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This chapter explains how liberal states, with the enthusiastic support of progressives across the country, repeatedly exercised their authority as sovereigns to oppose and challenge some of the Trump administration’s most misguided, harmful, and discriminatory policies. State-based resistance to the Trump administration was particularly robust in matters related to immigration and environmental regulations. State-based policies were also crucial in filling the void left by the Trump administration’s failure to provide effective national leadership on issues that desperately demanded it, including the stemming of gun violence and controlling the spread of the coronavirus pandemic. The chapter argues that if progressives going forward embrace federalism only situationally—defending it when there is a conservative in the White House, but dismissing its relevance or appropriateness when there is a liberal in that position—then it is less likely that the principle will remain a viable and effective tool in resisting the policies of a future right-wing administration in the Trumpian mold. In contrast, if progressives after the Trump era defend federalism as a matter of principle, then it is more likely that the concept will retain its constitutional and political legitimacy, making it available to progressives in future years when confronting another right-wing and potentially autocratic federal administration.

This chapter explores the ways in which some progressives, in the years leading up to Trump’s election, had grown skeptical of expansive First Amendment protections, viewing them as impediments to the pursuit of equality objectives. Although some of that skepticism is understandable, the chapter details the multiple ways in which free speech and free press protections helped curtail some of Trump’s autocratic policies and practices. In doing so, the chapter argues that progressives, going forward, should not allow what it calls “First Amendment skepticism” to grow to the point that it undermines the amendment’s ability to shield democratic processes, dissenters, and vulnerable groups from future autocratic government officials in the Trump mold. The chapter ends with an exploration of future hate speech regulations. While it would be understandable for progressives, after Trump’s repeated use of hate speech, to call for greater regulations of such speech, the chapter urges progressives to be cautious in this area because of the real possibility that the regulations will be used by future government officials in the Trump mold to target and discriminate against both progressive viewpoints and racial and religious minorities.

This chapter explores the many ways in which Trump abused the powers of his office to create what it calls a Madisonian nightmare. Trump’s abuses of power included his efforts (1) to obstruct the special counsel’s investigation of Russia’s interference with the 2016 election; (2) to gain personal, political advantages from Ukraine and other countries while carrying out his official duties as president; (3) to obstruct the exercise of Congress’s impeachment and other investigatory powers; (4) to push the Department of Justice to investigate his political enemies and to protect his political allies from the enforcement of federal law; (5) to punish sanctuary jurisdictions for refusing to help implement the administration’s harsh immigration policies; and (6) to defy Congress by reallocating funds to pay for a border wall despite congressional disapproval of such action. These abuses of power show why it is crucial for progressives going forward to prioritize the reining in of presidential power in domestic affairs as a political issue, adding it to traditional liberal concerns such as economic justice and civil rights protections. The chapter ends with specific suggestions on how Congress and the courts can constitutionally limit the powers of the presidency in domestic affairs in ways that can help deter the types of repeated and dangerous presidential abuses of power that the nation experienced during the Trump era.

This chapter examines patterns of policymaking and intergovernmental conflict during the first year of the Trump Administration. There is remarkable continuity with the activity discussed in the body of the book. As reflected in staffing decisions, ideas, and official activity, the Trump Administration’s domestic agenda clearly extends the basic commitments of the state conservatives discussed in this book. Partisan and intergovernmental disagreements likewise remain highly concentrated in the same areas of policy. In challenging the activity of the Trump Administration, liberal state officeholders have been quick to make use of much of the repertoire of administrative and legal behaviors developed by conservatives in recent years. The chapter therefore argues that the pattern of conservative state opposition to the Obama Administration was not an isolated episode, but an emerging norm in American politics and government: the United States is likely entering an era of more conflictual intergovernmental relations. Owing to the underlying administrative law doctrines, as well as the Trump Administration’s efforts to limit the scope of the administrative and welfare state, the likely result is a rearranged federalism in which state governments are more powerful and active than they have been for generations.

This chapter argues that popular reactions to recent presidents have consistently reinforced the widening demographic, cultural, ideological, and even cognitive differences between ordinary Republicans and Democrats. Presidential candidates and presidents have thus been both the instruments and victims of the polarized partisanship that has emerged as the defining feature of American national politics during this century. Polarization was essential to the election of Donald Trump, whose campaign and conduct in office have so far served to magnify the demographic and cultural divisions between ordinary Democrats and Republicans. Although Trump executed a hostile takeover of the Republican Party and continues to attract vigorous criticism from many of its luminaries, his impact during his first year in office on how people view his party has been at least as large as that of previous presidents. In the intra-party struggle for the hearts and minds of ordinary Republicans, Trump has so far emerged as the consistent winner. But given his unpopularity outside core Republican circles, and especially among growing segments of the population, Trump’s dominance and prospective rebranding of the party threatens to erode its popular image, reputation, and appeal both immediately and for the long term.

