When you see a major politician, you aren’t just looking at a person, you are looking at a multi-million dollar corporate ecosystem. The regular campaign and the Leadership PAC, this is the tip that the public sees on the news. The real heavy lifting, and the biggest checks, happen underneath via the tax-deductible and anonymous foundations. It is a completely different world from the one regular voters see, and it’s why breaking into politics as an outsider is so incredibly difficult.

To me, political fundraising always looked straightforward: a candidate asks for small-dollar donations, hosts a dinner, and receives capped contributions from individual supporters. The Federal Election Commission (FEC) strictly regulates these funds, capping individual donations at $3,500 per election to keep the playing field theoretically level. But for the modern political operative, these official campaign committees are merely the public-facing storefront. The real power relies on an interconnected web of legal entities designed to exploit loopholes in tax and election law, transforming public servants into the CEOs of decentralized political conglomerates.

Let’s look at the first layer beneath the surface: the Leadership PAC. While traditional campaign committees fund a candidate’s own race, Leadership PACs allow incumbents to accept an entirely separate stream of non-deductible corporate and individual cash. Legally barred from spending this money on their own re-election, politicians utilize Leadership PACs to buy political capital. By cutting checks to struggling colleagues in competitive districts, safe incumbents essentially purchase loyalty within their own party. This is how congressional hierarchy is established; leadership isn’t just earned through policy acumen, but brokered through the redistribution of wealth. Furthermore, looser regulatory oversight allows these PACs to fund a lavish “fundraising lifestyle” of five-star resorts and elite dinners, blurring the line between political networking and personal luxury.

Clever scheme so far, but the most lucrative and insidious layer of the ecosystem operates entirely outside of election law, embedded instead within the tax code. By establishing 501(c)(3) public charities and “policy institutes,” politicians have unlocked the holy grail of fundraising: tax-deductibility. Wealthy donors and corporations, restricted by campaign caps, can write multi-million dollar checks to these foundations and deduct them from their taxes. While these charities are legally prohibited from explicitly telling citizens how to vote, they are permitted to fund the candidate’s national book tours, finance targeted policy research, and secure lucrative salaries for the candidate’s closest political allies. Right now, we are seeing an example of this tied to this year’s 4^th of July celebration. When the official, congressionally mandated “America250” commission proved too restrictive, partisan operatives simply bypassed it to create their own parallel planning committee, confusingly named “Freedom 250.” This private structure was starkly illustrated by how its civic celebration quickly became an invite only gateway for corporate interests to purchase direct access to administration figures under the guise of a charitable, non-partisan contribution. Together, these tax exempt vehicles ensure that a candidate’s message is amplified not by public consensus, but by deep-pocketed patrons getting tax write-offs.

Operating parallel to these charities are 501(c)(4) social welfare organizations, the engines of “dark money.” These entities allow corporations to inject unlimited funds into the political arena with complete anonymity. Because they are legally allowed to run aggressive issue-advocacy ads (short of using explicit magic words like “vote for”) they function as shadow campaign operations. Together with 501(c)(3) foundations, they form a parallel financial universe where the American taxpayer effectively subsidizes the very system that dilutes their individual vote.

Ultimately, this multi-layered corporate ecosystem fundamentally alters the nature of American democracy. It ensures that the barrier to entry for political outsiders is not merely a lack of ideas or public support, but the absence of a sophisticated legal and financial apparatus. When a campaign is no longer a temporary civic endeavor but a permanent corporate network, the relationship between the elected official and the constituent is irrevocably fractured. Until the public looks beneath the waterline of the political iceberg, power will continue to be concentrated not in the hands of the voters, but within the tax-exempt, anonymous foundations that quietly pull the strings of governance.

No wonder they have lost touch with the people they represent. I won’t.

Todd Sloan is a lawyer in Upstate New York, currently running for Congress as an independent in NY-24.

Click: Todd Sloan for Congress

It’s April of 2026 and I just read the FBI subpoenaed election records in Maricopa County, Arizona, last month related to the 2020 election. That came after the agency raided an elections hub in Fulton County, Georgia, earlier in the year, seizing of records related to the 2020 election.

