The U.S. bombed seven countries under President Trump’s orders. Congress has not authorized or approved any of them. “US bombed seven countries in 2025 as trump dramatically expanded airstrikes” This is perhaps the most serious end of Trump’s disregard for law. At the almost trivial end I have received more than half a dozen emails from “Trump” daily for many months. I carefully unsubscribe from each of them (over a hundred times) but they keep coming.
Trump has removed the established guard rails against executive abuse (e.g. all Inspector Generals have been removed). He has put an incompetent sycophant in charge of the Defense Department (appropriately renamed the War Department) who has fired senior military generals and admirals and replaced them with his loyalists. “Trump pushes out top US general-nominates retired three star-2025-02-22” And the Attorney General’s office regularly takes his orders etc. After illegally sending National Guard troops into LA, Portland OR, and Chicago he is finally removing them in response to the Supreme Courts confirmation of lower court rules of their illegality. “Trump national guard in Chicago Los Angeles Portland”
Trump’s disregard for the law in his effort to deport all illegal residents has become particularly ugly and damaging to the US economy https://wcoats.blog/2025/12/28/ice/
As each violation of law and norms becomes “normal,” Trump pushes further. Is anyone left to stop him? Is Congress slowly waking up to do its job?
Author: Warren Coats
I specialize in advising central banks on monetary policy and the development of the capacity to formulate and implement monetary policy. I joined the International Monetary Fund in 1975 from which I retired in 2003 as Assistant Director of the Monetary and Financial Systems Department. While at the IMF I led or participated in missions to the central banks of over twenty countries (including Afghanistan, Bosnia, Croatia, Egypt, Iraq, Israel, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kosovo, Kyrgystan, Moldova, Serbia, Turkey, West Bank and Gaza Strip, and Zimbabwe) and was seconded as a visiting economist to the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (1979-80), and to the World Bank's World Development Report team in 1989. After retirement from the IMF I was a member of the Board of the Cayman Islands Monetary Authority from 2003-10 and of the editorial board of the Cayman Financial Review from 2010-2017. Prior to joining the IMF I was Assistant Prof of Economics at UVa from 1970-75. I am currently a fellow of Johns Hopkins Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, Institute for Applied Economics, Global Health, and the Study of Business Enterprise. In March 2019 Central Banking Journal awarded me for my “Outstanding Contribution for Capacity Building.” My recent books are One Currency for Bosnia: Creating the Central Bank of Bosnia and Herzegovina; My Travels in the Former Soviet Union; My Travels to Afghanistan; My Travels to Jerusalem; and My Travels to Baghdad. I have a BA in Economics from the UC Berkeley and a PhD in Economics from the University of Chicago. My dissertation committee was chaired by Milton Friedman and included Robert J. Gordon. I live in National Landing Va 22202
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