This chapter considers how things have changed in the second half of the Obama administration and under the Trump administration. It shows how transgender rights activists used the politics of coming out to make important gains during Obama’s second term. It also shows that while Trump has worked to reverse LGBTQ+ rights during his presidency, public opinion has shifted in ways that are not easily or quickly reversed. Having felt the relief and joy of exiting the closet, people are not willing to return so easily. Dreamers have likewise refused to retreat into the shadows, and the undocumented immigrant movement continues to encourage coming out as a political strategy. Meanwhile, the Trump administration seems to have provided a catalyst for feminist organizing—including but not limited to the issue of sexual harassment and assault, while also emboldening members of the “alt-right,” or white nationalist movement, to “come out of the woodwork.”

This chapter examines how Republican foreign policy professionals found themselves in an outright rebellion against their own party's nominee by the spring and summer of 2016. They were not prepared for their party nominating a candidate they suspected of illicit relationships to America's adversaries. Their level of alarm not only far eclipsed that of other Trump skeptics, but their tight network structure and orientation toward collective action allowed them to act quickly, and in concert. They managed to put together two letters—one during the primary and the second after Donald Trump was nominated at the Republican Party convention in Cleveland—that denounced him in the strongest possible terms. These letters, signed by a wide swath of the most senior members of the Republican foreign policy establishment, were aimed with martial intent. The signatories hoped that a warning this grave would alarm Republican primary voters, and then the electorate in the fall, causing them to turn away from the serious risk they were taking with the nation's security by putting its arms in the hands of Donald Trump. Having shot at Trump and missed, they were declared persona non grata as the president staffed his administration.

This chapter explores the creation of Checks and Balances, a new group of conservative legal critics of the Trump administration. From his racist attack on the federal district judge ruling on the Trump University case and suspicions that he would appoint his own sister to the Supreme Court, to his threats to revise libel law so as to silence his rivals and his nearly total lack of constitutional discussion, Donald Trump was almost no prominent conservative lawyer's first choice. Once he dispatched all his Republican rivals, however, conservative lawyers were in a quandary. The death of Antonin Scalia, the most celebrated conservative jurist of his generation and a leader of the conservative legal movement, put the future of the Supreme Court squarely on the ballot. Once the character of Trump's governance became clear, Checks and Balances emerged to criticize the administration's legal conduct.

This chapter discusses America’s “contemporary” roles in Southeast Asia. It examines the Obama and Trump administrations’ policies and actions in the region, and considers three categories of the US footprint at present: commerce, security, and soft power/public diplomacy. For Southeast Asia, the United States continues to be an important guarantor of regional security and stability—but its commercial contributions and soft power appeal are also strong attractive features. If America has a pronounced weakness in the region it is in the area of diplomatic engagement. This is not new—as the strategic and economic importance of Northeast Asia and the “tyranny of distance” to Southeast Asia have long conspired to limit Washington’s attention span. The Obama administration was the exception to the rule, as it prioritized ASEAN as never before. The Trump administration does seem to have relatively downgraded the region when compared with the Obama years. Still, this has been a relative downgrading—and, if anything, a return to the more traditional pattern of episodic US (in)attention.

We conclude the book by summarizing our key analysis and findings and drawing general conclusions about the expansive role that politics plays in the administration of federal justice. In doing so, we reflect on the broad conclusions about how political factors affect federal prosecutorial staffing and decision-making. We examine continuity and change in these themes during the Trump Administration and speculate about these trends in the coming years. We also discuss opportunities for further research and potential reform, arguing that the empirical study of prosecution is a topic ripe for further inquiry by those interested in the law and politics of the U.S. federal government, the states, and legal systems around the world.

This introductory chapter provides an overview of the emergence of the “#nevertrump” hashtag on Twitter. Like any meme, #nevertrump had a variety of meanings to those who deployed it. However, for the elite Republicans and conservatives who embraced it, #nevertrump signaled horror and incomprehension at the rise of Donald Trump and how it had turned their political world upside down. #Nevertrump was also a way of signaling that Trump represented something more sinister than normal quadrennial Republican and conservative movement primary politics. Once they recognized the threat, the strongest adherents to Never Trump relentlessly and desperately searched for ways to frustrate Trump's takeover of the Republican Party. Shocking even themselves, a number of these lifelong Republicans, who had spent their careers battling Democrats, ended up voting for someone other than their party's nominee, up to and including their former nemesis, Hillary Clinton. Even after his election, a remnant of these Never Trumpers have kept up rear guard efforts to expose the deceitfulness of the Trump administration and to call their former allies away from the siren song of Trumpian populism.

How to resist President Donald Trump’s assault on international law? This introduction sketches the tripartite plan of this book. First, it discusses a counterstrategy of resistance based on transnational legal process. Second, it illustrates that counterstrategy with respect to immigration and refugees, and human rights; the Paris Climate Change Agreement, the Iran Nuclear Deal, and trade diplomacy; with countries of concern such as North Korea, Russia, and Ukraine; and with respect to America’s wars: Al Qaeda, Islamic State, Afghanistan, and Syria. Third, it reviews what broader issues are at stake in the looming battle between maintaining the post-World War II framework of Kantian global governance versus shifting to an Orwellian system of authoritarian spheres of influence.