Like many, I’m done with this issue, and I have a possible way to end it. I would tell people, maybe, just maybe, think about certifying a 2020 election win for the President. Let me tell you why.

By the President’s own reckoning, he won the 2020 election. The President has been so insistent on his 2020 victory that he has created a massive, public record. He treats the claim not as a theory, but as a foundational fact of his administration. If we view these statements as a matter of legal record, the count is staggering. He has asserted he won the 2020 election:

• During his 2025 Inaugural Address, where he called his return a “resumption” of power.

• At the Davos World Economic Forum, claiming he won “by a lot” to a room of world leaders.

• At the 2026 National Prayer Breakfast, citing his 2020 “win” as the reason for his current “ego.”

• On the Dan Bongino podcast, stating he “won everything” in 2020.

• In a formal White House Press Release defending the Fulton County “ballot retrieval.”

• During a 7:00 a.m. social media “Truth” on January 6, 2026.

• During a joint press conference with the Prime Minister of Hungary.

• At the CPAC 2025 keynote, where he referred to 2020 as “the first time I was re-elected.”

• In a letter to the DOJ demanding the “restoration” of his 2020 electoral votes.

• To a group of Eagle Scouts on the South Lawn, calling himself the “three-time winner.”

• During a televised town hall in Des Moines, Iowa.

• While signing an Executive Order on “Election Integrity” in the Oval Office.

• In a 45-minute phone call to the Georgia Secretary of State (again).

• During his victory speech in Palm Beach on election night 2024.

• In a fundraising email titled “THE TRUTH ABOUT 2020.”

• At a “Restoration Rally” in Butler, Pennsylvania.

• During an interview with Elon Musk on X, claiming “the numbers were all there.”

• In a speech to the National Association of Realtors.

• While visiting the site of the new border wall segments in Texas.

• During the 2026 State of the Union Address.

The list goes on. He has publicly asserted his win in 2020 so many times that the sheer weight of the evidence is undeniable. Yet, I am not saying “let the baby have his bottle,” or even suggesting that because he has said it so much we may as well make it so. No, I am saying let’s look at what happens if we officially recognize that he was “elected” in 2020.

The Constitution is clear. The 22nd Amendment is not a suggestion and it contains a hard ceiling. It states: “No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice.”

If we take the President at his word, and if we officially “correct” the record to reflect the victory he claims, then he was elected in 2016, elected in 2020, and elected in 2024. That makes three. In the eyes of the Constitution, the moment that 2020 win is recognized, his 2024 term becomes a legal impossibility.

In a court of law, we call this judicial estoppel. You cannot argue that you won the lottery to collect the jackpot, and then argue you did not win it to avoid the taxes. If the administration’s current investigations succeed in proving his 2020 triumph, they will have successfully filed the paperwork for his immediate removal.

Be careful what you wish for. If the President is right about 2020, he is ineligible for 2026. If he wants to stay in the Oval Office, he has to admit he lost. He can have his grievance, or he can have his presidency. The Constitution says he cannot have both.

Todd Sloan is a lawyer currently running for Congress as an independent on the Upstate ballot line in NY-24.

toddsloanforcongress.com

That’s what I would say when I first started to worry. When I first looked around and realized the problems our country was experiencing weren’t just politics as usual. When I started tracking this abdication by Congress and the burgeoning instability, I told myself at least one thing was holding steady. Whatever else was happening, gas prices weren’t killing us.

How’s that going now?

I’m not here to point fingers at any one cause. But right smack in the middle of it is a war that Congress never authorized and has never formally debated. That’s not a coincidence. That’s how abdication works. When Congress sits on its hands, the instability spreads, and eventually you feel it at the pump, at the grocery store, and everywhere goods are moved and priced.

That is the volatility tax. Nobody voted for it and everyone is paying it.

When Congress refuses to govern, when they drop the ball, someone else picks it up. Control shifts to the executive branch, to agencies, to guidance documents, and to temporary commands masquerading as durable policy. Since those policies are not grounded in stable legislation, they can change overnight. The result is not merely constitutional disorder. It is a practical burden imposed on everyday people just trying to go about their lives.

