If Covid 19 and the economic mayhem that it has unleashed don't scare the crap out of you, then read the op ed www.nytimes.com/... in today’s New Times written by Elizabeth Goitein and Andrew Boyle who work at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law..
Trump Has Emergency Powers We Aren’t Allowed to Know About
Given that they could make their first appearance in the coronavirus crisis, Congress should insist on having full access to them.
After invoking the Stafford Act and the National Emergencies Act, Trump boasted, “I have the right to do a lot of things that people don’t even know about.”
Among the secret powers Trump was granted by declaration on March 13 of a Covid 19 emergency are those unknown to both Congress and the public that are laid out exclusively in classified “presidential emergency action documents.” This suite of emergency powers, first made available to President Eisenhower in anticipation of the possibility of a global nuclear war, are among the nation’s best kept secrets. They have been revised and expanded several times since the 1950s
There are believed to be between 50 and 60 ‘presidential emergency action documents’ currently in existence. While none have ever been invoked, it is believed that they would allow the president to do things like suspend habeas corpus, detain US citizens suspected of being “subversive” allow for warrantless searches and seizures, impose martial law, and censor the news.
The coronavirus pandemic is fast becoming the most serious crisis to face this country since World War II. And it is happening under the watch of a president who has claimed that Article II of the Constitution gives him “the right to do whatever I want.” It is not far-fetched to think that we might see the deployment of these documents for the first time and that they will assert presidential powers beyond those granted by Congress or recognized by the courts as flowing from the Constitution....
Read the op ed
If you believe in the power of prayer — then pray.
If you believe in the power of the people, demand Congressional oversight.