Dereliction of Duty – USA Gov Policy

In the midst of one of the most severe challenges the United States has faced in decades, Congress has ceased functioning, and members, especially the leadership, have gone home, leaving vital legislative needs unresolved. It is a dereliction of duty to the most extraordinary degree. While American families and small businesses seek ways to survive economically daily, their elected representatives are on an extended vacation at least until May 4.

Nancy Pelosi and other legislative leaders have not even had the dignity to honestly admit that they have abandoned the citizenry in their time of need, maintaining a dishonest façade of being in session in only the most technical terms. This has prevented the Executive Branch from engaging in the appointment functions constitutionally provided to it to administer to immediate needs while the legislature is in recess. An angered President Trump stated that ““The current practice of leaving town while conducting phony pro forma sessions is a dereliction of duty the American people can’t afford during this crisis.”

The use of pro forma sessions effectively prevents the White House from even temporarily filling positions that require Congressional approval. A 2014 Supreme Court ruling addressed that issue, finding that as long as a pro forma session continues, a president cannot make a recess appointment.

President Trump has threatened to address that façade by exercising the powers granted go him by Article 2, Section 3 of the Constitution:

“… he may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper; he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers; he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the Officers of the United States.”

Despite the protestations by Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, and their sycophants in the media and academia, the wording of Article 2, Section 3 is absolutely clear and unambiguous. Can anyone seriously argue that the COVID-19 plague is not an “extraordinary occasion”?

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In addition to the current, stunning neglect of duty, the utter abandonment of the needs of the tens of millions of Americans and their enterprises who require Congress to do its legislative functions during this crisis period, the current leadership of the House of Representatives has long-sought to disrupt the functioning of the Executive Branch. The fraudulent charges against the Trump campaign and the President himself, all of which have been thoroughly disproven after a lengthy and aggressive investigation, has received exceptional news coverage. Less discussed has been the attempts to sabotage, and that word is used in its full legal and practical sense, the duly elected Administration in two ways using personnel policy.

The first is the most apparent, and is the immediate spark that resulted in Trump’s fury: the failure to confirm presidential appointments. Currently, about 85 appointments remain unaddressed. Much less discussed is the success that Obama had in insuring that left wing personnel survived into the Trump Administration.

Key positions within essential agencies, such as the State Department and the Department of Justice, have been held by individuals less loyal to either the Trump Administration or, more importantly, the Constitution, than to the Democratic Party and leftist ideals. They have sought to nullify the effects of the 2016 election by thwarting the policies voters supported when they voted for a change in Washington.

Much of this became public during the Russian Collusion hearings, when some of these individuals vented their frustration, testifying that Trump refused to take their advice. One assumes these bureaucrats forgot or didn’t care that it was their duty to obey the elected President, not the other way around.

Congress needs to either end these artificial “pro forma” sessions and let the White House do its job, or do what they were elected to do, come back to Washington, and get back to work. Unless they do, history will long note that in a time of unprecedented crisis, the American people were abandoned by their legislators.

Illustration: The painting depicts Independence Hall in Philadelphia on September 17, 1787. (Architect of the Capitol)

Quick Analysis

Ukraine’s Frozen Conflict

As we approach winter in the northern hemisphere, the war in Ukraine is beginning to resemble a “frozen conflict” from many perspectives. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently told the media he hopes the war will end faster once President-elect Trump takes over in January. Opinions in Moscow, however, differ from that of the Ukrainian leader. Russian President Vladimir Putin argues that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) needs to exclude Ukraine from joining in “exchange” for peace. If it does not, he says, then no end to the war is in sight. So far there is no Christmas solution. Several NATO countries, according to Vladimir Socor of the Jamestown Foundation, are tentatively considering “coalitions-of-the-willing” to provide security for Ukraine outside of the formal NATO framework. There is, however, no collective mechanism today under which such an arrangement is viable. According to the NATO Charter, while Ukraine is a NATO partner country, it may not join as a full member since it has not fulfilled the requirements for membership. That has not stopped NATO and allies from continuing “to provide Ukraine with unprecedented levels of support, helping to uphold its fundamental right to self-defence,” according to the organization. Socor says that keeping Ukraine out of NATO will not advance peace with Russia. Waiting for a peace settlement, he suggests, would only serve to encourage Moscow to continue the war indefinitely. Although the Biden Administration officially withdrew its support for Ukrainian membership in 2021, NATO maintains an “open door” policy toward membership-seeking countries. The current White House position led the way for European states to oppose Ukraine’s membership saying that a decision should be delayed until “conditions are met.” Biden pushed for changing “open door” to a “bridge” metaphor. It is not intended as an across-the-board NATO policy and has been implemented in the past on a case-by-case basis, says Socor. “The alliance’s open-door policy was not fully insulated from Russia’s non-statutory blocking power, and NATO-aspirant countries’ path toward membership was not always irreversible.” Russia has successfully blocked states like Georgia from joining, first in 2008 and again after the war in Ukraine began in 2014. Russia recognizes the value add of Ukraine to NATO is enormous and that Kyiv has a better case than some other nations. Putin’s invasion was, in part, intended to foreclose that option. By 2021, Moscow was pushing hard to maximize its war objectives, which included further annexations of Ukrainian territory. A main goal for Putin was, and is, to ensure there is no Ukraine left to join NATO. As President-elect Trump prepares to assume office in January, he is faced with the historical challenges presented by the war. Post-conflict security guarantees were the center of several proposals made during the 2023 military stalemate. The incoming Trump Administration has yet to outline how it intends to handle the Russia-Ukraine war. Analysts in Washington believe that the new Administration will expect its European allies to guarantee the majority of Ukraine’s security needs. As we approach 2025, several European nations have acknowledged that they do not view Ukraine as eligible for NATO membership as it would draw the organization into the middle of the conflict. Others want to wait until the war is over or pending a “peace” settlement before considering Ukrainian membership. Socor reports that some “influential voices” are suggesting that “Kyiv should join NATO after “freezing” the war along a stable armistice line, de facto accepting Ukraine’s partition, with NATO security guarantees applying de jure to the government-controlled territory only.” This would mean starting accession talks soon with the actual talks to commence only after a ceasefire is in place. Trump arrives in Washington at a time when Putin’s hybrid strategies of war in Ukraine have eviscerated commonly-held differences between war and peace. “Absent a political consensus in NATO over Ukrainian membership, certain European allies, including France’s President Emmanuel Macron, are holding informal consultations about post-conflict security guarantees to Kyiv by NATO members outside of NATO’s framework,” according to the Jamestown Foundation. The Biden Administration downplayed the discussions on possible forms of military assistance and defense industry cooperation by sending only an Assistant Secretary of State. For a European peace to hold the Trump Administration would need to formally extend the United States’ nuclear deterrence to Ukraine. Options under discussion in Europe include a “coalition of the resolute” to deploy forces to Ukraine as part of a possible armistice package, deterring further Russian attacks, says Secor. European officials are also debating, without any agreement, whether its military forces could perform non-combat logistical roles to free Ukrainian forces to fight. None of the possible courses of action has moved forward as all eyes are waiting on the incoming Trump Administration for clues about its intended level of support for a NATO framework and other non-NATO proposals. Daria Novak served in the U.S. State Dept.