systems Protection Board for employees who face adverse employment action for lawfully refusing unauthorized directives, with automatic reinstatement pending final determination; and (4) criminal penalties for supervisors who deliberately facilitate unauthorized actors' access to protected federal systems after receiving formal notice of the lack of statutory authorization.^[1] The civil service's function as a constitutional check on executive overreach depends on civil servants' ability to resist unlawful orders without career destruction.^[2]

1. Civil Service Reform Act of 1978, Pub. L. No. 95-454, 92 Stat. 1111 (1978). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-92/pdf/STATUTE-92-Pg1111.pdf ↩
2. Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989, Pub. L. No. 101-12, 103 Stat. 16 (1989). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-103/pdf/STATUTE-103-Pg16.pdf ↩

The Federal Advisory Committee Act must be strengthened to close structural loopholes that enable shadow governance by private actors

This rule strengthens transparency requirements for advisory committees to prevent hidden influence by lobbyists and special interests on government policy.

The Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA) requires that advisory bodies established or utilized by the federal government operate with public transparency, balanced membership, and open meetings.^[1] DOGE was structured to exploit ambiguity in FACA's coverage — whether it constituted an "advisory committee" subject to the Act, or a Presidential advisory body exempt from FACA's transparency and balance requirements. Courts have interpreted FACA's Presidential advisory body exemption as broad enough to exclude bodies operating under direct presidential authority, even where those bodies exercise operational rather than purely advisory functions.^[2] This ambiguity creates a legal structure through which private actors can participate in federal governance without public accountability.

Congress must: (1) eliminate the Presidential advisory body FACA exemption for any body whose members access federal operational systems, issue directives to agency personnel, participate in personnel decisions, or exercise any operational — as distinguished from purely advisory — function; (2) require that any entity consulting with two or more federal agencies on the same matter, or advising on government-wide policy, register as an advisory committee subject to FACA regardless of how it is formally styled; (3) mandate that FACA advisory bodies' meetings, records, membership lists, and any written products be published in real time on a centralized federal transparency portal; and (4) provide the GAO with standing to audit any body claiming a FACA exemption and to publish its findings. Shadow governance thrives in definitional ambiguity; closing FACA's structural loopholes removes the legal cover that enables private actors to exercise public power in private, under the cover of a claimed advisory role that functions as a command authority in practice.

1. Federal Advisory Committee Act, Pub. L. No. 92-463, 86 Stat. 770 (1972). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-86/pdf/STATUTE-86-Pg770.pdf ↩
2. Public Citizen v. Department of Justice, 491 U.S. 440 (1989). https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/491/440/ ↩

Independent regulatory agency commissioners may be removed only for cause; Congress must codify Humphrey's Executor by statute to protect this principle from judicial erosion

This rule protects independent regulatory commissioners from being fired by the President except for serious misconduct, ensuring independent oversight of industries.

Humphrey's Executor v. United States (295 U.S. 602, 1935) held that Congress may protect members of multi-member independent regulatory commissions from at-will presidential removal, limiting removal to neglect of duty, malfeasance in office, or comparable cause.^[1] Seila Law LLC v. CFPB (591 U.S. 197, 2020) distinguished — but explicitly did not overrule — Humphrey's Executor, holding that its protection applies to multi-member commissions but not to single-director agencies.^[2] The Trump administration's 2025 termination of Democratic FTC commissioners and NLRB members — in direct contravention of the for-cause protections in their governing statutes — tested this framework, forcing litigation and creating enforcement vacuums at agencies with active proceedings.

Congress must codify Humphrey's Executor's protection by explicit statute rather than leaving it to rest solely on judicial precedent that the current Supreme Court might narrow or overrule. Legislation must: (1) provide that members of multi-member independent regulatory commissions — FTC, FCC, NLRB, EEOC, SEC, CFTC, CPSC, MSPB, and comparable bodies — may be removed only for neglect of duty, malfeasance in office, or conviction of a felony; (2) prohibit removal for policy disagreement, party affiliation, or to alter the commission's enforcement priorities; (3) provide for expedited judicial review of challenged removals with automatic reinstatement of the removed commissioner pending final adjudication; and (4) make clear that any agency action taken during a period when a commissioner has been wrongfully removed and a replacement unlawfully installed is voidable at the election of the restored commissioner. An independent regulatory commission whose members can be removed the moment they initiate inconvenient enforcement actions is not independent — it is a captured agency operating under the fiction of independence.

