A New “To Do” List For Congress

So It Can Reclaim Its Constitutional Role

A New “To Do” List For Congress So It Can Reclaim Its Constitutional Role
Congress has finally cleared the sprawling “One Big Beautiful Bill,” a cobbled-together legislative behemoth containing the President’s policy wishes and reshaping the nation’s spending priorities. Its central item is a tax extension only fractionally offset by spending reductions. There is much less soft power, and more hard power, both domestically and abroad, in the federal government is to operate. And within the law’s 1,000-plus pages are a grab-bag of poorly vetted ideas that members of Congress are just learning about, long after votes were cast.

Members of Congress find themselves at a crossroads. The rushed, secretive, centralized process by which the bill was enacted raises urgent questions about the health of our two national legislative chambers. Congress granted President Trump’s major wishes without debate, added reams of provisions largely unvetted by committees, and silently inserted private last-minute individual deals to gain the slimmest of majorities in each chamber. The new law puts an exclamation point on the broader abdication of legislative leadership so far this year in light of unilateral presidential actions of all types. In truth, these last few months are a condensed and amplified version of a decades-long process of congressional abdication and deterioration.

This is not the way the national government should work, and a smart candidate for Congress could plausibly run against it. The Founders designed the national level of American system with a separation of powers between the two elected branches. They would jealously check each other, Congress at least a coequal branch whose many members would safeguard the public interest of the citizens, localities, and states that make up the union. In this year’s rush to deliver the President’s campaign promises for him, lawmakers reversed the intended power equation between legislature and executive. Members of the legislative branch failed to take time to balance and blend the wishes of the president with the views of their local constituencies and the institutional interests of Congress itself. But here we are. The question is what to do.

Congress and its members should begin a renewed commitment to the principle of checks and balances. If Congress is to reclaim its rightful role, it must wake up, correct the errors of the recent past, reassert its independence, and restore the equilibrium between President and Congress. It’s quite possible presidential actions and this new legislation will be quite unpopular when fall 2026 elections roll around, so next year’s electoral needs may match well institutional interests.

Here are several areas where Congress’s traditional share of power has recently receded sharply, and what steps it could and should take to reassert itself:

1. Trade and Tariff Policy
Trade and tariff policy is a congressional prerogative under the Constitution’s Article I, Section 8. The use of "congressional-executive agreements" for specific negotiations is where the President does the detail work and Congress approves (either in advance or afterward) the package. This has sometimes blurred who is the lead partner. However, this year’s actions like immediate tariffs on specific goods, or on all goods from specific nations, with frequent sharp changes, have turned Congress into a virtual bystander. Congress can reassert its authority by requiring explicit legislative authorization for trade agreements, setting time limits for presidential actions on tariffs, and by beginning tariffs only after actively approving them through changes to law.

2. National Emergencies
The National Emergencies Act of 1976 allows presidents to declare emergencies, and in doing so provides a president more unilateral power in sever policy areas. Presidents have also declared emergencies in particular cases under a broad interpretation of their basic executive powers. Trump declared a national energy emergency to expedite and deregulate drilling and has declared emergencies to enhance his tariff-setting ability and to redirect military funds for border wall funding. Congress could revise the National Emergencies Act to require affirmative Congressional approval of presidential declarations within 30–60 days, or else they would expire and to define more tightly what constitutes emergencies and how they might be extended if necessary.

3. Immigration and Citizenship
Immigration law and citizenship requirements are supposed to be set by Congress, and changed only by Congress, in the lawmaking process. Many of the last few presidents have significantly changed immigration policy by executive order and other unilateral actions, sometimes blocked by later federal court rulings. Trump has drastically revised immigration policy, including refugee and asylum practices and standards, and is attempting to redefine birthright citizenship which for a long time has almost universally been seen as settled law. Congress has avoided substantial involvement in immigration policy for too long, but it can and should pass comprehensive immigration reform, and clarify asylum and refugee standards, DACA protections, and funding procedures for border security and immigration courts.

4. Budgeting
Congress holds the “power of the purse,” controlling federal spending, taxation, and appropriations. By the words of the Constitution, the House is supposed to initiate all tax legislation. By tradition, it also initiates all spending bills. Executive attempts to redirect or withhold funds without Congressional approval threaten these foundational powers of the House. In the early 1970s Congress enacted the Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 to correct the abuses of presidents Johnson and Nixon in this area. Whereas it allowed for limited halts to review spending, any long-term stoppages or redirections had to be approved by congressional action. Congress can and should go back to better enforcement of current law and clarify and strengthen the base 1974 act where needed.

5. War Powers and National Defense
The share of presidential and congressional leadership and management of military action has been a longer-term issue that has already raised its head in the second Trump term. The Constitution’s Article 1 grants Congress the power to declare war, raise and support armies, and regulate the military, while Article 2 states the president is commander in chief of the military. Presidential military actions without Congressional authorization have been a recurring issue, and in response to overreaches by presidents Johnson and Nixon, Congress passed the War Powers Resolution of 1973, to limit by type of threat and duration the President’s ability to engage U.S. forces without Congressional approval. There are also open-ended and outdated Authorizations for Use of Military Force (AUMFs) that Congress passed in specific instances of tensions, mostly with nations in the broader Middle East. Congress could repeal or at least update some or all of the currently existing AUMFs, and more generally reassert its role by requiring more timely and thorough consultations and hurdles such as time-limits and votes before new or extended military actions.

6. Federal Judiciary
The Senate has an unavoidable role in evaluating and confirming a president’s judicial appointments. President Trump has sought to appoint some unusually controversial federal judges. He has also aggressively criticized many individual federal judges in cases that did not go his way and has disputed practices like nationwide injunctions he hasn’t liked. Congress should maintain rigorous standards for confirmation and consider reforms to the appointment process to ensure timely processing of well-qualified nominees. Congress has authority provided to it in Articles 1 and 3 of the Constitution to structure the federal judiciary, including the size and jurisdiction of the federal judicial system including the Supreme Court, and to step in and resolve issues such as the occasions for and impacts of federal district court rulings on executive branch matters.

7. Other General Legislative Powers
The United States is a nation of laws, and all law-making powers are vested in Congress, not to be usurped by executive orders or administrative rulemaking. Sadly, Congress has increasingly written vague laws and allowed courts, agencies (and presidents) to fill in the details. This has let individual members of Congress plead weakness and ignorance as flaccid defenses and given everyone else wide discretion to alter policies. Federal court decisions have noted this voluntary ceding of power away, and recently the Supreme Court has more directly pushed back, essentially telling Congress to do its job more thoroughly. It can do so. Congress should increase the resources it allocates to overseeing agency rulemaking, and draft more precise legislation when authorizing agencies, thereby limiting the executive's discretion in interpretation and implementation.

Conclusion
Congress has a constitutional mandate to be the leading branch in lawmaking. President Trump’s early domination of Congress has been a complete, total, and apparently voluntary ignorance of that idea. Members need to re-enter the lawmaking arena: to regain the central element of their job description, to correct the errors and overreaches of recent activity, and to rebalance the power equation between President and Congress. The most suitable areas for congressional reassertion are tariff policy, national emergencies, immigration, budgets, and judicial structure and processes. These are domains where the Constitution and historical practice clearly assign Congress a leading role, and where recent executive actions have encroached the most.

Rebalancing power is not about undermining one president or one political party. It is about improving a government to build back real checks and balances and have a bigger voice for locally influenced policy even at the national level. It is also about reclaiming the full job description of a member of Congress, and more fully respecting the will of one’s geographic constituency. When Congress and its members become excessively deferential, it and they undermine public trust and erode democratic legitimacy.