Pelosi And Schumer: National Emergency Is ‘Power Grab By Disappointed President’

WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 25: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) speaks during a news conference with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) following an announced end to the partial government shutdown at the U.... WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 25: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) speaks during a news conference with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) following an announced end to the partial government shutdown at the U.S. Capitol January 25, 2019 in Washington, DC. U.S. President Donald Trump agreed to reopen federal agencies shutdown for the past 4 weeks while negotiations about border security take place between congressional leaders over the next three weeks. (Photo by Zach Gibson/Getty Images) MORE LESS
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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) decried President Donald Trump’s “unlawful” move to declare a national emergency to secure funding for a border wall in a joint statement Friday morning.

Pelosi and Schumer said that Trump is declaring an emergency over a “crisis that does not exist” and that his move is “plainly a power grab by a disappointed President.”

Read Pelosi and Schumer’s joint statement below:

“The President’s unlawful declaration over a crisis that does not exist does great violence to our Constitution and makes America less safe, stealing from urgently needed defense funds for the security of our military and our nation.  This is plainly a power grab by a disappointed President, who has gone outside the bounds of the law to try to get what he failed to achieve in the constitutional legislative process.

“The President’s actions clearly violate the Congress’s exclusive power of the purse, which our Founders enshrined in the Constitution. The Congress will defend our constitutional authorities in the Congress, in the Courts, and in the public, using every remedy available.

“This issue transcends partisan politics and goes to the core of the Founders’ conception for America, which commands Congress to limit an overreaching executive. The President’s emergency declaration, if unchecked, would fundamentally alter the balance of powers, inconsistent with our Founders’ vision.

“We call upon our Republican colleagues to join us to defend the Constitution. Just as both parties honored our oath to protect the American people by passing the conference committee bill, the Congress on a bipartisan basis must honor the Constitution by defending our system of checks and balances.

“The President is not above the law. The Congress cannot let the President shred the Constitution.”

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