1. Humphrey's Executor v. United States, 295 U.S. 602 (1935). https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/295/602/ ↩
2. Seila Law LLC v. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, 591 U.S. 197 (2020). https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/591/197/ ↩

Independent regulatory agencies must receive mandatory floor-funded appropriations not subject to budget rider defunding or politically motivated rescission

This rule guarantees adequate funding for independent regulatory agencies, preventing the President or Congress from defunding agencies to stop enforcement.

The independence of regulatory bodies from political pressure depends in part on their financial independence from the annual appropriations process. Agencies funded entirely through annual discretionary appropriations are vulnerable to defunding through targeted budget riders, continuing resolutions at reduced levels, and politically motivated rescissions — mechanisms that allow a hostile Congress or executive to nullify statutory mandates operationally without formally repealing them in law. An agency that cannot pay its staff cannot enforce its statute, even if the statute remains on the books. The effect is regulatory nullification through the budget process, which bypasses the procedural protections — committee consideration, floor debate, presidential veto — that attach to formal statutory repeal.^[1]

Independent regulatory agencies — including the FTC, CFPB, NLRB, EEOC, SEC, CFTC, FCC, and CPSC — must receive mandatory minimum appropriations calculated as either a defined percentage of the revenues their activities generate (pre-merger filing fees, civil penalties, disgorgement) or as a statutory minimum dollar floor adjusted annually for inflation. Appropriations above the floor are subject to the normal congressional process; appropriations below the floor are automatically rejected and the floor amount is automatically appropriated. This structure mirrors the Federal Reserve's funding independence and the CFPB's Federal Reserve earnings funding mechanism — both of which were specifically designed to insulate financial oversight from political attack on annual appropriations, and the latter of which was upheld by the Supreme Court as constitutionally valid.^[2] Regulatory independence is not self-executing — it must be designed into the financial architecture of the agency, not left to the annual goodwill of those the agency regulates.

1. 31 U.S.C. § 1341 (Antideficiency Act). https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid:USC-prelim-title31-section1341 ↩
2. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau v. Community Financial Services Association of America, 601 U.S. 416 (2024). https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/601/416/ ↩

Congress must have statutory standing to challenge executive encroachment on legislative branch authority, with expedited judicial review

This rule gives Congress automatic legal standing to sue when the executive branch violates the law or usurps Congressional powers, ensuring enforcement of separation of powers.

The separation of powers is a structural constitutional guarantee — but its value depends on each branch having legal means to enforce its constitutional prerogatives against encroachment by the others. Current standing doctrine, particularly as interpreted following Raines v. Byrd (521 U.S. 811, 1997), has been read to deny individual legislators and, in some circumstances, congressional chambers institutional standing to challenge executive usurpation of legislative authority in federal court.^[1] The result is that Congress's practical check on executive overreach is limited to informal political pressure, the annual appropriations process, and impeachment — mechanisms that are unavailable, insufficient, or structurally blocked in precisely the scenarios where executive encroachment is most acute. A court cannot be asked to enforce the separation of powers when the branch whose prerogatives have been usurped cannot establish standing to sue.

Congress must enact standing-conferring legislation establishing: (1) the Senate and House have institutional standing as plaintiffs to challenge executive branch actions that violate the constitutional separation of powers — including unauthorized exercises of executive power by entities without statutory authorization, executive orders that effectively repeal statutory mandates, impoundment of appropriated funds, and removal of independent agency officials in violation of for-cause statutory protections; (2) a fast-track judicial review process with mandatory resolution of separation-of-powers challenges within 90 days of filing; (3) automatic preliminary injunctive relief against continued encroachment pending final judicial determination, upon a showing that Congress has facially plausible constitutional claims; and (4) that final judgments in such cases bind the executive branch with the same force as any other federal court order.^[2] The value of constitutional structure as a check on consolidated power depends on the existence of a forum where that structure can be enforced against those who violate it.

