Berkeley Law professor John Yoo is very comfortable around controversy. But voting for then-candidate Donald Trump in 2016 was a step too far.
“His many personal and professional flaws, including his bankruptcies, sexual scandals, crude and cruel language, repelled me. I saw him as a populist, even a demagogue, who had not prepared for the heavy responsibilities of the presidency,” said the celebrated conservative legal expert with the University of California.
“My study of the separation of powers, and my time in the three branches of government, led me to worry that Trump would test, evade, or even violate the Constitution,” he added in his upcoming book, Defender in Chief.
Now, as Trump campaigns for reelection on a platform of tough executive orders, expanding conservative voices on federal courts, and beating back impeachment, Yoo is telling a different story.
“Boy was I wrong. Trump campaigns like a populist but governs like a constitutional conservative,” he wrote in the book due next month and published by All Points Books, an imprint of St. Martin’s Publishing Group. The publisher provided Secrets with an advance copy of the book, which is set for release July 28.
Over the course of 300 pages comparing Trump moves to the wishes of the Founding Fathers, Yoo discovered that despite constant criticism that Trump was destroying the Constitution, he was actually propping it up and using it to defend the presidency.
“Rather than a sword, the Constitution has become Trump’s shield. Even though he had not had any previous government or military office or public policy experience, Trump has defended the constitutional text, structure, and design for an independent, vigorous executive,” writes Yoo.
In virtually every move by Trump, from busting the FBI, fighting impeachment from Democrats, withdrawing from key international agreements, and adding Republicans to the federal bench, Yoo expressed support for the president’s moves.
He also dismissed critics of the Electoral College who are still angry that Trump lost the 2016 popular vote but won a majority of the electoral votes. While the opponents have called for its end, Yoo suggested that could be worse.
“Doing so would make the rise of a future demagogue far more likely. Under pure majority vote, a future populist need only appeal to urban majorities to win the presidency,” said the professor.
Yoo, who has battled thought police and political correctness for years, also said that he disagreed with Trump on immigration but gave him credit for pushing the limits of his power to close the border to illegal crossings and fight liberal extremists.
“Because the resistance to Trump sought to sweep away constitutional norms, it made Trump’s defense of his own policies a defense of the institution of the presidency as well,” he wrote.
Yoo’s embrace of Trump validated others who have defended the president, especially during the impeachment.
“No one could better elucidate this unlikely and welcome development than John Yoo, a Trump-skeptic and vitally important scholar of presidential power in our constitutional order,” said Andrew C. McCarthy, a National Review contributing editor.
Mostly, though, it gave credit to Trump and his White House for strengthening the presidency, which will help all of his successors.
“He has returned to the Framers’ original vision of the presidency as an office of unity, vigor, and independence. In securing the benefits of an energetic executive for his successors, Trump may have done the nation his greatest service,” Yoo concluded.
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