Trump’s Executive Order Isn’t Just a Power Grab—It’s the Logical Next Step of His Immunity Ruling
The text of the so-called "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" executive order is out, and its purpose is undeniable: this isn’t just about centralizing agency control—it’s about leveraging the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling to erase any meaningful limits on executive power - extending its umbrella over all agencies, all departments, all bureaus fully act with the president's impunity in an attempt to sidestep the Chevron ruling.
The order mandates that all federal agencies must follow the President’s and Attorney General’s interpretation of the law, eliminating legal independence. That means if Trump claims an action is within his “official duties,” it’s both unchallengeable and unenforceable in court. This EO is designed to function as the legal infrastructure for executive power without judicial oversight.
The DOJ has already cited the Supreme Court ruling to justify removing independent agency heads. This is the pattern: rewrite agency authority, purge those who resist, and create a system where law is whatever the White House says it is. If federal agencies are no longer independent and courts are ignored or stripped of enforcement power, then where does resistance come from?
The answer has to be state insulation. If Washington is no longer bound by the rule of law, then states must act before federal control is fully consolidated. That means:
Immediate legal challenges to block agency takeovers before courts are rendered powerless.
Refusal to enforce federal policies that override state authority, particularly in regulatory and economic areas.
State economic barriers that disrupt funding channels for captured federal agencies.
This is a moment where protest must become action—not just marching, but organizing around concrete demands for state-level resistance. If states do not step up now, they will lose the power to do so at all.
Time is running out to put meaningful barriers in place. The old strategies—waiting for courts, hoping for a political shift—are obsolete. This fight has to move to the state level, and it has to start now.
Hello Victor! Thank you so much for writing/sharing this. I believe this is something that more people need to see so I would like to copy the major points into an easy to print/share pamphlet. I want to do this only if it's alright with you to be shared this way. It will in NO way be sold or otherwise marketed; just distributed for free to hopefully increase the number of people seeing this. Please let me know if this would be acceptable and any other considerations/concerns you may have.
Taylor, first off—thank you. Not just for asking, but for recognizing that getting this message into more hands is what matters most.
Yes, you absolutely have my permission to copy the major points into a pamphlet for free distribution. This movement can’t grow if people only encounter it online—it needs to be talked about, shared, and made real in the places where decisions happen: town halls, local meetings, workplaces, and community spaces.
If you’d like, I can take a quick look at the pamphlet draft when you have it to ensure the framing is clear and effective. But either way, I appreciate you taking the initiative. Every person who reads and engages with these ideas brings us one step closer to making Radical Federalism a force that can’t be ignored.
Thank you for being part of this. Let me know if you need anything.
Awesome! I'm working on it right now; I'll send the draft your way asap. I'm using Canva so it will probably be in pdf format. What would be your preferred way of receiving it?
Hey, that sounds great! I really appreciate you taking the time to put this together—getting these ideas into more hands is exactly what we need.
Although the stakes are low here, I think this is the right time and place to handle this as we should all our protest activities: with security and privacy in mind from the start. I’ll send you instructions via Substack message (okay, this one small part isn't demonstrating best practices but it's what we've got) on how to share the draft securely. Looking forward to seeing what you put together!
Sarah, that’s great to hear. Getting these ideas into people’s hands, beyond the internet, is exactly how this movement spreads.
You might consider reaching out to IMakeCandles, who just put together a flyer design and may already be thinking about distribution strategies. If you’re looking for places to share, libraries, community centers, co-op spaces, and college campuses are all good starting points. Connecting with local activist groups, tenants’ unions, or mutual aid networks could also help get this material into the right hands.
If you want to coordinate with others in Pittsburgh, feel free to drop a way for people to reach you safely—or let us know what kind of support you need. Feel free, also, to send me a Substack message if it would be helpful. This kind of groundwork is what turns shared ideas into action.