1. Raines v. Byrd, 521 U.S. 811 (1997). https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/521/811/ ↩
2. INS v. Chadha, 462 U.S. 919 (1983). https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/462/919/ ↩

Contempt of Congress must carry automatic fines ($10,000/day) and direct federal court enforcement without DOJ intermediary; individual members have standing to sue

This rule imposes automatic daily fines of ten thousand dollars on officials who ignore Congressional subpoenas, making contempt of Congress expensive.

Congress must have direct contempt enforcement power that does not depend on executive branch cooperation. When a House or Senate committee votes to hold a witness in contempt of Congress, that vote must automatically trigger: (1) a civil fine of $10,000 per day from the date contempt is certified until full compliance, collectible by the Treasurer of the United States without additional judicial process; (2) direct enforcement authority in the appropriate federal district court on motion by committee counsel, without requiring a DOJ referral, indictment, or prosecution decision; (3) individual standing for any Member of Congress who voted for the contempt resolution to seek judicial enforcement, with an expedited 30-day decision deadline from filing; and (4) a private right of action for any registered voter in the Member's constituency to compel compliance when committee leadership declines to bring an enforcement action. DOJ criminal contempt referral remains available but may not be made the exclusive remedy or used as a substitute that allows the executive branch to decline enforcement.

The current contempt of Congress process is structurally dependent on the executive branch to prosecute — creating a conflict of interest when the executive branch itself resists oversight. The Trump DOJ declined to prosecute contempt referrals against Trump officials including Steve Bannon and Mark Meadows on the theory that presidential advisers had absolute immunity from congressional process. Automatic civil fines and direct court enforcement break this structural dependency: Congress need not ask the entity it is investigating to investigate itself. The $10,000/day rate ensures fines accumulate to meaningful amounts within weeks; direct court enforcement bypasses the prosecutorial discretion that has historically allowed executive defiance to go unpunished.

Executive branch officials who defy congressional subpoenas without asserting a specific, court-reviewable privilege face automatic criminal contempt referral; DOJ prosecution is non-discretionary

This rule allows fast court enforcement when executive branch officials refuse Congressional subpoenas, with marshals authorized to compel testimony.

Executive branch officials who receive a congressional subpoena and fail to comply — without asserting a specific, court-reviewable privilege claim within the compliance deadline — must be deemed in criminal contempt upon a committee vote. The referral to the Department of Justice must be automatic; DOJ's duty to present the criminal contempt referral to a grand jury is non-discretionary and may not be declined based on policy grounds, OLC opinions about presidential immunity, or the official's current or former White House status. Federal courts must have jurisdiction to compel grand jury presentation on petition by the issuing committee within 21 days of filing. Officials who assert privilege must do so with specificity — document by document and question by question — and blanket assertions of immunity from congressional process are void on their face.

The OLC's "absolute immunity" doctrine — the theory that senior presidential advisers have categorical immunity from any congressional compelled process — was used to block criminal contempt prosecutions of Trump White House officials including Don McGahn and Hope Hicks. This doctrine has no textual basis in the Constitution and conflicts with the Supreme Court's holding in United States v. Nixon (1974) that executive privilege is qualified, not absolute, and must yield to demonstrated legal need. Non-discretionary grand jury presentation eliminates the structural veto that allows the executive to immunize its own officials from oversight.

Executive privilege must be codified by statute with binding limits: cannot shield criminal conduct; expires when the administration ends; mandatory court review within 30 days

This rule defines executive privilege in statute with binding limits, preventing presidents from claiming blanket privilege to hide wrongdoing.

Congress must codify executive privilege in statute with enforceable limits: (1) executive privilege may not be invoked to shield criminal conduct, fraud, waste, abuse of power, or obstruction of justice by any executive branch official — a court may reject a privilege claim upon an in camera finding that the communications relate to such conduct; (2) executive privilege claims expire automatically when the administration ends — former Presidents may invoke privilege only upon a specific showing that disclosure would cause current, concrete harm to deliberative processes in a successor administration; (3) any executive privilege assertion must be adjudicated by a three-judge federal district panel within 30 calendar days of assertion, with direct Supreme Court review; (4) privilege assertions must be specific — document by document, with a privilege log — and blanket categorical refusals to produce any documents in a category are void; and (5) the government bears the burden of establishing that each withheld communication falls within the scope of legitimate deliberative process privilege.

