Senate parliamentarian rejects GOP budget bill provision limiting judicial contempt over Trump admin

The Senate parliamentarian rejected the GOP budget bill's provision that limited courts' contempt powers over Trump administration officials.

Senate parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough ruled that the budget reconciliation bill, which only requires a simple-majority vote to pass, cannot include a provision that would limit the courts' ability to hold Trump administration officials in contempt, The Hill reported. The provision would have required a person bringing a lawsuit against the federal government to pay a bond before a court would be permitted to use its contempt power to enforce injunctions and other rulings.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer praised the decision on Sunday.

"Senate Republicans tried to write Donald Trump’s contempt for the courts into law—gutting judicial enforcement, defying the Constitution, and bulldozing the very rule of law that forms our democracy," Schumer said in a statement. "It was nothing short of an assault on the system of checks and balances that has anchored this nation since its founding, and a brazen attempt crown Trump king.

"But Senate Democrats stopped them cold. We successfully fought for rule of law and struck out this reckless and downright un-American provision. If enacted, this would have been one of the most brazen power grabs we’ve seen in American history  — an attempt to let a future President Trump ignore court orders with impunity, putting him above the law," he continued.

"Donald Trump is not above the law. And thanks to Senate Democrats – including the tireless work of Senator Durbin and the Judiciary Democrats – the courts can still hold him and any president accountable."