I know that so many of us are wondering why the Democrats in Congress are not fighting back against Trump’s authoritarian manipulations. A post today by Heather Cox Richardson in her Letters from an American gives us some insight about just how hard they really are trying in the ways that they have available.

Today was a rough day for administration officials on Capitol Hill as Senate committees held hearings on the 2026 budget requests for the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Department of State. The Senate Finance Committee also held a hearing for Trump’s nominee to be Commissioner of Internal Revenue, former Missouri representative William “Billy” Long. Democrats came prepared and demanded answers that the department secretaries and nominee were either unable or unwilling to give…Administration officials today seemed to illustrate their utter disregard for the work their jobs require and their refusal to govern for Americans. Instead, they seem to see their offices as ways to get access to large amounts of money and power they can use to impose their will on the country.

Here are some excerpts from Richardson’s piece:

Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem was testifying before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee about the Department of Homeland Security’s budget for fiscal year 2026…“Habeas corpus is a constitutional right that the president has to be able to remove people from this country,” Noem said. Hassan corrected her: “Habeas corpus is the legal principle that requires that the government provide a public reason for detaining and imprisoning people…Noem’s habit in these hearings is simply to ignore questions and to attack, and she tried that with Hassan, suggesting that the president has the right to suspend habeas corpus if circumstances require it… The Constitution permits Congress to suspend habeas corpus; not the president.

Over in the Appropriations Subcommittee on Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Related Agencies, things didn’t go much better…Health and Human Services secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. exploded when Senator Patti Murray (D-WA) asked him whose decision it was to withhold childcare and development block grant funding…When she tried to get him back on track, he continued to talk over her, accusing her of “presiding over the destruction of the health of the American people” and of not doing her job. Murray repeatedly tried to recall him to appropriate behavior, finally appealing to the Republican chair of the committee, who asked Kennedy to stop…When Murray repeated her question, he simply said the decision was made “by my department.” While he refused to take responsibility for the cuts himself, Murray did get him to admit that the department has blocked billions of dollars in federal child care funding.

Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee took Secretary of State Marco Rubio to task for abandoning the principles they believed he held when they voted to confirm him…When Van Hollen told Rubio he regretted voting to confirm him as secretary of state, Rubio retorted: “Your regret for voting for me confirms I’m doing a good job.”

If Republican lawmakers didn’t seem up to their jobs today, neither did the president. He announced a “Golden Dome” missile shield defense system—a U.S. version of Israel’s “Iron Dome”—that he claims will be operational in 3 years and cost $175 billion. Experts say it is not yet possible to construct such a defense system for intercontinental ballistic missiles and that such a project could cost as much as $542 billion…Such a system would likely benefit at least one person: it would depend on thousands of satellites, a requirement that seems likely to benefit billionaire Elon Musk’s SpaceX.

It’s not that the Democrats are not using every means Constitutionally available to them to try to stop Trump’s coup; it’s rather than the Republicans are ignoring the Constitution and doing their worst. This is the stuff revolution is made of.