Excellent to read and this as we head out the door for our April 5th rally …800 people have signed up which is not thousands but this is Akron, O. Would loved to share this piece with our group. How to do this as I am new to Substack? Thanks so much for researching during this time for you and sorry for the damn fall.
That’s great to hear—800 in a medium-sized city in Ohio is no small thing.
The easiest way to share is just to share the url—all our posts are fully public, so anyone can read them even without a substack account by just scrolling/clicking "continue" on the ‘please sign up’ overlay (substack does not make that obvious, but it is a huge help for people to sign up (not least of whixh, they can engage and leave comments, but also it is the clearest sign of what’s working and what isn’t and guarantees every subscriber gets allerged to each new post…) Anyway, feel free to print, snip, edit, modify the post in any way—we take a fully rhizomatic approach here.
Tremendous showing all around—so much so that media outfits that seemed intent to ignore it have been forced to confront it—Handsoff managed to be ‘too big to ignore’ and those caught flatfooted (like the NYT) have , as I’ve already seen some put it, exposed their illegitimacy.
Thank you so much for sharing. I have been thinking a lot about this lately with respect to the administration's unconstitutional actions - specific demands, and specific acts to hold our elected officials accountable. I sketched it out here: https://civicreform.substack.com/p/hello
Do you have any thoughts or suggestions on organizations or networks for lawyers/law students who want to contribute to this strategy can get involved with? NLG comes to mind, but others?
That’s a great question, and before I begin I want to preface this by saying that this isn't an area I'm an expert in and I welcome feedback and comments from others and suggest you reach out to your mentors for additional advice if you can.
That said, the answer depends on what exactly you want to do. The legal infrastructure for resisting centralized executive power isn’t just about filing lawsuits—it’s about structuring resistance across multiple fronts: litigation, election protection, government accountability, and movement lawyering.
This is the high-profile work—suing the administration, challenging agency takeovers, fighting federal preemption. The major players:
Protect Democracy – Founded by former DOJ lawyers, specializing in litigation against executive abuses. They have an ongoing pipeline of cases targeting federal overreach, including voting rights and constitutional challenges.
Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection (ICAP) at Georgetown Law – Think of them as constitutional litigators for the rule of law. They take on separation-of-powers cases and unlawful government actions.
Brennan Center for Justice – Primarily focused on voting rights, campaign finance, and executive accountability. They combine litigation with policy advocacy.
State Attorneys General (AG) Offices – A significant amount of legal pushback against executive actions is coming from state AGs. The attorneys general of California, New York, and Massachusetts, among others, have built teams specifically for multistate litigation against federal overreach.
Law students interested in this should look at fellowships or clinic placements with these groups, particularly in state AG litigation units.
The current administration is already dismantling federal election security efforts. If you’re looking to push back on that:
Election Protection (866-OUR-VOTE) – The main legal defense network against voter suppression.
Fair Fight Action – Originally founded to fight Georgia’s election laws, now expanding nationwide to combat voting restrictions.
Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law – Specializes in election security litigation and rapid-response legal teams during elections.
A lot of this work involves preemptive litigation—challenging new restrictions before they are implemented—and direct election monitoring. If you are a law student, these groups often recruit election-day legal volunteers.
If you want to defend activists and whistleblowers :
The administration has already signaled its intent to purge independent federal employees and target government critics. The legal defense infrastructure here includes:
National Lawyers Guild (NLG) – The oldest movement lawyering network in the U.S., focused on defending activists and protest movements. Their Mass Defense Committees provide legal observers, criminal defense, and protest-related civil litigation.
Government Accountability Project (GAP) – Represents whistleblowers and federal employees who refuse to comply with illegal directives.
Whistleblower Aid – A nonprofit that specializes in national security whistleblowing.
If you’re a law student, NLG chapters are a good entry point for legal observing and movement lawyering. GAP and Whistleblower Aid often take legal fellows.
Radical Federalism, in practice, means pushing legal authority back to the states. That means working on state constitutional litigation, state AG lawsuits, and legal frameworks that reinforce state autonomy.