I call that burden the volatility tax. No statute imposed it by name. Congress never debated it, but it is there all the same, built into higher prices, delayed investment, disrupted markets, uncertain benefits, shifting regulations, and a general inability to plan with confidence. It is one of the hidden costs of congressional abdication, and almost everyone pays it.

Consider what this looks like in practice. At the gas pump, in the grocery aisle, and everywhere goods are moved, sold, or priced, instability gets passed along. When the attack on Iran was launched without Congress first doing its constitutional job, the uncertainty spreads immediately. Energy markets react. Transportation costs react. Insurance reacts. Food prices react. Families do not experience that as an abstract separation-of-powers dispute. They experience it as life getting more expensive.

Farmers pay it too, and often earlier than most. Farming requires planning. A farmer cannot simply wait and see what executive trade policy will look like next Tuesday. Fertilizer, equipment, labor, storage, and contracts all require decisions in advance. When tariff policy changes mid-season, when fertilizer prices spike because of Canadian tariffs and an unauthorized war with Iran, when foreign markets react to sudden executive action, when courts are left trying to sort out what Congress should have controlled in the first place, the damage is not theoretical. It lands on people who must make long-term decisions in an unstable legal environment.

Small businesses live under the same pressure. They need to know what the rules are before they hire, expand, borrow, or invest. They need some confidence that regulations, trade conditions, and federal policy will not lurch in a new direction overnight. A law they dislike is still easier to live with than an executive improvisation they cannot predict. At least law can be planned around. Executive volatility cannot.

Families may pay this tax most directly. Not in theory, but at the grocery store and at the gas pump. They pay it in the price of everything that gets grown, made, moved, or sold in an unstable economy. When the rules change overnight, prices react. Families don’t experience that as a constitutional dispute. They experience it as the cost of living going up.

Communities pay it as well. Local governments, schools, hospitals, and nonprofits cannot responsibly budget around a federal government that increasingly acts first and explains later. If Congress will not defend its own appropriations, if agencies can be destabilized by unilateral executive action, then every dependent institution downstream becomes less secure.

What we are seeing is the real-world consequence of congressional abdication. It is not just that Congress looks weak. It is that everyone else has to live with the instability created by its weakness.

This is why constitutional governance matters in practical life. When Congress does its job, the country gets law. Law may be imperfect. It may be contested. It may even be unpopular. But it is visible, knowable, and stable enough for people to organize their lives around. Businesses can price it. Farmers can plant around it. Families can prepare for it. Communities can budget around it.

Effective government provides stability. That is one of the great practical gifts of constitutional structure. It slows power down. It forces debate. It channels major decisions through a branch designed to deliberate in public and legislate with some durability. It does not guarantee wisdom. But it does provide stability.

Executive improvisation provides the opposite. It gives us rule by fluctuation. Rule by memo. Rule by emergency declaration. Rule by whatever can be announced, suspended, revived, or rebranded without passing a law. That kind of government does not merely violate constitutional design. It makes life harder, more expensive, and more uncertain for everyone subject to it.

This is what constitutional government actually does for ordinary people. It does not merely satisfy a theory. It gives citizens something indispensable: rules stable enough to live by.

When Congress abdicates, that stability disappears.

What replaces it is a volatility tax on us all, and it just went up.

Todd Sloan is a lawyer currently running for Congress as an independent on the Upstate ballot line in NY-24.

toddsloanforcongress.com

I set out to write a zoomed-out essay, a broad survey of the primary powers assigned to Congress and the ways Congress has ignored, forgotten, or simply given them away. But every time I look at the news, there is another major controversy. Another edict from the executive. Another agency head improvising authority while Congress sits idle. This do-nothing Congress. This Congress that has been in recess for more days than any other in over 150 years. It is now Easter break and Congress left for vacation while our government still isn’t fully funded. They didn’t get their job done, but maybe they’ll actually see the lines at the airports.

