Rep. Mike Levin (D-CA) joined "Forbes Newsroom" to discuss how Republicans in Congress have reacted to President Trump.
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00:00I know that you think that President Trump fumbled this comeback opportunity, especially
00:05in these past first 100 days. A new CNN poll about these 100 days found that more than half
00:12of voters think Congress is doing too little to check President Trump's power. And also Democrats
00:18are those who lean Democrats. This poll found have more negative feelings toward their party's
00:23leadership than the right. 61% disapprove and just 38% approve, whereas the broad majority
00:29of Republicans approve of Republican leadership. What do you think as a Democrat in Congress
00:34about these numbers? What's stunning to me, Brittany, is that the Republicans in Congress
00:40have really just handed their constitutional responsibility under Article 1 of the Constitution
00:46over to the president. It is up to the Congress to pass the laws, to appropriate the funds,
00:54to authorize the programs. And then it's up to the president of the United States to faithfully
00:59execute those laws and to apportion the funds, to distribute the funds that Congress has
01:04already appropriated and authorized. And that's not what is happening today. What's happening
01:10today is that the House and Senate under Republican control have given that power over to President
01:16Trump. Another example is on tariffs. It's Congress, not the president, that has power on tariffs.
01:22But Mike Johnson and John Thune decided as part of the continuing resolution that passed a while
01:29back to explicitly prohibit Congress from standing against this president on tariffs as one of many
01:37examples. Oversight is another very important function of the Congress. Look, when Mike Johnson
01:44was Speaker and Republicans like Jim Jordan had the gavels, they were not bashful about conducting
01:50oversight of the Biden administration. But now that President Trump is there, there's no oversight
01:55at all of the Trump administration or any of the things that may be unethical or illegal going on
02:02in the Trump administration. So I think that there is a lack of a co-equal branch of government,
02:10unlike we've seen in the history of certainly of our lifetimes, but my knowledge is in American history.
02:17Madison in Federalist 51 said it would be the ambition of the legislators that would check the
02:24ambition of the executive. And clearly that's not happening. I don't think the founders anticipated
02:29that the Congress of the United States would roll over the way it has for Donald Trump.