An open letter from 23 former GOP lawmakers published Monday urges Republicans currently in Congress to block President Trump's national emergency, which he declared earlier this month to obtain funding for border wall construction.
With signatories including former Defense Secretary and Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.), the letter "offer[s] two arguments against allowing a president — any president, regardless of party — to circumvent congressional authority." One is the Constitution's investiture of lawmaking power, including the power of the purse, in Congress, not the presidency. To permit the president to usurp that authority, the letter says, is to undermine "true representative government."
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