Establishment media outlets appear to be laying the groundwork to impeach President Donald Trump and perhaps a few of his team members, based on the president’s purge of the so-called “deep state” or administrative state.
Reporters and pundits’ portrayal of Trump’s actions appears to be a signal for what is perhaps to come if Democrats gain control of the House in 2026.
Legacy media and Democrat operatives appear particularly upset that the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) gained access to the federal payment system at the Treasury Department to monitor outflows of taxpayer funds. They are also angered about Trump’s decision to essentially defund many agencies, such as the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and fire rogue and corrupt actors within the administrative state.
These allegations, bolstered by think tank “experts,” caused some Democrat lawmakers to publicly demand the impeachment of Trump, the chief executive of the federal branch. Other Democrats, like Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), suggested they should start by impeaching the president’s director of DOGE, Elon Musk.
“As Trump team overhauls government, a constitutional crisis looms,” wrote CNN’s Joan Biskupic, the network’s chief Supreme Court analyst:
In these early weeks of Trump’s second term, federal district court judges – the first rung of the US judiciary – have begun impeding his efforts to transform the federal workforce, freeze government funding and overhaul the country’s immigration policy.
On Saturday, a federal judge temporarily restricted Musk’s government efficiency team from accessing the Treasury Department payment system that covers Social Security benefits and federal employees’ salaries, among other payments.
Musk responded by calling the judge “corrupt” and saying he “needs to be impeached.”
Politico Playbook wrapped the “constitutional crisis” allegations in a nutshell for its readers:
Donald Trump’s stunning disregard for almost every legal norm is hitting crisis point this week as his government suffers multiple defeats in courts across the land. On Monday alone, five different judges around the U.S. issued temporary blocks on five different Trump-ordered executive actions, per a message last night from POLITICO legal eagle Kyle Cheney. Never before has a new president clashed with the courts on such a scale.
The Washington Post‘s Amber Phillips wrote the headline: “What is a constitutional crisis?” She claimed Trump “potentially” broke laws by trying to rein in the “deep state” and cited “many legal experts” who claim “we are in a constitutional crisis”:
Nearly four weeks into his second term, President Donald Trump has potentially broken laws, steamrolled Congress and has a billionaire donor trying to dismantle the U.S. government, as his administration taunts the authority of the courts to stop them — in what appears to be a pursuit of some of the most expansive and aggressive presidential power in American history.\
Many experts believe that means we are in a constitutional crisis because it’s not clear if the country’s leaders will follow or stand up for the democratic system of government set up nearly 250 years ago. There are very few guardrails left if the United States has a president willing to break the law and a Congress unwilling or unable to react.
Adam Liptak, a New York Times reporter, told readers that although “there is no universally accepted definition of a constitutional crisis,” Trump’s actions “have created a constitutional crisis,” according to legal scholars. Liptak wrote:
He [expert] ticked off examples of what he called President Trump’s lawless conduct: revoking birthright citizenship, freezing federal spending, shutting down an agency, removing leaders of other agencies, firing government employees subject to civil service protections and threatening to deport people based on their political views.
That is a partial list, Professor Chemerinsky said, and it grows by the day. “Systematic unconstitutional and illegal acts create a constitutional crisis,” he said.
The distinctive feature of the current situation, several legal scholars said, is its chaotic flood of activity that collectively amounts to a radically new conception of presidential power. But the volume and speed of those actions may overwhelm and thus thwart sober and measured judicial consideration.
ProPublica’s Jake Pearson and Anjeanette Damon also tried to frame Trump’s purge as a crisis that tested the “limits of the presidency”:
Agencies continue to suspend funding, despite multiple court orders blocking the federal freeze. Experts say the Trump administration’s actions set the stage for challenges to Congress’ authority — and the limits of the presidency.
The term “deep state” or “administrative state” describes the phenomenon of unaccountable and unelected administrative agency personnel, including the national security apparatus, exercising power to create and enforce their own rules. The administrative state uses its rule-making ability to essentially usurp the separation of powers between the three branches of government by creating a so-called fourth branch of government not formed by the Constitution.
Many unelected bureaucrats within the administrative state also use their position to inflict their own agenda on citizens. For instance, after the “laptop from hell” story broke in 2020, 51 intelligence officials signed a letter that insinuated Hunter Biden’s laptop was Russian disinformation. Politico peddled the letter under the title, “Hunter Biden story is Russian disinfo, dozens of former intel officials say.” The 51 signatories seemingly knew the Politico story was false at the time because the FBI had the laptop that Hunter abandoned at a Delaware computer repair shop. Former President Joe Biden cited the story during a 2020 presidential debate with Trump to discredit the laptop’s contents. The story was allegedly planted by former Secretary of State Antony Blinken for Biden to use during the event.
Wendell Husebo is a political reporter with Breitbart News and a former RNC War Room Analyst. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality. Follow Wendell on “X” @WendellHusebø or on Truth Social @WendellHusebo.
