Discussion: What Is “Rule of Law” and Why is Trump out to shred It?

What Is “Rule of Law” and Why is Trump out to shred It? Why does this matter? And what do we do now?

Discussion based on the revcom.us article Fascist Attack on the Rule of Law and drawing from Some Points on Strategic Orientation for the Next Period
by the Central Committee, Revolutionary Communist Party, USA

The rule of law is under serious attack—and this is part and parcel of a fascist restructuring of society.

Trump and his cabal are packing high-level courts with fascists and fascist-enablers, all the way up to the Supreme Court. And they are discrediting, bullying, and whipping up their base against, and threatening to simply ignore, court orders that get in the way of their aims.

Trump’s attacks on the judiciary are of a piece with a multifaceted attack on rule of law—that is, an attack on the concept that nobody is above the law. He has called for protesters at his events to be “carried out on stretchers.” His attorney general Jeff Sessions is a lifelong enemy of civil liberties. In a country where police terror and murder in oppressed communities is virtually unchecked as it is, Trump told leaders of the Fraternal Order of Police, “We will always support ... the incredible men and women of law enforcement. I will always have your back—100 percent.” 

All this is aimed at both shredding rights supposedly guaranteed to people at large by the U.S. Constitution, and to steamroll over opposition within the ruling class, in part through concentrating absolute and unchallenged power in the executive branch (the presidency, agencies of violent repression like the FBI and CIA, and the federal administrative agencies), and bulldozing the ability of the courts to get in the way of Trump’s agenda.

All this sharply underscores the urgent need for millions to step forward to oust the Trump regime now, before it is too late.