The Supreme Court in United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683 (1974), held that executive privilege exists but is not absolute and yields to demonstrated specific need in criminal proceedings. Subsequent administrations have used privilege claims primarily as delay tactics — asserting broad privilege, then litigating for years while the underlying political controversy becomes moot. Codifying limits with a 30-day court review deadline eliminates delay as a strategy. Automatic expiration at the end of the administration prevents former Presidents from using privilege claims to block investigations of their own conduct indefinitely.

Nominees must answer substantive questions at Senate confirmation hearings; materially false testimony during confirmation constitutes perjury and requires automatic removal

This rule requires nominees for major positions to answer substantive questions at Senate hearings, not just refuse to answer everything.

Senate confirmation hearings must produce substantive commitments from nominees rather than rehearsed deflections. Congress must establish by statute that: (1) nominees who provide materially false or misleading testimony to the Senate during confirmation hearings — including false statements about prior conduct, prior public statements, or the nominee's views on established legal principles — must be referred for perjury prosecution under 18 U.S.C. § 1621; (2) upon conviction for confirmation perjury, a confirmed officer must be removed from office automatically, without requiring a separate impeachment proceeding; (3) the Senate must establish by rule that nominees who refuse to answer questions about their judicial philosophy on settled constitutional questions — using the "judicial temperament" or "pending cases" deflection without a specific pending case — may be rated unqualified by the Judiciary Committee, and such a rating must trigger a mandatory floor vote on the record; and (4) any nominee who has testified falsely in a prior confirmation proceeding is ineligible for any future federal appointment requiring Senate confirmation.

Multiple Supreme Court justices provided testimony about stare decisis, precedent, and settled law during their confirmation hearings that was broadly interpreted as representing commitments about preserving established doctrine — testimony that their subsequent votes overturning those same precedents rendered, at minimum, materially misleading. The confirmation hearing process has devolved into a ritual of deliberate uninformativeness. If confirmation hearings are to serve their constitutional function of advising and consenting to nominees' qualifications and judicial philosophy, they must be able to elicit truthful substantive answers — and false testimony must have consequences commensurate with its effect on the constitutional process.

Abolish the statutory debt ceiling; replace with automatic borrowing authority for all congressionally appropriated spending

This rule eliminates the debt ceiling and automatically authorizes borrowing to pay for spending Congress already approved, ending debt ceiling hostage crises.

The statutory debt ceiling (31 U.S.C. § 3101) must be repealed and replaced with automatic, non-discretionary borrowing authority that extends to cover all spending Congress has already appropriated by law. Congress may not simultaneously appropriate spending and then refuse to authorize borrowing to fund that spending: once an appropriation is enacted, the Treasury Department must have automatic legal authority to issue debt sufficient to fund it. If Congress wishes to reduce the national debt, the mechanism is reducing appropriations before they are enacted — not manufacturing a default crisis by blocking borrowing authority for legally enacted spending after the fact. Treasury's obligation to honor all legally appropriated expenditures must be self-executing; no additional legislative action authorizing specific borrowing is required or permitted to delay payment.

The debt ceiling is not a spending constraint — it is a limit on the government's ability to pay for spending Congress has already authorized, appropriated, and obligated. Using it as leverage in unrelated budget negotiations creates manufactured crises that threaten U.S. creditworthiness, destabilize financial markets, and impose real economic costs on ordinary Americans. The Fourteenth Amendment's Public Debt Clause states that the validity of the public debt "shall not be questioned," which most constitutional scholars interpret as limiting Congress's ability to refuse to honor validly incurred obligations. Abolishing the ceiling removes a recurring extortion mechanism while preserving Congress's full authority over spending and revenue decisions before appropriations are enacted.

Presidential rescissions of appropriated funds require affirmative Congressional approval within 45 days; unapproved rescissions lapse automatically and funds must be immediately obligated

This rule requires Congressional approval for the President to cut spending Congress appropriated, preventing presidents from unilaterally rewriting the budget.

