Why Trump Can Get Away With Everything: The System Was Built for This
Trump is consolidating power at a pace that would have been unthinkable in past administrations. Agencies are being dismantled, oversight is disappearing, and political opposition is struggling to keep up.
The question is: Why isn’t anyone stopping him?
Where are the checks and balances? Where are the courts? Where is Congress?
The answer is not incompetence—it is complicity. The American political system is structured in a way that makes it easy for power to concentrate at the top, and Trump is using every weakness to his advantage.
Congress is too divided, too weak, and too bought off to intervene.
The courts have already been stacked to favor his agenda.
The Republican Party has fully embraced his rule.
The system was supposed to prevent this. Instead, it is enabling it.
Congress: Too Broken to Function
Congress was designed to be a check on executive power, but it no longer works that way. Trump is not dealing with a functional legislative body—he is dealing with a gridlocked, corrupt, and weakened institution that cannot act fast enough to stop him.
1. Republican Control: A One-Party System in Disguise
The reason Trump faces no real congressional resistance is simple: his party controls Congress.
The Republican majority in both chambers means any legislative check on Trump dies before it even begins.
Even Republicans who privately disagree with him won’t speak out, because opposing Trump means political suicide.
The Republican Party is no longer just a political party—it is a loyalty machine. Dissent is punished.
Without opposition from his own party, Congress ceases to be a check on power.
2. Democrats: Outnumbered and Largely Powerless
Even when Democrats controlled Congress, they lacked the unity and strategy to meaningfully check Trump. Now, with Republicans in charge, they are in an even weaker position.
Filibuster rules prevent meaningful action. Even if Democrats introduce bills to limit Trump’s power, Republicans block them.
Budget control is in Republican hands. This means Trump’s restructuring of agencies and programs can continue without real obstacles.
Investigations are stalled. Congressional committees that could investigate corruption are run by Trump loyalists who shut down probes before they begin.
Even if Democrats win elections, the damage is already embedded into the system.
3. Money Controls Everything
Congress isn’t just ineffective—it is bought.
Lobbyists and billionaires dictate policy. Many in Congress are financially tied to the very corporations that benefit from Trump’s policies.
Political careers depend on funding. Anyone who crosses Trump risks losing their donors and their re-election chances.
The public has no real leverage. Elections happen every few years, but policy is dictated by those who fund campaigns, not by voters.
This isn’t dysfunction. This is how the system was designed to work.
The Courts: Already Stacked in Trump’s Favor
Many people assume that if Congress won’t act, the courts will step in. But that only works if the courts are independent.
They aren’t.
Trump has spent years filling the judiciary with loyalists—not just on the Supreme Court, but throughout the entire federal court system.
1. The Supreme Court: A Conservative Supermajority
Trump appointed three Supreme Court justices, shifting the balance to a solid 6-3 conservative majority.
This means that any legal challenge to his actions faces an uphill battle before it even begins.
The Court has already ruled in favor of executive power in key cases, setting precedents that make it harder to challenge Trump’s authority.
Even if lawsuits are filed against Trump’s actions, the Court is more likely to uphold them than strike them down.
2. The Lower Courts: Packed With Trump-Appointed Judges
Trump appointed hundreds of federal judges, ensuring that cases never make it far enough to pose a real threat.
Republican-controlled states are already using conservative courts to block opposition policies.
The judiciary is not neutral—it has been systematically reshaped to support Trump’s agenda.
The legal system is not designed to stop this—it has been engineered to allow it.
The Republican Party: Reshaped for Total Loyalty
The biggest reason Trump faces no resistance is that the Republican Party no longer functions as a traditional political party.
It is now a personal loyalty network—built to protect, enable, and expand Trump’s power.
1. Purges and Loyalty Tests
Republicans who criticized Trump in the past have been pushed out of office or forced into silence.
The party enforces strict loyalty—any sign of defiance results in career destruction.
What remains is a party that exists to serve Trump, not govern the country.
2. Media Control and Narrative Shaping
Conservative media does not function as news—it functions as a propaganda machine.
Trump controls the messaging through platforms like Fox News, OANN, and social media.
This creates an alternative reality, where Trump’s actions are justified, excused, or ignored by millions of people.
3. A Party That No Longer Fears Elections
Republicans do not need to be popular to win elections.
Gerrymandering ensures they stay in power regardless of vote totals.
Voter suppression laws disproportionately affect groups that oppose them.
State-level control allows them to change election laws to their advantage.
They don’t need a majority—they just need to control the system that counts the votes.
What This Means: The System Was Built for This
Trump is not breaking the system—he is using it exactly as it was designed to function.
Congress is too broken and corrupt to act.
The courts have been stacked in his favor.
The Republican Party is fully aligned with his rule.
This is not just about Trump. This is about a system that has been manipulated to ensure that once power is taken, it cannot be meaningfully challenged.
Why No One Is Stopping Him
Too many people benefit from his rule. Politicians, corporations, and billionaires are profiting from his policies.
The institutions that should check him have already been reshaped to support him.
The opposition is using old strategies to fight a new kind of power.
This is why every move Trump makes faces little to no real resistance. The system is not designed to stop him—it is designed to protect him.
Conclusion: This Is What a Broken Democracy Looks Like
The U.S. still holds elections, still has courts, and still has a Congress—but none of them function as real checks on power.
The collapse of democracy does not always happen through a single dramatic event. Sometimes, it happens quietly, as institutions become so corrupted that they no longer serve their original purpose.
Trump is not the cause of this problem—he is the result of it.
He can do all of this because the system was built in a way that allows him to.
And once that kind of power is normalized, there is no guarantee it will ever be undone.
Sources
How Congress Lost Its Power Over the Presidency – The Atlantic
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/02/congress-power-executive-trump/
Trump’s Federal Judge Appointments and the Reshaping of the Courts – Brookings Institution
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/trump-federal-judges-impact/
The Republican Party’s Transformation into a Loyalty Machine – The New York Times
