On his nightly radio show the evening of the State of the Union address, conservative host Mark Levin, author of The Liberty Amendments, instructed the House of Representatives on how to confront President Obama’s declaration that he would be using further executive orders and other means to get around Congress when the legislative body fails to enact the type of legislation he desires.
Levin said:
The House of Representatives should, post-haste, pass a simple but blunt resolution, as follows:
Whereas the President of the United States has exerted executive powers not granted to him under the United States Constitution, the United States House of Representatives hereby asserts, as an equal governing authority, that all such acts by the president are null and void.
The House of Representatives further asserts that no federal department, or official, or federal employee is authorized to appropriate any sum of taxpayer dollars in furtherance of any unconstitutional act by the president.
Levin invited the question, “How can this be enforced?” His response:
Obama will not be president forever, but the House of Representatives will exist beyond his presidency. The House can also assert penalties and fines it will apply when it can assert its power in a direct way on individuals who defy its resolution.
Levin continued:
If the President of the United States – though he pretends not to know anything about it -through his minions, can unleash the Internal Revenue Service against citizens he disagrees with; can unleash his bureaucracy to sell weapons illegally to Mexican cartels; if he can unleash his Attorney General to go after federalism in the states; to eviscerate our immigration laws; to trash the appointments clause in the Constitution; to defy the Commerce clause in the Constitution; to attack the 1st Amendment; the 2nd Amendment; the 4th Amendment; the 5th Amendment; the 9th Amendment; and the 10th Amendment; then, by God, it is time for the House of Representatives to stand up and say:
We have power, too. We will exercise it to the full extent that we can, and we call this president out of control and any acts that violate the Constitution, from our perspective, are null and void, and we encourage the United States people not to comply with them.
Levin said Obama’s State of the Union speech was “historic,” but “not because it’s brilliant, not because he’s a statesman – quite the opposite – because we will have in a speech before Congress and members of the Supreme Court, and the entire nation and media, a man asserting imperial powers he does not lawfully possess under the Constitution.”
Referring to Obama’s record as “horrific,” and asserting that the president has “lied repeatedly” to the American people “to advance his radical agenda and to win two elections,” Levin said Obama will keep lying because he is now “desperate, his popularity ratings are in the toilet, he’s afraid he’s not going to be able to keep the Senate, and so he’s asserting imperial powers that he cannot lawfully exercise under our Constitution.”
Levin added, however, that Republican leadership is “cowardly,” “timid,” and “passive,” and that some members of the Republican Party have been corrupted.