Under the Impoundment Control Act (2 U.S.C. §§ 681 et seq.), the President may propose to rescind appropriated funds by transmitting a special message to Congress. Congress must vote to affirmatively approve each rescission proposal within 45 calendar days of receipt; any proposal not approved by both chambers within 45 days must lapse automatically and the withheld funds must be obligated or released within five business days. The current procedure — which allows the President to withhold funds during the 45-day review period, effectively achieving a temporary impoundment regardless of outcome — must be reformed so that funds remain fully available and must be actively obligated pending congressional action. Failure to obligate funds within five days of lapse constitutes an impoundment violation subject to criminal penalties under the reformed Impoundment Control Act.

The Impoundment Control Act was enacted in 1974 to end Nixon-era systematic refusals to spend appropriated funds. The rescission procedure has been exploited as a short-term impoundment: a President sends rescission proposals covering large amounts of appropriated funds, effectively freezing them for 45 days, then sends new proposals before the deadline — creating a rolling impoundment with no effective time limit. The Trump administration impounded congressionally appropriated Ukraine security assistance through this and related mechanisms, generating the GAO finding central to the first impeachment. Requiring automatic obligation upon lapse eliminates the tactical benefit of serial rescission proposals.

Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, veterans' benefits, and active-duty military pay must be permanently and automatically appropriated — immune from any government funding lapse

This rule permanently protects Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and veterans' benefits from being used as bargaining chips in budget negotiations.

Congress must enact permanent, automatic appropriations — not subject to annual reauthorization, continuing resolution status, or government shutdown disruption — for: Social Security retirement, disability, and survivors benefits; Medicare Parts A, B, and D; Medicaid federal matching payments; veterans' service-connected disability compensation; veterans' non-service-connected pensions; active-duty military pay; and military retirement and survivor benefit payments. Treasury must disburse these payments on their legally established schedules regardless of the status of any government shutdown, funding lapse, debt ceiling controversy, or congressional appropriations dispute. Any legislation that would delay, reduce, or condition these payments during a funding lapse must be declared void and unenforceable. The beneficiaries of these programs — who bear no responsibility for congressional budget failures — must not be used as leverage in political negotiations.

During government shutdowns, millions of Americans who depend on Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and veterans' benefits face uncertainty about continued payment, even when those programs are not technically at issue in the spending dispute. The 2018–2019 shutdown — the longest in U.S. history — demonstrated that the political leverage created by threats to essential benefits is real and has been used deliberately. Permanent automatic appropriations for these essential obligations remove them from the shutdown leverage calculus entirely: Congress can argue about discretionary spending without holding beneficiaries hostage to a dispute they did not create. Military pay protection also ensures that service members are not subjected to financial hardship by partisan congressional standoffs.

Abolish the Electoral College; elect the President by national popular vote — interstate compact as interim step, constitutional amendment as ultimate goal

This constitutional amendment would abolish the Electoral College and elect the President by direct national popular vote, making every vote count equally.

This platform supports a constitutional amendment abolishing the Electoral College and replacing it with a direct national popular vote for President and Vice President, in which every vote cast by any citizen of the United States counts equally regardless of the state in which the voter resides. As an interim measure before constitutional amendment is achievable, Congress must actively support and states must be encouraged to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, under which each signatory state awards all of its electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote, taking effect when compact members collectively control a majority of electoral votes. The Electoral College's structural malapportionment — which assigns disproportionate electoral weight to voters in small states relative to large states — is incompatible with the constitutional principle of equal political representation and must be corrected. No structural arrangement that systematically over-weights some citizens' votes relative to others' is consistent with democratic legitimacy.

Two of the five U.S. presidents elected since 2000 — George W. Bush in 2000 and Donald Trump in 2016 — won the Electoral College while losing the national popular vote.^[10] Both subsequently governed as mandate-holders while having received fewer votes than their opponents. The Electoral College was originally designed partly to protect slave states' political power through the Three-Fifths Compromise, a structural origin that provides no legitimate justification for its continuation. The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact has been enacted by states representing a significant share of electoral votes^[11] and represents the most practicable near-term path to popular-vote presidential selection without a constitutional amendment.

This platform opposes any constitutional balanced budget amendment; fiscal policy must remain flexible for recessions, emergencies, and public investment

This position opposes any balanced budget amendment to the Constitution because it would force cuts to essential services during economic downturns when people need them most.

