When the president makes the case that he’s simply doing what other modern presidents have done, there’s no reason to believe him.
When Donald Trump arrived at the White House’s Rose Garden on Friday morning, the public already knew he would declare a national emergency at the border and grant himself the power to redirect funds in defiance of Congress’ wishes. It just took him a while to get there.
The president meandered for a long while, referencing a variety of other issues that were on his mind, before eventually getting to the point.
Looking past Trump’s unintentionally amusing use of “so…” – he seemed to treat the emergency declaration as an afterthought – his underlying point was that previous presidents relied on similar powers without incident, so there’s no reason to make a fuss about his latest gambit.