Emory Law’s Center on Federalism – Focuses on state constitutional law as a legal shield against federal preemption.
StateAG.org – Tracks multistate AG lawsuits and provides legal research for state-led litigation.
The NYU State Impact Center – Works with state AGs, particularly on environmental and regulatory challenges, helping coordinate legal strategies against federal control.
Most of the real legal action is shifting to the states, because at some point federal lawsuits become academic if the courts are captured. State-level challenges will matter more in the long run.
There is also an entire legal-intellectual infrastructure supporting state resistance and legal challenges to executive power:
The Center for State Constitutional Studies at Rutgers – Researches ways state constitutions can be used to protect rights beyond federal baselines.
Harvard’s Democracy and Rule of Law Clinic – Works on legal frameworks for preventing democratic backsliding.
The American Constitution Society (ACS) – State Attorneys General Project – Provides legal research and advocacy for AGs pushing back against federal overreach.
If you’re an academic or law student, contributing research and legal analysis to these groups is one way to be useful.
Where you engage depends on whether you want to be in a courtroom, in the streets, or in a library. The litigation groups are trying to hold the line in court. The election groups are trying to prevent the takeover of election infrastructure. The whistleblower and protest defense lawyers are trying to make sure people don’t get purged or imprisoned. The state constitutional and federalism groups are trying to push legal authority back to the states before Washington consolidates total control.
If you’re a law student, your best bet is probably a state AG office, a law school clinic, or one of the organizations that provide direct legal support. If you’re already a lawyer, finding a pro bono pipeline or a position in a legal nonprofit is the way to go.
But the main point is: the courts alone aren’t going to save us, so the legal fight needs to be waged on multiple fronts.
Trump’s Executive Order Isn’t Just a Power Grab—It’s the Logical Next Step of His Immunity Ruling
The text of the so-called "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" executive order is out, and its purpose is undeniable: this isn’t just about centralizing agency control—it’s about leveraging the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling to erase any meaningful limits on executive power - extending its umbrella over all agencies, all departments, all bureaus fully act with the president's impunity in an attempt to sidestep the Chevron ruling.
The order mandates that all federal agencies must follow the President’s and Attorney General’s interpretation of the law, eliminating legal independence. That means if Trump claims an action is within his “official duties,” it’s both unchallengeable and unenforceable in court. This EO is designed to function as the legal infrastructure for executive power without judicial oversight.
The DOJ has already cited the Supreme Court ruling to justify removing independent agency heads. This is the pattern: rewrite agency authority, purge those who resist, and create a system where law is whatever the White House says it is. If federal agencies are no longer independent and courts are ignored or stripped of enforcement power, then where does resistance come from?
The answer has to be state insulation. If Washington is no longer bound by the rule of law, then states must act before federal control is fully consolidated. That means:
Immediate legal challenges to block agency takeovers before courts are rendered powerless.
Refusal to enforce federal policies that override state authority, particularly in regulatory and economic areas.
State economic barriers that disrupt funding channels for captured federal agencies.
This is a moment where protest must become action—not just marching, but organizing around concrete demands for state-level resistance. If states do not step up now, they will lose the power to do so at all.
Read the full executive order here: https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/02/ensuring-accountability-for-all-agencies/
Time is running out to put meaningful barriers in place. The old strategies—waiting for courts, hoping for a political shift—are obsolete. This fight has to move to the state level, and it has to start now.
Hello Victor! Thank you so much for writing/sharing this. I believe this is something that more people need to see so I would like to copy the major points into an easy to print/share pamphlet. I want to do this only if it's alright with you to be shared this way. It will in NO way be sold or otherwise marketed; just distributed for free to hopefully increase the number of people seeing this. Please let me know if this would be acceptable and any other considerations/concerns you may have.
thank you again!!
Taylor H.
Pittsburgh PA
Taylor, first off—thank you. Not just for asking, but for recognizing that getting this message into more hands is what matters most.