Still, the point is not any one example. The point is how many there are. This piece is broad on purpose. It is a survey of congressional abdication. Some of these examples deserve fuller treatment, but taken together, they reveal a deeper problem: Congress is no longer merely failing in isolated moments. It is falling into a habit. The pattern becomes clearer when the examples are laid out one by one.

War Powers

I start here because this is one of the clearest and most serious examples. At the time I am writing this, we have been at war with Iran for thirty days. Yes, war. Label it however you want, but when the United States military is dropping millions of dollars of bombs on sovereign foreign territory, we are at war. Just imagine how we would have reacted if even one Iranian jet had flown over American soil. You can also imagine how we would react if one of their missiles struck a girl’s school. Even if they said “Oh, it wasn’t us. The other bombs, yes, but not the one that hit the school.” I’m guessing America would consider that an act of war.

This is not some cryptic hidden power of the Constitution. This is basic. This is the one power that everyday Americans still recognize on sight: Congress declares war. Congress raises and supports armies. Congress controls the purse.

Yet the administration never came to Congress for authorization, it sounds like they may come begging for money to fund this unauthorized war, but they still haven’t asked permission to conduct it. We haven’t even gotten to the question of whether or not this particular conflict is wise. The case has never been presented. No one has followed the constitutional process.

So, where is Congress on war powers? Absent.

Tariffs

It took a year, but the courts finally stepped in to remind us all that tariffs are taxes and the power to tax belongs to Congress. I don’t recall Congress protesting too much, and it took a lawsuit from a toy company to “undelegate” the power that was never delegated in the first place. Tariffs are taxes. Taxes belong to Congress. Regulation of foreign commerce belongs to Congress too. That is not controversial, unless one happens to be in office and would prefer not to ask.

Congress was largely on the sidelines and still remains there. More tariff fights are on the horizon.

So, where is Congress on tariffs? Absent.

Alienage

Congress has plenary authority over naturalization and sets the legal framework for alienage. That’s lawyer talk for immigration. Congress writes the rules for citizenship and establishes the legal structure governing non-citizens. The executive enforces those laws. It does not own the field.

Modern practice too often treats immigration, removal, and border policy as though they were matters of inherent presidential authority. They are not. Enforcement discretion is real, and agencies exercise delegated authority, but that does not transform the subject into a domain of free-floating executive power. Congress writes the rules. Congress sets the framework. Congress decides what the law is.

And if that framework is producing abuses, lawlessness, or lethal consequences, then Congress should not stand there blinking like it just heard about the subject yesterday. If Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers are shooting American citizens dead, it may be time for Congress to remember that this area of law exists because Congress created it.

So, where is Congress on immigration? Absent.

Elections

I don’t want to hear anything more about executive orders about elections. When it comes to elections, the executive branch controls nothing in the ordinary constitutional sense. Even Congress has only limited authority here. The Constitution gives the states primary control, with Congress holding limited power to regulate the times, places, and manner of federal elections. The executive has no general constitutional role in election administration. None.

Yet every cycle brings fresh pressure. More coordination. More implied federal control. More executive assertions in an area that is wholly absent in Article II. Congress may legislate within its limited constitutional lane. The states may administer elections within theirs. But the executive has no place in this field. And when those boundaries begin to blur, Congress needs to say so. Instead, too often, it says little and does less.

So, where is Congress on elections? Absent.

Agency Closure

Temporary government employees cannot chainsaw agencies. The executive cannot eliminate them. Agencies are brought into this world by Congress and they can only leave this world by Congress.

What agencies has Congress created? You name it, the CIA, EPA, FBI, IRS, all your favorites, even USAID and the Department of Education. Congress created them all. Congress funded them. Congress defines what they do.

Here’s the catch, once created, they are basically run by the executive branch. So a President can cut their budgets, shrink them through attrition, divert their resources, or ignore their statutory mandates. But a President cannot abolish a statutory agency because he finds it inconvenient, and he cannot refuse to spend money Congress has lawfully appropriated simply because he disagrees with the policy. That is called impoundment. That is a one-man line-item veto through noncompliance. That is legislative power exercised by the wrong branch.