This platform formally and emphatically opposes any constitutional amendment requiring the federal government to maintain a balanced budget, cap federal spending as a percentage of GDP, or require supermajority votes to run deficits or raise the debt ceiling. The federal government's fiscal capacity — its ability to borrow, spend, and invest countercyclically during recessions, pandemics, and national emergencies — is a primary macroeconomic tool that must remain flexible and responsive to economic conditions. Constitutionalizing austerity would prevent the federal government from using fiscal policy to respond to economic downturns, fight recessions, fund emergency responses, or invest in long-term public goods during periods of low private investment. Fiscal discipline is appropriately achieved through normal legislative process; constitutional constraints that prevent democratic majorities from responding to economic emergencies are categorically wrong.

Most U.S. states have constitutional balanced budget requirements; economic research consistently shows these requirements force procyclical spending cuts during recessions — reducing government spending exactly when economic conditions call for increased support — that deepen and lengthen downturns.^[12] The federal government has no structural obligation to balance its budget, and federal deficit spending during the 2008 financial crisis and COVID-19 pandemic prevented economic collapses that would have imposed vastly greater costs than the deficit financing that prevented them. A balanced budget amendment would have made the New Deal impossible, prevented the 2009 Recovery Act, and blocked the 2020–2021 pandemic relief programs. Opposing this amendment is a foundational commitment of this platform.

Reform or abolish the Senate filibuster; no procedural rule may permanently block majority-supported legislation from receiving a Senate vote

This position supports ending or reforming the Senate filibuster so a minority cannot block legislation supported by the majority.

The Senate filibuster — specifically the 60-vote cloture requirement that permits a minority of senators to permanently block majority-supported legislation from receiving a vote — must be reformed or abolished. At minimum, the Senate must: (1) restore the "talking filibuster" requiring senators to physically maintain floor debate to sustain a filibuster — senators who leave the floor end their filibuster; (2) replace silent holds with a 48-hour maximum hold period, after which nominations and legislation proceed to a floor vote; (3) eliminate post-cloture delay provisions that allow extended floor time after cloture is invoked; and (4) exempt voting rights, anti-corruption, and constitutional reform legislation from any supermajority requirement. This platform supports the option of the Senate majority abolishing the filibuster by simple majority vote — the so-called "constitutional option" — to restore democratic majority rule when the filibuster is used to permanently block legislation on voting rights, climate, or economic justice. No procedural rule derived from Senate standing rules rather than the Constitution may permanently prevent a democratically elected majority from enacting its program.

The Senate filibuster is not a constitutional requirement — it derives from Senate standing rules that have evolved over centuries, most dramatically after an 1806 revision inadvertently created the procedural mechanism that was eventually developed into the modern filibuster. The Constitution explicitly requires supermajority votes only in specific cases — treaties, constitutional amendments, veto overrides, conviction in impeachment — and the framers rejected proposals to require supermajorities for ordinary legislation. The modern filibuster allows 41 senators representing states with a minority of the national population^[13] to permanently block legislation supported by 59 senators representing a majority of the population. This is a democratic deficit without constitutional justification.

Congress must be prohibited from stripping federal courts of jurisdiction over constitutional rights claims; the Exceptions Clause cannot eliminate judicial review of constitutional violations

This rule prevents Congress from stripping federal courts of authority to hear constitutional cases, ensuring everyone can access courts to protect their rights.

Congress may not strip federal courts — including the Supreme Court — of jurisdiction over claims alleging violations of individual rights guaranteed by the Constitution. Article III's Exceptions Clause (U.S. Const. art. III, § 2, cl. 2) cannot be interpreted or used to eliminate judicial review of unconstitutional government conduct. Legislation that purports to remove federal court jurisdiction over categories of constitutional claims — including habeas corpus petitions, First Amendment claims, due process claims, Equal Protection claims, Fourth Amendment claims, and claims under the Bill of Rights — must be declared facially unconstitutional and void. Congress retains its authority to define and allocate jurisdiction over purely statutory claims and may channel certain constitutional claims to specialized tribunals with full Article III review available, but may not eliminate review entirely. Individuals who have suffered violations of constitutional rights must always have access to a federal court to seek remedy.

