The U.S. Constitution

What Is TPS and Can a Federal Judge Defy the Supreme Court?

Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, has a name that sounds like a constitutional guarantee. It is not. TPS is a statutory tool Congress created and the executive branch administers, with federal courts acting as referees when people argue the government did not follow the law. TPS and DACA are...

Can a President Order Signs Outside the Smithsonian?

The headline version of this story is simple: for example, imagine a president issues an executive order directing executive-branch officials to place signs on federally managed walkways near Smithsonian museums , pointing visitors to a White House report criticizing how American history is...

What Is the War Powers Resolution?

The Constitution gives Americans a comforting civics myth: Congress declares war, the president fights it. In real life, the order is often reversed. Presidents initiate, Congress reacts, and everyone argues about what the Founders “really meant.” This article was prompted by a familiar kind of...

Trump’s Under-the-Radar Deportation Court Gambit

Some government actions are loud on purpose. Others slip by quietly, wrapped in procedural language that feels too technical to worry about. This week’s immigration news falls squarely into the second category. The Justice Department has taken steps to activate a special deportation tribunal...

House panel subpoenas three nonprofits in Singham funding probe

The House Ways and Means Committee has escalated an investigation into what it describes as a far-left influence-and-funding network, issuing subpoenas to three nonprofits after Chairman Rep. Jason Smith said earlier requests yielded no responsive records. Smith, a Missouri Republican, is focusing...

Trump’s Under-the-Radar Deportation Court Play

Most immigration crackdowns are loud on purpose. Raids. Press conferences. Big numbers. But some of the most unsettling moves are the ones that happen quietly, on paperwork most people will never see. This month, the Trump administration took a step that should make anyone who cares about...

Answering the Door Armed: The Fourth Amendment Trap

There are constitutional questions that live comfortably in textbooks, and then there are constitutional questions that show up on your porch, under a flashing blue light, when your heart rate is already climbing. Here is one of those questions: Can you put on a holstered handgun before you answer...

DOJ Targets U.S. Virgin Islands Magazine Ban

When people talk about the Second Amendment, they usually picture a debate playing out in a state legislature or a federal court somewhere on the mainland. This week, that familiar argument landed in a place many Americans rarely think about in constitutional terms: the U.S. Virgin Islands. On...

Home Whiskey, Home Weed, and the Commerce Clause

One of the Constitution’s most practical, day-to-day powers is also one of its most slippery: Congress’s authority “ to regulate Commerce…among the several States .” That short phrase, the Commerce Clause, helps determine what you can buy, sell, ship, grow, brew, and sometimes even what...

Why Discovery Gets Aggressive in Trump’s $10B CBS Lawsuit

When Donald Trump sued CBS for $10 billion over a 60 Minutes segment, the most predictable fight was never going to be about cable-news commentary. It was going to be about proof: if you demand a number that large in a civil case, you invite the other side to ask hard questions about your math. In...

Alien Terrorist Removal Court Explained: Visas, Speech, and Removal Power

Some government powers feel absolute until you look closely at how they are built. The federal government has broad authority over immigration. It can deny visas. It can remove noncitizens. It can treat certain noncitizens as national security threats. But in practice, the executive still has to...

DOJ Religious Liberty Guidance, Explained

When the Department of Justice releases “religious liberty guidance,” it is not passing a new law. It is issuing an internal policy document that tells executive branch lawyers and program officials how DOJ believes the Constitution and federal statutes should be applied before the next lawsuit...

Why SSI Is Suddenly Everywhere: August Dates, New SSA Tools, and a Childhood Disability Fix

Supplemental Security Income is the kind of phrase you usually hear only in a benefits office. Then late July hits, and it turns into kitchen-table questions: When does the check arrive? How do I file? What happens when my child turns 18 on paper? Right now, three SSI storylines are colliding: the...

Are Sanctuary Cities Constitutional?

“Sanctuary city” sounds like a moral label. In court, it is usually something much more technical: a fight over who has to do the work. Immigration law and removal decisions are federal power. But the day-to-day machinery of policing and jail operations is mostly state and local. That tension...

What Is a Congressional Criminal Referral?

A “criminal referral” from Congress sounds like the beginning of a prosecution. It is not. It is closer to a formal request backed by an allegation: a committee says, in writing, that it believes evidence suggests a federal crime, and it asks the Department of Justice to take a look. That...

When War Injuries Go Quiet

In civics class, students always wanted to argue about the big questions of war. When can a president strike? Who has the power to declare? What counts as self-defense? But the grown-up fight is often smaller, quieter, and in some ways more revealing: who gets to know what war costs and when. This...

A $95,000 Plane for a 6-Pack: The Supreme Court Takes an Eighth Amendment Forfeiture Case

It is hard to teach the Bill of Rights as a set of living limits on power, and then watch a case like this drift across the legal landscape for more than a decade. The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear the challenge of Ken Jouppi, a retired 82-year-old Alaska bush pilot whose $95,000 Cessna...

Can the President Order Military Strikes Without Congress?

The modern argument over war powers usually starts with a simple sentence: the president is commander in chief. Then someone points to a different simple sentence: Congress declares war. Those two ideas can coexist, but they do not always fit neatly together, especially when a president threatens...

What Is Birth Tourism? Birthright Citizenship and the 14th Amendment Explained

“Birth tourism” is the term commonly used for a practice critics often describe as a loophole. A nonresident travels to the United States late in pregnancy, gives birth here, and returns home. The goal is straightforward: if the baby is a U.S. citizen at birth, that status can matter later,...

Who Can Legally Vote in U.S. Elections? Citizenship Rules Explained

Every election cycle, a familiar alarm goes off: foreigners are voting . Sometimes the claim is exaggerated. Sometimes it is a real administrative failure, like a voter-registration system that let non-citizens slip onto the rolls. But the legal question underneath the heat is steady and...