The conclusion focuses on the long-term ramifications of immigration reform activists’ limitations in 1965. Bringing the history of immigration reform to the present, the conclusion also reflects on the similarities and differences between immigration reform activists discussed in the book and those pushing for immigration reform during the Trump administration. Even during the most challenging times for restrictionists during the 20^th Century, reformers could always count on family reunification as a priority for critics and supporters of immigration alike. That option is no longer available today. Nor can activists count on the executive office as a mitigating institution seeking common ground between the two poles. They face instead a president who uses anti-immigrant rhetoric to retain power and who bypasses Congress to change the country’s immigration and refugee policy dramatically.

This chapter maps the changing transatlantic relations and underlines how this impacts Brexit and EU-UK relations. It points out that the view of the US government remains influential in European affairs, despite claims about transatlantic divergence. It also mentions the endorsement and encouragement of the Trump Administration of the Brexit project, while the new Biden Administration remain unwavering in its commitment in favour of the Belfast Good Friday Agreement and the Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland. The chapter suggests that Brexit should not just be regarded as a UK-European affair but one of the biggest geopolitical shifts since the Second World War. It discusses the Trump phenomenon and why it represented a threat to both the transatlantic relationship and the European project.

American officials attempted to construct the plausible legality of torture, indefinite detention, targeted killing, and mass surveillance in the global war on terror. These efforts were largely successful, foreclosing prosecution and ensuring impunity for human rights violations. Moreover, with the exception of torture, many of these counterterrorism practices persist and enjoy widespread acceptance. Around the world, international human rights and humanitarian law have been weakened by American efforts to erode and reinterpret constraints on state violence. This has created space for more overt attacks on legal norms by the Trump administration, which has signaled its intent to shift American national security legal culture toward the politics of exception. At the same time, international law advocates are pushing back. The chapter concludes by reflecting on possible pathways for promoting a culture of human rights in the United States.

This chapter examines the concept of “sedition” and efforts to suppress dissent and disloyalty. President Adams used the Sedition Act of 1798 to prosecute and jail his critics and political opponents. That episode ultimately revealed the “central meaning of the First Amendment”—that Americans must be free to criticize their public officials, even if that criticism is often caustic and unpleasant. Federal and state officials have not proposed reviving the crime of seditious libel. However, several critics of the Trump administration have come under fire and suffered tangible consequences for openly criticizing the president and the Trump administration. As in prior eras, recent efforts to punish sedition and disloyalty pose serious threats to democratic self-government and political discourse.

This chapter investigates how politics and power shape health outcomes, with special emphasis on how these forces intersect with economic inequality and the disproportionate burden of sickness experienced by low-income populations. During the spread of COVID-19, American political leadership faced a test of its ability to respond to sudden crisis. Rising to such a difficult occasion requires detailed plans for what to do in such a scenario, robust public health infrastructure, and leadership which takes decisive, data-informed action, listening to experts and communicating clearly and consistently with the public. Tragically, COVID-19 found the United States lacking in all these areas. Political leaders are in a position to mold public opinion, nudging the public mind towards new ways of thinking. The precise term for this is “shifting the Overton window.” By helping to mainstream a cavalier attitude towards COVID-19, the Trump administration shifted the Overton window towards greater acceptance of behaviors which create poorer health. The chapter then looks at the failure to adequately address race in the US. Among the factors that shape health, the area of race is particularly sensitive to political dynamics.

This chapter introduces the main themes of the book. It situates the concepts of the Deep State and the unitary executive in the politics of the Trump presidency. When President Trump employed the term “Deep State,” he envisioned a duly elected leader hindered in the pursuit of his political priorities by an entrenched officialdom and their extensive support networks arrayed. Americans are predisposed to be wary of the state, and the specter of a Deep State is a national nightmare. President Trump invoked this image to strengthen the case for an executive branch unified and hierarchically controlled by the president. But for defenders of steady management, the presence of trained public servants is a necessary means to implementing knowledge-based public policy, guarding against hasty and arbitrary impositions, and ensuring that checks and balances work. The Deep State and the unitary executive are phantom twins, symptoms of two different conceptions of good government in contemporary America.

This concluding chapter summarizes the book’s conceptual framework with regard to China’s economic integration with select LAC countries since 2000. The author disputes realist interpretations of China’s rise in Latin America as a security threat to US hegemony and argues that China needed to internationalize its development strategy to compensate for its natural resource deficit. China’s ten LAC strategic partners now represent the majority of trade, loans, and FDI outflows from China to Latin America, and China is now the second-most-important trade partner for the region after the US. This relationship is contributing to the development of select LAC countries in order to propel China’s own growth and development. The author then moves to the political economy scenarios that have evolved within those LAC countries that have the strongest trade links and FDI inflows from China, in order to dispute the critique of neo-dependency scholars before offering the main takeaways.