Congress creates agencies by statute. It funds and defines their functions. That is how our system works. The executive does not get to simply wave agencies away. When Congress shrugs at this, it is consenting to the disappearance of its own role.

So, where is Congress on agency closure? Absent.

Civil Service

It’s generally a good idea to have workers who know how to do their jobs. That’s the basic idea for the civil service. Before it was created, a new administration would just reward their cronies with government jobs. Those workers didn’t have to know how to do anything and often they weren’t expected to do anything. This is not the best system for a functioning government. So, Congress created statutory civil service protections. Those protections were meant to curb patronage, preserve competence, and ensure that government did not become a spoils system for whichever administration happened to be in office. They were legislative judgments, not bureaucratic accidents.

When an administration rewrites those protections through administrative maneuver, mass reclassification, or executive fiat, it is not merely adjusting personnel policy. It is doing by executive action what should require legislation. The power belongs to Congress. The same is true when whistleblower protections created by Congress are gutted in practice through administrative redesign. Congress built those protections. Congress could defend them. But once again, Congress mostly watches while the executive tests how much of the statutory structure can be hollowed out without formal repeal.

So, where is Congress on civil service? Absent.

Minting

Yes, minting. Congress does that.

Article I gives Congress the power to coin money and regulate its value. The executive has no independent monetary authority except through statute. That is why the penny still exists even though Treasury stopped producing it. Treasury may suspend minting under existing law. It may not abolish the penny. Only Congress can do that.

And now we have the 250th anniversary coin controversy, with members of Congress suddenly rediscovering that there are laws and restrictions governing what can and cannot appear on the nation’s money. Good. Better late than never. But it is remarkable how quickly Congress can remember that it legislated in this field when the controversy becomes gaudy enough. No one seemed particularly eager to remind the public that the penny cannot be canceled by executive order. But now that a commemorative coin may carry the face of a living President, suddenly Congress remembers it once passed laws about money.

What better way to celebrate the 250th anniversary of throwing off the yoke of a king than by putting the current living President scowling on a coin?

So, where is Congress on minting? Absent.

Conclusion

In one area after another, the power at issue belongs to Congress, yet Congress says little, does less, and lets the executive fill the space. Or the executive moves in and Congress steps aside.

That is not what the Framers intended. More importantly, it is not how this constitutional republic is supposed to function.

This is not a failure of the Constitution.

It is a failure to use it.

Todd Sloan is a lawyer currently running for Congress as an independent on the Upstate ballot line in NY-24. ToddSloanForCongress.com

Independent campaigns are fueled by people, not parties

Members issue statements. They hold press conferences. They introduce bills that never move. They announce investigations, float impeachment, and generate headlines. But all too often, nothing follows. No vote. No result.

That is not governing. That is performance.

The Constitution does not assign Congress the role of commentator. It assigns Congress the responsibility to act. Article I is not a suggestion. It is the job. Congress is supposed to legislate, control spending, oversee the executive, and check the expansion of power before it hardens into permanence.

Instead, we have drifted into a system where action is delayed, responsibility is avoided, and the expectation is that someone else will step in later. The executive acts. Congress reacts. The courts are left to sort it out months or years afterward. Congress has learned that it is easier to signal than to govern. It is easier to vote on non-binding resolutions than to use the power of the purse. It is easier to complain about executive action than to restrict it. It is easier to let legislation languish in committee than to force a vote. And when a crisis actually does occur, it is easier to hope that the courts will clean it up.

That is abdication.

Even our most serious constitutional tools have been pulled into this culture of performance. Impeachment, for example, is no longer treated as a constitutional mechanism of accountability. It is treated as a public spectacle. Members threaten it, announce it, and use it to generate attention, often with no realistic path to resolution.

That is not what it is for.

If impeachment is warranted, it should be pursued with purpose and discipline. If it is not, it should not be used as a prop.

The same is true for every other tool Congress possesses. If you are going to act, act to achieve a result. That is the difference between performative governance and operational governance. Performative governance is about signaling. Operational governance is about results. For too long, Congress has chosen the former, and that choice has consequences.

