Today, Jan. 20, 2026, marks one year since Donald Trump was inaugurated as the 47th president of the United States. America has changed during this period — and not for the better.
Television videos, photographs in print media and on the internet show scenes of masked ICE officers engaging in improper actions of stopping, abusing and arresting people violating their constitutional rights without legal authority. ICE’s authority is limited to immigration matters, nothing more.
Congress has not fulfilled its constitutional responsibilities. For example, during this past year the Trump administration bombed Iran, Venezuela and numerous boats from Venezuela in violation of Article I Section 8 Clause 11 of the U.S. Constitution which gives Congress the right to declare war.
Congress allowed the Trump administration to fire many federal employees such as Rebecca Slaughter of the Federal Trade Commission and Lisa Cook at the Federal Reserve Board, bodies established by Congress to be independent agencies. Their challenges are pending in the United States Supreme Court.
Congress did not object when the Trump administration cut funding to federal agencies such as the Department of Education. All the above actions are responsibilities delegated to Congress in Article 1 of our Constitution and not to the executive branch of government.
Federal District Court Judges Karin Immergut of Oregon, Jia Cobb of the District of Columbia, Charles Breyer of California, Lewis Kaplan of New York, Sara Ellis of Illinois and William Young of Massachusetts and others have upheld their constitutional obligation to protect the First Amendment’s free speech provision, peaceful protests and free press rights as well as the Fifth and 14th Amendments equal protection and due process guarantees.
But sadly, during this past year too many United States Court of Appeals judges reversed those decisions, and the United States Supreme Court has employed its emergency application process (the shadow docket) to, in effect, aid and abet the Trump administration’s agenda.
On a more positive note, people in cities such as Los Angeles, Portland, Chicago, Washington, New York and now in Minneapolis have said “not in our name.” Millions of people marched peacefully on No Kings Day 1 and 2 expressing the theme of no to kings and yes to democracy.
Recently, the focus on the Trump administration immigration deportation enforcement program has been on Minneapolis. The shooting death of Renee Good was horrific. It should not have happened. A fair and full investigation must be undertaken. The State of Minnesota must be included in the investigation.
If the facts bear out what was revealed by the video of the shooting — that the ICE agent was not in harm’s way, that his gun was not fired in self-defense, not necessary or proper and clearly unlawful, then the ICE agent needs to be held accountable.
It is incumbent on Congress to alter the ICE immigration deportation program, strategy, and tactics expeditiously. Currently, it operates in a manner that is antithetical to fundamental provisions of our Constitution such as the First, Fourth, Fifth and 14th Amendments. Congress would be wise to place programmatic and financial limits on the ICE program as soon as possible.
During the past year, people asked what we can do? How do we stop the Trump administration from carrying out its authoritarian agenda? Reflecting on American history specifically the Southern Civil Rights movement in the 1950s and ’60s when Black and white Southerners with support from other Americans united under the leadership of Martin Luther King Jr. and others to change the face of the South.
It was clearly not easy to achieve what they did. But they never gave up. They kept trying “to overcome” a system of racial discrimination by urging themes like non-violence and “Jim Crow must go.”
Perhaps today, we need to reflect on our past to confront the present and dream for the future for freedom, equality, justice, and fairness for all. This means we cannot be bystanders witnessing negative changes in our country. We do not have to accept the proposed changes. We must get involved, speak up, and organize.
Please, remember that the First Amendment guarantees the right to peaceful protest and the right to redress grievances. Together we are resilient people, believers in social justice and the rights in our constitutional democracy. We can make a difference. We cannot give up. We do not have to accept the autocratic direction that the Trump administration is implementing. We can oppose that negative direction as not constituting what America has stood for.
Siegel is a civil rights lawyer.
