The Washington Post reported that activists are working with the White House on an executive order to declare a “national emergency” over America’s elections and pave the way for a power grab.
“Pro-Trump activists who say they are in coordination with the White House are circulating a 17-page draft executive order that claims China interfered in the 2020 election as a basis to declare a national emergency that would unlock extraordinary presidential power over voting,” reported the Post‘s Isaac Arnsdorf. “President Donald Trump has repeatedly previewed a plan to mandate voter ID and ban mail ballots in November’s midterm elections, and the activists expect their draft will figure into Trump’s promised executive order on the issue.”
Peter Ticktin, a MAGA activist in favor of the executive order, told the Post that “we have a situation where the president is aware that there are foreign interests that are interfering in our election processes,” and that “the president has to be able to deal with it,” including by banning mail-in ballots and certain voting machines.
What will the US military with their oath to protect the US Constitution?
Probably not.
I would love to be proven wrong, but the evidence of the last year tells me I won’t be.
The only way the US military would ever -MAYBE - intervene is if Trump openly and unambiguously violated a direct order from the Supreme Court. If SCOTUS directly prohibited Trump from seizing control of elections, and Trump just ordered the military to intervene, that might be enough to make them refuse orders.
But that’s unlikely to happen. First, SCOTUS will likely just slow walk this until after the election, refusing to rule on it while also not allowing any injunctions. Three months after the election they rule against it.
Or, even if SCOTUS does strike it down, Trump can rely on ambiguity. The court strikes this one down? Three weeks before the election, Trump issues a new executive order. This does much the same thing as the one the court struck down, but it’s based on a completely different legal authority. The military then no longer has a clear unambiguous ruling from the court on how to act.
The only way the military might refuse to follow orders is if Trump openly and clearly violates a direct SCOTUS ruling. And Trump can simply engineer things so that such a clear unambiguous case never happens. It’s one thing for a group of soldiers to cite a direct court ruling in their refusal to follow orders. It’s another for some 19 year olds to decide the constitutionality of a presidential action by themselves and refuse to intervene.