When Congress refuses to act, power does not disappear. It shifts. It moves to the executive branch or to agencies. It moves to anyone willing to fill the vacuum. And with that shift comes instability, policies that change from one administration to the next, rules that appear and disappear, and uncertainty that makes long-term planning nearly impossible. Communities are left reacting instead of building. Small businesses scramble to plan around rules that shift without warning. Farmers make decisions months in advance, only to see trade policy change overnight. The result is higher costs, weaker planning, and a volatility tax on us all.

When Congress chooses spectacle over results, it surrenders its power. When Congress surrenders its power, it abdicates.

This is not a failure of the Constitution. It is a failure to use it.

Todd Sloan is a lawyer who runs his own practice in the Finger Lakes, currently running for Congress as an independent on the Upstate ballot line in NY-24.

ToddSloanForCongress.com

The Structural Brake vs. The Judicial Backstop

The Framers did not design a system that relies on “suing later.” They designed a system of ambition counteracting ambition. The Constitution was intended to be self-enforcing through the institutional jealousy of its branches. Each branch was presumed to want to covetously hold on to the powers bestowed on them in the Constitution. I’ll spare you the quotes from the Federalist Papers, but go read #51, it lays it out pretty cleanly.

Article I (Congress) was intended to be the primary mechanism through use of the power of the purse, oversight, and impeachment to block executive overreach at the threshold. And, Article II (The Executive) was intended to be bound by an oath of self-restraint, acting only within the delegated authority of the law.

When we accept the “not self-executing” defense, we are essentially tolerating constitutional passivity. This is what allows actions by the executive to operate as legitimate even when they are invalid on their face. An Executive Order that attempts to amend the constitution (e.g. birthright citizenship) is facially invalid. It is a legal nullity. Allowing it to exist until someone sues breathes life into it.

Likewise when the Executive moves to nationalize elections by Executive Order or through agency “coordination” rather than through the Elections Clause (Article I, Section 4) it is unconcerned with constitutionality. Why would it be? Under our course of conduct someone (and the proper someone, mind you, the concept of someone with “standing” is a whole other article) will have to file a lawsuit and then it will be months before the courts can “sort it out.” This flips the constitutional order on its head and it treats the violation as the status quo and the Constitution as an intruder. In the face of blatant unconstitutionality Congress is just shrugging its shoulders.

The High Cost of the “Institutional Shrug”

The danger of this abdication is that unconstitutional actions are not neutral. During the months or years it takes for a challenge to reach a courtroom, the damage hardens in three specific ways. One, normalization: bureaucracies adapt, and the illegal becomes the standard operating procedure. Two, compliance: regulated parties and states are forced to comply under the “color of law,” making the eventual judicial remedy feel disruptive rather than restorative. Three, legislative atrophy: Congress avoids difficult votes and accountability, content to posture for their base while delegating their actual power to the Executive and their responsibility to the Judiciary.

Even then, when we finally get to the end and a ruling comes down, it is often a judicial dodge. The doctrines I mentioned before, “standing” or “mootness,” frequently allow a court to avoid the core issue entirely. This is not a failure of the Constitution’s clarity; it is a failure of institutional courage.

Reclaiming the Bedrock

The answer is not another lawsuit. The answer is more straightforward: don’t follow an unconstitutional order. A facially invalid Executive Order is a legal nullity. Compliance is not legitimacy. Congress should say so. Agencies should act accordingly. The Constitution does not require our compliance with its own violation.

The Republic crumbles not through sudden collapse, but through the convenience of abdication; either willfully or by the preference for letting it happen over the friction of enforcing limits. The Constitution does not need to be self-executing to be binding; it needs to be recognized as the supreme law that forbids action before it begins. If Congress continues to behave like a bystander rather than a co-equal branch, the Executive will continue to expand into that vacuum.

My position remains simple: bedrock doesn’t preserve itself. We do.

Todd Sloan is a lawyer who runs his own practice in the Finger Lakes, currently running for Congress as an independent on the Upstate ballot line in NY-24. toddsloanforcongress.com