Circumventing Legislatures by Ignoring the Constitution

Matthew Mangino
Mon, 16 Mar 2026 23:00:00 -0700
Opinion

Last June, a federal judge in Texas blocked a two-decade-old law offering undocumented residents the same discounted tuition as other in-state college students, after the Trump administration sued Texas over the law.

That is not surprising. Making it difficult for undocumented residents has become the cornerstone of this administration. However, what is surprising is that the state's Republican lawmakers tried unsuccessfully to change the law only days before the lawsuit was filed.

Most surprisingly, the day the federal lawsuit was filed, the state of Texas settled. According to The New York Times, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a close ally of President Donald Trump, simply agreed that the state law should be invalidated.
Updated: Tue Mar 17, 2026

Last June, a federal judge in Texas blocked a two-decade-old law offering undocumented residents the same discounted tuition as other in-state college students, after the Trump administration sued Texas over the law.

That is not surprising. Making it difficult for undocumented residents has become the cornerstone of this administration. However, what is surprising is that the state's Republican lawmakers tried unsuccessfully to change the law only days before the lawsuit was filed.

Most surprisingly, the day the federal lawsuit was filed, the state of Texas settled. According to The New York Times, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a close ally of President Donald Trump, simply agreed that the state law should be invalidated.

The legislature, which was unable or unwilling to amend or strike the law, was sidestepped. What is wrong with smart lawyers at the Department of Justice and the Texas Attorney General's Office finding a clever way to get done what the 181 members of the Texas legislature could not?

The problem is that sham lawsuits violate the U.S. Constitution and this is not the only time the Trump Justice Department has colluded with states to violate the Constitution, circumventing the legislative process.

Article III, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution limits federal court jurisdiction to actual, ongoing disputes between adverse parties, prohibiting courts from issuing advisory opinions or ruling on hypothetical scenarios.

Pursuant to the "Cases and Controversy Clause," parties to a lawsuit must truly be adverse to each other, the dispute must be concrete and the dispute must be capable of being resolved through an award of specific relief. That was not the case in Texas. The outcome was known before the suit was filed.

In Florida, according to The New York Times, the Trump administration reached a legal settlement in February, with the Republican-led state requiring the Department of Homeland Security to forgo its authority to admit immigrants for 15 years. Though reached with a state government, the settlement could affect immigration policy for the whole nation.

In Kentucky, the federal Department of Transportation proposed a settlement in a case with a pair of industrial companies challenging decades-old racial and gender-based preferences, acceding to the businesses and agreeing to end use of the preferences in its contracting nationwide.

More than a half a century ago, Chief Justice Earl Warren suggested that cases and controversies "limit the business of federal courts to questions presented in an adversary context and in a form historically viewed as capable of resolution through the judicial process ... a tripartite allocation of power to assure that the federal courts will not intrude into areas committed to the other branches of government." As a result, suits that are collusive or feigned by two friendly parties to resolve a question of interest to them are unconstitutional.

If the blatant legal schemes in Texas, Florida and Kentucky — defying the Constitution —are not enough, consider this major Trumpian hustle. Trump is suing himself and demanding a settlement. The IRS falls under the executive branch of the U.S. government. It operates as a bureau within the Department of the Treasury, which is one of the 15 executive departments. The Secretary of the Treasury is appointed by the president and serves at his pleasure.

At the heart of the case is Trump's contention that the federal government should be held liable for the leak of his federal tax returns during his first term as president.

Trump wants the Treasury Department and IRS to pay damages to him in the amount of $10 billion. Could Trump demand that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent settle the case and pay out?

You probably think something like that is far-fetched. Well, Democrats in the United States Senate don't think so; they introduced the "Stop Presidential Embezzlement Act," which would block any financial benefit to Trump resulting from the $10 billion lawsuit.