Stephen Miller Said the President Has "Plenary Authority," but What Does That Mean?

If you look at how the Trump administration has behaved since entering office, it's fair to say that they have a pretty expansive view of the powers of the presidency. Trump and his administration have used those powers to reshape the federal government and also to focus relentlessly on the issue of immigration enforcement.

At the same time, his administration has also been sending National Guard troops into American cities, often against the wishes of the governors and mayors of those cities. During a recent interview about those deployments, White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller suggested that the president has "plenary authority," and many wanted to know more about what he meant. Here's what we know.

In the interview, Miller was asked whether he was planning to abide by a court order that would prevent the administration from deploying troops to Portland, Ore.

"Well, the administration filed an appeal this morning with the Ninth Circuit," he said. "I would note the administration won an identical case in the Ninth Circuit just a few months ago with respect to the federalizing of the California National Guard. Under Title 10 of the U.S. Code, the president has plenary authority."

According to Cornell University, plenary authority is "power that is wide-ranging, broadly construed, and often limitless for all practical purposes."

Essentially, then, one of the president's chief advisors appeared to be suggesting that the president has nearly limitless power, which is a theory that would certainly support the actions the administration has taken to expand the power of the presidency.

Immediately after Miller suggested that the president had these broad, sweeping authorities, CNN suggested that there were some technical difficulties that forced them to take a commercial break.

While a technical difficulty is the most likely explanation, some on X (formerly Twitter) suggested that Miller actually froze up because he accidentally "said the quiet part out loud."

"Stephen Miller didn't glitch. He said 'plenary authority' and whoever was in his ear told him to STFU because he said too much and he froze like a deer in headlights," one person wrote.

"He slipped up and brought up 'plenary authority' letting too much of the plan out and went mute," another added.

Of course, the administration has not exactly been shy about its belief that Trump's power as the president is not limited.

Whether the glitch was on Miller's end or not, though, it seems clear that he was trying to assert that courts should not be able to stop the Trump administration from deploying troops to cities as it sees fit. The administration clearly believes it has the authority to do that, and that's because it has done it in multiple cities across America.

Plenary authority suggests an executive that cannot be checked, which is not the system of laws that the founding fathers drew up. An unchecked executive might be able to get a lot done, but there's a reason America fought a war of independence.