During the 2024 Presidential campaign, Donald Trump came out strong for states’ rights, particularly when it came to the abortion issue.

Trump has also trumpeted his support for states’ primacy on other issues such as disaster aid, education standards, public lands, and other issues where conservatives have opposed federal laws and initiatives.

Yet, for all the talk about states’ rights, since Trump became President for the second time, he’s attacked states and state programs that don’t agree with his rhetoric and agenda.

Just one day after Donald Trump’s inauguration, Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove wrote a memo to the Justice Department calling on U.S. attorneys to prosecute state and local officials who do not cooperate with the deportation efforts of the Trump administration.

On March 25th, Trump issued an executive order directing an independent bipartisan federal agency, the Election Assistance Commission, to impose voter registration mandates on all fifty states; place restrictions on the deadline for states to receive legitimately cast ballots; and threatened to withhold funding for election safety programs if states fail to comply.

Tom Homan – Trump’s “border czar” — has threatened to go after states and cities that refuse to comply with the president-elect’s deportation plans, including arresting mayors, despite the fact that past Supreme Court decisions have held that the federal government cannot force local authorities to carry out federal laws, nor to incarcerate local leaders for not adhering to an administration’s policy.

Just this past week, Trump issued an executive order week directing the Justice Department to stop states from enforcing their own climate laws. The order targets a broad sweep of state policies, from environmental justice reviews to decade-old carbon markets, as well as taking aim at states suing fossil fuel companies for damages related to climate impacts. He also issued an executive order pushing the building of coal power plants and ordering attacks on state laws that would prohibit or limit coal fired power plants.

The bottom line?

The only rights and principles Trump supports are those that get him what he wants. When states’ rights suit him, he’s for them, but when the states oppose him, they’re the enemy to be destroyed.