Jonathan Turley 2/13/2025
Below is my column in the New York Post on the growing claim of a “constitutional crisis” over the Trump reforms. It is the latest political jump scare to see if it will rouse the public. It seems, again, to be backfiring as polling shows Trump with record approval levels and widespread support for reducing government.
Here is the column:
Forty years ago, a radio personality coined the phrase “jump the shark” in reference to the episode of the sitcom “Happy Days” in which the character Fonzie (Henry Winkler) jumps over a live shark on water skis. The term is often applied to dying franchises that turn to sensational language or scenes to try to revive the fading interest of the public. More often, you jump the shark and land in utter obscurity.
This week, the Democratic Party jumped the shark.
For years, Dems and their allies pushed the absurd claim that democracy was about to die if Joe Biden or Kamala Harris was not elected president. The public wasn’t buying it. In 2024, Donald Trump won a majority of the voters as well as control of both houses of Congress.
Rather than examine its messaging, Democrats decided to double down. After the election, politicians and pundits announced a new “constitutional crisis” surrounding the effort to downsize the federal government led by Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
Kris Mayes, the attorney general of Arizona, declared this week, “We are on the brink of a dictatorship, and America has never been in a more dangerous position than she is today.”
The same media that carried the breathless accounts of the imminent death of democracy with the last election are now running “constitutional crisis” articles with many of the same “experts.”
More:
https://jonathanturley.org/2025/02/13/democrats-jump-the-shark-the-latest-claims-of-a-constitutional-crisis-will-not-lead-to-happier-days/
