Josh Shapiro fears Trump is pushing US toward 'tyranny' as president has amassed too much power

WASHINGTON, DC: Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro warned that President Donald Trump has amassed “way more power” than the nation’s founders intended and is now trying to restrict Americans’ liberty.

The Democratic governor said the concentration of power risks pushing the country back toward the “tyranny” the founders feared. He also accused weak members of Congress of failing to uphold the constitutional foundation they inherited.

Josh Shapiro blasts chaos of executive

Speaking Sunday, July 5, on CNN’s ‘State of the Union,’ Shapiro tied his warning directly to what he described as the “excesses and the corruption and the chaos of the executive.”

“Things are hard now, I think, because of the excesses and the corruption and the chaos of the executive, something that our founders in this room debated, deliberated over,” Shapiro said.

He argued that the founders were deeply concerned about allowing any one leader to gather enough authority to resemble a king.

“They were worried about creating a government where a king could form again, where one individual would amass so much power that you’d have tyranny all over again,” Shapiro said. “I fear that we are finding our way back to that.”

Shapiro then turned his criticism toward Congress, accusing lawmakers of failing to provide the strength he believes the moment demands.

“I think, unfortunately, you have some profoundly and pathetically weak individuals in Congress who could learn a few lessons from the strong foundation that the founders set for us here in this room,” he said.

Pennsylvania governor says Trump is restricting liberty

Shapiro’s sharpest warning centered on what he portrayed as a break from the country’s long effort to broaden freedom.

“As a nation over the last two centuries, we’ve been working to expand liberty, and we’ve been working to expand the promise of freedom,” he said.

Shapiro argued that the current executive has moved in the opposite direction while accumulating authority beyond what the founders would have accepted.

“Only more recently do we have an executive who, again, I think, has accumulated way more power than our founders would have hoped, would have liked, who’s trying to restrict liberty,” he said.

The Pennsylvania governor also accused the administration of applying different standards to Americans when it comes to freedom.

“Who’s trying to put a litmus test on who gets more liberty than others?” Shapiro asked.

He called that approach “really dangerous and destructive,” while directing criticism at both Trump and the vice president over language he said separates Americans and determines “which one gets liberty, which one gets freedom, and which one is not.”

Shapiro accuses Trump of dividing Americans

Shapiro closed his criticism by arguing that Trump and vice president are sorting Americans into different categories rather than treating them equally.

“I think we have a president and vice president who are trying not to lift up all Americans, but to divide Americans and to try and put us in different buckets, different tiers and try and say, who’s more American than someone else?” he said.

“And that in and of itself is un-American,” Shapiro said.