Yes, you absolutely have my permission to copy the major points into a pamphlet for free distribution. This movement can’t grow if people only encounter it online—it needs to be talked about, shared, and made real in the places where decisions happen: town halls, local meetings, workplaces, and community spaces.
If you’d like, I can take a quick look at the pamphlet draft when you have it to ensure the framing is clear and effective. But either way, I appreciate you taking the initiative. Every person who reads and engages with these ideas brings us one step closer to making Radical Federalism a force that can’t be ignored.
Thank you for being part of this. Let me know if you need anything.
Awesome! I'm working on it right now; I'll send the draft your way asap. I'm using Canva so it will probably be in pdf format. What would be your preferred way of receiving it?
Hey, that sounds great! I really appreciate you taking the time to put this together—getting these ideas into more hands is exactly what we need.
Although the stakes are low here, I think this is the right time and place to handle this as we should all our protest activities: with security and privacy in mind from the start. I’ll send you instructions via Substack message (okay, this one small part isn't demonstrating best practices but it's what we've got) on how to share the draft securely. Looking forward to seeing what you put together!
I live in Pittsburgh and would love to connect to print and distribute!
Sarah, that’s great to hear. Getting these ideas into people’s hands, beyond the internet, is exactly how this movement spreads.
You might consider reaching out to IMakeCandles, who just put together a flyer design and may already be thinking about distribution strategies. If you’re looking for places to share, libraries, community centers, co-op spaces, and college campuses are all good starting points. Connecting with local activist groups, tenants’ unions, or mutual aid networks could also help get this material into the right hands.
If you want to coordinate with others in Pittsburgh, feel free to drop a way for people to reach you safely—or let us know what kind of support you need. Feel free, also, to send me a Substack message if it would be helpful. This kind of groundwork is what turns shared ideas into action.
Thank you for the encouragement and info. I will see if I can connect directly with IMakeCandles and coordinate.
Excellent to read and this as we head out the door for our April 5th rally …800 people have signed up which is not thousands but this is Akron, O. Would loved to share this piece with our group. How to do this as I am new to Substack? Thanks so much for researching during this time for you and sorry for the damn fall.
Suellen R
Akron, O
Suellen,
That’s great to hear—800 in a medium-sized city in Ohio is no small thing.
The easiest way to share is just to share the url—all our posts are fully public, so anyone can read them even without a substack account by just scrolling/clicking "continue" on the ‘please sign up’ overlay (substack does not make that obvious, but it is a huge help for people to sign up (not least of whixh, they can engage and leave comments, but also it is the clearest sign of what’s working and what isn’t and guarantees every subscriber gets allerged to each new post…) Anyway, feel free to print, snip, edit, modify the post in any way—we take a fully rhizomatic approach here.
Hold the line today!
—VH
In Akron 2500 showed up!
Tremendous showing all around—so much so that media outfits that seemed intent to ignore it have been forced to confront it—Handsoff managed to be ‘too big to ignore’ and those caught flatfooted (like the NYT) have , as I’ve already seen some put it, exposed their illegitimacy.
Thank you so much for sharing. I have been thinking a lot about this lately with respect to the administration's unconstitutional actions - specific demands, and specific acts to hold our elected officials accountable. I sketched it out here: https://civicreform.substack.com/p/hello
Do you have any thoughts or suggestions on organizations or networks for lawyers/law students who want to contribute to this strategy can get involved with? NLG comes to mind, but others?
That’s a great question, and before I begin I want to preface this by saying that this isn't an area I'm an expert in and I welcome feedback and comments from others and suggest you reach out to your mentors for additional advice if you can.
That said, the answer depends on what exactly you want to do. The legal infrastructure for resisting centralized executive power isn’t just about filing lawsuits—it’s about structuring resistance across multiple fronts: litigation, election protection, government accountability, and movement lawyering.
So, options.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If you want to litigate executive overreach :
This is the high-profile work—suing the administration, challenging agency takeovers, fighting federal preemption. The major players:
Protect Democracy – Founded by former DOJ lawyers, specializing in litigation against executive abuses. They have an ongoing pipeline of cases targeting federal overreach, including voting rights and constitutional challenges.
Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection (ICAP) at Georgetown Law – Think of them as constitutional litigators for the rule of law. They take on separation-of-powers cases and unlawful government actions.
Brennan Center for Justice – Primarily focused on voting rights, campaign finance, and executive accountability. They combine litigation with policy advocacy.
State Attorneys General (AG) Offices – A significant amount of legal pushback against executive actions is coming from state AGs. The attorneys general of California, New York, and Massachusetts, among others, have built teams specifically for multistate litigation against federal overreach.
Law students interested in this should look at fellowships or clinic placements with these groups, particularly in state AG litigation units.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If you want to protect elections :
The current administration is already dismantling federal election security efforts. If you’re looking to push back on that:
Election Protection (866-OUR-VOTE) – The main legal defense network against voter suppression.
Fair Fight Action – Originally founded to fight Georgia’s election laws, now expanding nationwide to combat voting restrictions.
Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law – Specializes in election security litigation and rapid-response legal teams during elections.
A lot of this work involves preemptive litigation—challenging new restrictions before they are implemented—and direct election monitoring. If you are a law student, these groups often recruit election-day legal volunteers.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If you want to defend activists and whistleblowers :
The administration has already signaled its intent to purge independent federal employees and target government critics. The legal defense infrastructure here includes:
National Lawyers Guild (NLG) – The oldest movement lawyering network in the U.S., focused on defending activists and protest movements. Their Mass Defense Committees provide legal observers, criminal defense, and protest-related civil litigation.
Government Accountability Project (GAP) – Represents whistleblowers and federal employees who refuse to comply with illegal directives.
Whistleblower Aid – A nonprofit that specializes in national security whistleblowing.
If you’re a law student, NLG chapters are a good entry point for legal observing and movement lawyering. GAP and Whistleblower Aid often take legal fellows.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If you want to work on state-level resistance :
Radical Federalism, in practice, means pushing legal authority back to the states. That means working on state constitutional litigation, state AG lawsuits, and legal frameworks that reinforce state autonomy.
Emory Law’s Center on Federalism – Focuses on state constitutional law as a legal shield against federal preemption.
StateAG.org – Tracks multistate AG lawsuits and provides legal research for state-led litigation.
The NYU State Impact Center – Works with state AGs, particularly on environmental and regulatory challenges, helping coordinate legal strategies against federal control.
Most of the real legal action is shifting to the states, because at some point federal lawsuits become academic if the courts are captured. State-level challenges will matter more in the long run.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If you want to do the scholarly work :
There is also an entire legal-intellectual infrastructure supporting state resistance and legal challenges to executive power:
The Center for State Constitutional Studies at Rutgers – Researches ways state constitutions can be used to protect rights beyond federal baselines.
Harvard’s Democracy and Rule of Law Clinic – Works on legal frameworks for preventing democratic backsliding.
The American Constitution Society (ACS) – State Attorneys General Project – Provides legal research and advocacy for AGs pushing back against federal overreach.
If you’re an academic or law student, contributing research and legal analysis to these groups is one way to be useful.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Final Thoughts :
Where you engage depends on whether you want to be in a courtroom, in the streets, or in a library. The litigation groups are trying to hold the line in court. The election groups are trying to prevent the takeover of election infrastructure. The whistleblower and protest defense lawyers are trying to make sure people don’t get purged or imprisoned. The state constitutional and federalism groups are trying to push legal authority back to the states before Washington consolidates total control.
If you’re a law student, your best bet is probably a state AG office, a law school clinic, or one of the organizations that provide direct legal support. If you’re already a lawyer, finding a pro bono pipeline or a position in a legal nonprofit is the way to go.
But the main point is: the courts alone aren’t going to save us, so the legal fight needs to be waged on multiple fronts.
Thank you! This is really helpful, and I'm starting to reach out and try and involve some of my peers.