Court-stripping legislation — bills that remove federal court jurisdiction over specific categories of constitutional cases — has been proposed by members of both parties as a means of bypassing unfavorable judicial decisions on issues ranging from school prayer to immigration detention. The constitutional basis for such legislation is contested: some scholars argue the Exceptions Clause grants Congress plenary authority over Supreme Court appellate jurisdiction; others argue that jurisdiction-stripping that eliminates all judicial review of constitutional claims violates separation of powers. This platform takes the position that judicial review of constitutional rights claims is not a congressional gift that can be retracted — it is a structural requirement of constitutional government that predates Marbury v. Madison and is implicit in the constitutional design.

The Supreme Court must provide written explanation for cert denials in constitutional cases with circuit splits; shadow docket emergency orders must include a vote count and written basis

This rule requires the Supreme Court to explain in writing why it refuses to hear cases, preventing secret decisions to ignore important issues.

The Supreme Court must: (1) provide a written explanation — however brief — for any denial of certiorari in a case that presents a federal constitutional question on which two or more federal circuits have reached conflicting conclusions; the explanation must at minimum identify which circuit split the Court is declining to resolve and why; (2) all shadow docket orders — emergency stays, injunctions, or other dispositive orders issued without full briefing and oral argument — must disclose the vote count of the justices for and against the order; (3) all shadow docket orders that affect the rights of more than 1,000 individuals must include a written statement, signed by at least one justice in the majority, identifying the legal basis for the order; and (4) the Court may not grant emergency stays in cases where no lower court injunction is in place, absent an extraordinary and specific showing of irreparable imminent harm that cannot await normal briefing.

The Supreme Court's shadow docket — the practice of issuing major policy-determinative orders without full briefing, oral argument, or written opinions — expanded dramatically in the 2017–2025 period, with consequential orders on abortion, immigration, vaccination mandates, and other major policies issued without public deliberation or written reasoning. In many cases, the public and affected parties had no way to know whether the order was unanimous, narrowly divided, or even what legal theory the majority relied upon. Written explanations for cert denials in circuit-split cases would reduce the legal uncertainty that forces lower courts to operate with inconsistent binding precedent — a condition that denies equal justice to people in different circuits facing identical legal questions.

Establish a statutory Supreme Court ethics commission with binding enforcement authority; any Supreme Court expansion requires a two-thirds supermajority; mandatory recusal enforcement

This rule creates a statutory ethics commission with real enforcement power over the Supreme Court, ending self-regulation by justices.

Congress must: (1) establish a statutory ethics commission with binding authority to enforce a written Code of Conduct — equivalent to the Code already applicable to lower federal courts — on all federal judges including Supreme Court justices, with authority to impose public censure, mandatory recusal from specific cases, and referral to the House Judiciary Committee for impeachment consideration upon findings of serious violations; (2) require all federal judges, including Supreme Court justices, to recuse from cases involving entities whose legal interests the judge's current spouse is paid to represent, entities or individuals who have provided the judge with substantial financial consideration, and organizations in which the judge holds formal fiduciary or governance membership; (3) require that any legislation expanding the number of Supreme Court justices above nine receive approval by two-thirds of both chambers of Congress; and (4) require the Judicial Conference to publish, within 30 days of each court term's conclusion, a complete disclosure of all financial interests, reported recusals, recusal-requested-but-denied instances, and travel received by each justice and federal judge.

Investigative reporting revealed that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas received millions of dollars in undisclosed gifts, travel, and real estate transactions from billionaire Republican donor Harlan Crow over more than two decades^[8] — and that these relationships were not disclosed under any mandatory reporting requirement applicable to Supreme Court justices. The Supreme Court was the only federal court without a binding Code of Conduct. The Court adopted a voluntary code in 2023, but without an independent enforcement mechanism. The two-thirds requirement for court-packing prevents court composition from becoming a partisan leapfrog — one party packs the court, the next packs it back — while preserving Congress's constitutional authority to set court size.

FISA must require mandatory disclosure to surveillance targets within one year after investigation closes; create private right of action with $50,000 minimum damages for illegal surveillance

This rule requires the government to notify people when they've been surveilled under FISA after investigations end, so they know their rights were affected and can challenge improper surveillance.

