This commentary is by Melinda Moulton of Huntington, a writer, filmmaker, social and climate activist, and community leader.
Our Constitution states that the Treasury Department does not have the right to spend any funds unless authorized by Congress and signed into law by the president. There is a little-known act called the Antideficiency Act that demands that governmental agencies stop operating if the funding is not fully approved. The outcome is a government shutdown.
There are exceptions to the shutdown: funding for the president and members of Congress. But government employees considered essential — military members on active duty, federal law officers, federal hospital staff, and air traffic controllers — must keep working and do so without pay. The remainder of employees serving our well-being are considered nonessential and they are sent home — also without pay — and cannot come back until the shutdown is over, at which time they, and the essential workers, will receive back pay.
During a shutdown, Social Security and Medicare payments will continue but verifications will cease. The EPA will stop site inspections at 1,200 locations, which include hazardous waste sites, and checking on drinking water quality and overseeing chemical facilities.
The FDA will delay food inspections across the country. Visitor services at all national parks will cease, and trash will pile up. Our air traffic controllers and TSA agents will work without pay and some may walk off the job. The National Institutes of Health will not be allowed to admit any new patients or process grant applications. Investment dollars for pensions and 401(k) plans will be impacted and hiring decisions by businesses will be halted because federal permits cannot be secured, and federal loans will be frozen.
Our government’s ability to meet the needs of hungry Americans will be seriously impacted because food stamp benefits will be pulled into a shutdown. Folks with Electronic Benefit Transfer cards that need to be renewed lose access to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP.
Today, in the richest country on the planet, 34 million people, including 9 million children, go to bed hungry.
We are all feeling relieved that our government averted a government shutdown, but the food fight will be back on the table in a little over a month.
So, what does all this have to do with authoritarianism? Let us look at what is happening in our U.S. Congress, where a heavy handful of Republicans are endeavoring to tear down the fabric of our democracy. They speak out against the rule of law, our institutions, our military, our history, and everything associated with a liberal democracy. They encourage burning books like “To Kill a Mockingbird” and endeavor to rewrite our country’s history with a pale ivory ink.
Their allegiance is not to the Constitution but to a failed ex-president who has 91 federal felony counts looming against him. Speaker McCarthy has been ousted and our “People’s House” is in disarray, unable to do anything until a new speaker is elected. This includes funding our government at the end of the 45-day “stay.”
According to Oxford University Press, “Fascism means a belief in supremacy of one national or ethnic group, a contempt for democracy, and insistence on obedience to a powerful leader, and a strong demagogic approach.” Donald Trump called for “the termination of the Constitution” — need I say more?
The Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right has stated, “More than a hundred congressional leaders — all Republican — have contested a fair and democratic election with falsehoods and conspiracy theories. They blame the deep state, communists, socialists, liberals, antifascists, big tech, queer people, the global elite, and protestors who advocate for black lives for their state of alienation under late capitalism.”
Members of the GOP Freedom Caucus in the U.S. House of Representatives are making it noticeably clear that they will ensure the U.S. government is hobbled and brought down to its knees one way or another. We are riding in a fast-moving authoritarian roller coaster that is dead set on crushing our democracy.
The MAGA movement is propped up by authoritarian dictates — this cannot be disputed. Throughout history, authoritarian regimes have often developed into full-blown fascist regimes. We are now seeing this movement in “real time” in America as an out-in-the-open effort to tear down our democracy and rebuild it in the image of a few over the visions of the majority.
We the people need to keep our eyes, ears and minds wide open to protect our 250-year-old representative government before it is too late.
