CNN and MSNBC used the phrase “constitutional crisis” more than 200 times since Feb. 3, when Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) chairman Elon Musk announced that the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) was shutting down, the Daily Caller News Foundation learned in a keyword search of footage archived by Grabien News.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio defended the decision to shutter the agency during a Feb. 3 press conference in El Salvador, saying that his concerns about its oversight began when he was in Congress. He said the agency is “completely unresponsive” and “not functioning” as intended after DOGE representatives appeared at USAID headquarters Jan. 31 and gained access after a standoff with agency employees, ABC News reported. During a Feb. 4 Fox News interview, Rubio accused USAID of “rank insubordination” (RELATED: Alan Dershowitz Says Many ‘Improper’ Injunctions Against Trump Executive Orders Will Get Tossed)
MSNBC used the phrase “constitutional crisis” 141 times from 12:01 a.m. Eastern Standard Time on Feb. 3 to 12 a.m. Eastern Standard Time Tuesday, either from a host or a guest, according to the DCNF review. While CNN used the term only 69 times in that timeframe, 57 of those occurrences took place Monday and Tuesday, a pace similar to MSNBC’s 68 uses in that same time period, a count that includes re-airings of primetime shows late at night and in the early morning hours.
The increased usage of the phrase came after Vice President JD Vance criticized United States District Judge Paul A. Engelmayer, who was appointed to the federal bench by former President Barack Obama. Engelmayer issued an injunction at 1 a.m. Saturday barring DOGE and political appointees in the Trump administration from accessing the Treasury Department’s central payment system.
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“If a judge tried to tell a general how to conduct a military operation, that would be illegal,” Vance posted Sunday on X. “If a judge tried to command the attorney general in how to use her discretion as a prosecutor, that’s also illegal. Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power.”
“Morning Joe” used the phrase “constitutional crisis” 22 times starting Feb. 3, with 13 coming since Vance’s post on X according to the DCNF’s review and another six times on Friday. “Deadline: White House” used the phrase 23 times since Feb. 3, and 10 of those instances occurred Monday. Six uses of the phrase came in just under two minutes in an exchange between guest host Ali Velshi and New York University law professor Melissa Murray.
“So in my view, Ali, all of this is a constitutional crisis. We’re watching this unfold over time, and I don’t mean to be hyperbolic about this or to be on 11 all of the time, but the idea that the president can step in and appropriate congressional powers over how money is disbursed and to whom it is disbursed, is a usurpation of the lawmaking authority,” Murray told Velshi after being asked a question that used the phrase three times. “That is a genuine constitutional violation, and the fact that it hasn’t been corrected, or that it’s only been limitedly corrected, and it continues to go on among this executive is a constitutional crisis. The fact that the vice president of the United States, who is a law school graduate, a graduate of the same law school that I attended and from which I graduated, and who should know better, is talking about open defiance of the courts, that is a genuine constitutional crisis.” (RELATED: Scott Jennings Touches Off Verbal Brawl By Calling Out ‘Lawfare’ Against Trump, DOGE)
“The Supreme Court is not like the president. It doesn’t wield the power of the sword,” Murray said. “It’s not like Congress. It doesn’t wield the power of the purse. All it has for us to understand its work and to abide by its work is some sense that it’s legitimate, and what JD Vance is doing is stoking the idea that when the courts weigh in and rebuke this president and his DOGE bro minions, it is somehow illegitimate and that is a dangerous, dangerous place to be.”
The phrase was also used nine times on “The Source with Kaitlan Collins” Monday, with Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut using it three times in a seven-and-a-half minute interview with host and former Daily Caller White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins.
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