Noah Feldman, Columnist

Trump and Barr Vs. Congress Can Only End in a Stalemate

In this conflict between executive and legislative branches over testimony, the Constitution has no answers.

April 29, 2019 at 5:42 PM UTC

Noah Feldman is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. A professor of law at Harvard University, he is author, most recently, of “To Be a Jew Today: A New Guide to God, Israel, and the Jewish People."

Not happy to be here.
Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg

Provide news feedback or report an error

Site feedback:

Take our Survey

The brewing conflict between the House Judiciary Committee and Attorney General William Barr — over whether he will testify this week as scheduled, and under what ground rules — is a symptom of a much bigger emerging clash between Congress and the president. The most probable outcome is a stalemate: because the framers designed the Constitution that way.

We have entered a new phase of the constitutional stress test that began with President Donald Trump’s election and shows no signs of winding down. In the first phases, Trump pushed the limits of executive power on immigration, and went after the criminal justice system in the hopes of delegitimizing it.