The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (50 U.S.C. §§ 1801 et seq.) must be reformed to: (1) require the government to notify any U.S. person who was subjected to electronic surveillance or physical search under FISA of the surveillance within one year after the investigation closes or the target's related criminal case concludes — whichever is earlier — unless the government obtains a specific judicial finding that disclosure would cause imminent, concrete, and identifiable national security harm; (2) create a private right of action for any person subjected to surveillance conducted without legal authority, with statutory damages of not less than $50,000 per violation, actual damages, and recovery of attorney's fees, without requiring exhaustion of administrative remedies; (3) prohibit "about" collection — collecting communications that merely mention a surveillance target without targeting either party to the communication — which was suspended by NSA in 2017 and must now be permanently prohibited by statute; and (4) require an independent advocate appointed by the FISA Court to argue against government surveillance applications in all cases involving U.S. persons.

The FISA Court has historically approved the vast majority of government surveillance applications with minimal adversarial scrutiny, operating as a near-automatic approval mechanism rather than a genuine judicial check.^[9] Targets of FISA surveillance typically never learn they were surveilled, eliminating any post-hoc judicial challenge. The independent advocate requirement, modeled on a limited provision enacted in the USA FREEDOM Act of 2015, must be extended to all U.S. person applications. The private right of action creates deterrence for illegal surveillance beyond internal DOJ discipline — the only currently available remedy — which has proven insufficient to deter abuse including the FBI's improper applications in the Carter Page matter.

The state secrets privilege must be subject to mandatory independent in camera judicial review; courts must reject invocations covering illegal conduct; victims cannot be denied all remedy by government secrecy alone

This rule requires independent judicial review of state secrets claims and prevents the government from using secrecy to cover up illegal conduct or deny all remedies to victims.

When the United States invokes the state secrets privilege to withhold evidence from civil litigation, federal courts must: (1) conduct mandatory independent in camera review of all withheld materials to determine whether each document is genuinely protected and whether its exclusion would deny the plaintiff a fair opportunity to present their legal theory; (2) reject any invocation where the court finds — after in camera review — that the government seeks to use the privilege to conceal illegal conduct, abuse of official power, or political embarrassment rather than to protect information whose disclosure would cause identifiable harm to national security; (3) when legitimate privilege protects evidence so material that the plaintiff cannot fairly litigate without it, provide alternative remedies — including judgment against the government, adverse factual inferences, compensation from a Victims of Classified Wrongdoing Fund, or appointment of a special master — so that the privilege cannot be used as an absolute bar to any remedy for proven unconstitutional government conduct; and (4) require the government to produce a privilege log identifying each category of withheld materials, the general basis for invocation, and which agency head has personally certified the privilege assertion.

The state secrets privilege — a judicially created evidentiary rule tracing to United States v. Reynolds, 345 U.S. 1 (1953) — has been invoked to dismiss cases involving extraordinary rendition, torture, warrantless surveillance, and assassination programs, denying victims any judicial remedy by making the litigation of their claims impossible without the very evidence the government refuses to produce. In Reynolds itself, the government's claim that the accident report was too sensitive to disclose was later revealed to be false — the report contained no state secrets, but it did contain evidence of government negligence. Independent in camera review prevents the privilege from functioning as a tool of impunity rather than a genuine national security protection.

Ban political firings

This rule prohibits firing government employees for political reasons, protecting professional civil servants from being purged when a new administration takes over.

Ban political firings

Source: DB entry GOV-ACC-002, status: MISSING. Pending editorial review.

No pay during government shutdown

This rule stops pay for Congress and the President during government shutdowns, ensuring they feel the same consequences as federal workers and are motivated to prevent shutdowns.

No pay during government shutdown

Source: DB entry GOV-SHD-001, status: MISSING. Pending editorial review.

Permanent pay loss after 30 days shutdown

This rule permanently eliminates pay for Congress and the President if a shutdown lasts more than 30 days, creating strong incentive to resolve budget disputes quickly.

Permanent pay loss after 30 days shutdown

Source: DB entry GOV-SHD-002, status: MISSING. Pending editorial review.

Require declared wars

This rule requires Congress to formally declare war before sustained military operations begin, restoring the constitutional requirement that Congress, not just the President, decides on war.

Require declared wars

Source: DB entry GOV-WAR-002, status: MISSING. Pending editorial review.