The risks of letting Trump become the military paymaster [View all]

[In It to Win It]

https://donmoynihan.substack.com/p/the-risks-of-letting-trump-become

President Trump’s personalist presidency is driven by a simple logic: protect friends and punish enemies. The shutdown encapsulates this worldview. Trump is cancelling spending in blue states and cities and firing employees in “Democrat programs.”

Even more worrying: he is using the shutdown to woo our military and other armed agents, with the goal of turning them into loyal friends as he pursues “the enemy from within.”

Trump says that he can determine if the armed forces get paid or not during a shutdown. This is an unprecedented threat to American democracy in two ways.

First, Trump is dramatically escalating his Congressional power grab. He claims the right not just to impound funds Congress has appropriated, but also to spend funds for purposes Congress has not appropriated. Second, Trump is upending civil-military relations to encourage troops and other armed agents of the state view him as their personal patron.

It’s not just the military. Even as their civilian counterparts are not receiving a paycheck during the shutdown, FBI agents and parts of the Department of Homeland Security, such as Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, Coast Guard, Customs and Border Patrol, Secret Service, and Air Marshals will get their paychecks on time.

A good rule of thumb to understand which federal employees will be paid during the shutdown is whether their job involves carrying a gun. No gun, no paycheck.

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— Catherine Rampell (@crampell.bsky.social) 2025-10-24T13:14:01.286Z