America Slides Into A Congress-Shaped Hole, And Gorsuch Helps
To discuss the decision on tariffs, start with chronic illness. The human barnacle named Sen. Patty Murray berated Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in 2025 for cutting some research grants that Congress had funded, and he asked her in response what she had done about the crisis in American chronic illness. Ever. In her decades in Congress.
RFK Jr. to Sen. Murray: “You’ve presided here, I think for 32 years… What have you done about the epidemic of chronic disease?”pic.twitter.com/tIdlHUIwZl
— Defiant L’s (@DefiantLs) January 16, 2026
In a much-discussed passage from his concurring opinion in the tariff case, which is one of the opinions published here, Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote that tariff authority didn’t belong to the executive branch. Instead, Gorsuch wrote, “most major decisions affecting the rights and responsibilities of the American people (including the duty to pay taxes and tariffs) are funneled through the legislative process for a reason. … Through that process, the Nation can tap the combined wisdom of the people’s elected representatives, not just that of one faction or man. There, deliberation tempers impulse, and compromise hammers disagreements into workable solutions.”
He’s right, and that’s the structural theory of the republic. When was the last time it worked?
In 1996, Congress passed the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), defining, among other things, an enforceable right to medical privacy for patients. But read Section 264, which you can find on page 99 of this PDF file. It starts like this: “Not later than the date that is 12 months after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Health and Human Services shall submit to the Committee on Labor and Human Resources and the Committee on Finance of the Senate and the Committee on Commerce and the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of Representatives detailed recommendations on standards with respect to the privacy of individually identifiable health information.”
You get that? They forbade, in law, the unauthorized disclosure of private medical information, and then told the administrative state to come back in a year and explain to them what they had forbidden: Something is hereby not allowed. Could someone please let us know what we mean by this?
A little farther down, Section 264 (c) (1): “If legislation governing standards with respect to the privacy of individually identifiable health information transmitted in connection with the transactions described in section 1173(a) of the Social Security Act (as added by section 262) is not enacted by the date that is 36 months after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Health and Human Services shall promulgate final regulations containing such standards not later than the date that is 42 months after the date of the enactment of this Act.”
We hereby ban something, but we don’t know what we’ve banned, so come back and tell us so we can add it to the law, but if we don’t bother to add it to the law after you tell us what we meant, then just say for us in federal regulations what we meant to forbid.
Gorsuch: “Through that process, the Nation can tap the combined wisdom of the people’s elected representatives.” Uh-huh.
What Donald Trump is trying to do with tariffs is negotiate with other countries to end trade imbalances and reverse decades of incentives that have pushed American industry offshore. You can agree with the Supreme Court’s decision about the limits of his taxing authority and see the problem: What has Congress done about it? What will they do about it? What’s their plan?
We’ve spent two generations offshoring American industry, which “the combined wisdom of the people’s elected representatives” has yet to address. I don’t know, maybe they’ve been busy directing their wisdom toward everything else first. They must first determine, you see, if “boof” is flatulence, digging deeply into this important matter, and then they’ll get to the deindustrialization thing.
Predictably, Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., singled out Gorsuch’s passage on the wisdom and centrality of America’s bold solons in the guidance of a proud nation:
Some have asked me to comment on the SCOTUS ruling striking down tariffs based on emergencies declared by the Executive. Why should I comment when Gorsuch has already nailed it right here? 💯 pic.twitter.com/jUe5MM0S3c
— Thomas Massie (@RepThomasMassie) February 20, 2026
It’s not the job of the executive branch to use this tool and address this problem; it’s our job as the nation’s lawmakers. End of statement. Nothing follows. The silence eventually echoes.
Many of the replies to Massey point this out, by the way.
Our discussion, in media and in law, has been about Trump’s excesses and boundary-crossing. A better starting place would be the laziness and uselessness of the Article I branch, which doesn’t do anything, and apparently doesn’t care to start doing anything. That void is the foundational void, the cause of all the subsequent structural distortions. “Excuse me, WE MAKE THE LAWS,” they declare, and then we … wait for them to make the laws? This is the catch basin full of drunken clowns and senile elderly toddlers that properly guides the nation, sir!
Anyway, stand aside, President Trump, it’s wise leaders like Jasmine Crockett who are supposed to be leading the nation forward through crisis and decline. Any minute now. Should be great.
Chris Bray is a former infantry sergeant in the U.S. Army, and has a history PhD from the University of California Los Angeles, not that it did him any good. He also posts on Substack, at “Tell Me How This Ends,” here.
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