With Democrats in the minority, they're searching for ways to serve as a check on Republican power in Congress and at the White House.

Andy Kim entered the U.S. Senate late last year after spending his entire working life in government service,

at USAID, the U.S. State Department, the National Security Council, and the U.S. House.

This weekend, the New Jersey Democrat declared the country to be on the cusp of a constitutional crisis. He joins us now from Capitol Hill. Senator Kim, welcome to the News Hour. Thanks for joining us. Yeah, thanks for having me.

So what does it mean to you to be on the cusp of a constitutional crisis? What does that mean? Well, it means that right now we're already in a

place where the Trump administration is engaged in lawless activity through unilateral executive

branched action rather than coming through Congress. We see the efforts of firing or putting on

administrative leave employees that are now, there are lawsuits there.

And one thing that I'm particularly concerned about is that I'm not sure that this executive branch,

this administration, will follow the law even when given a court order to do so,

given that vice president statements about how they don't feel like they need to follow through

with the orders of these judges,

that's deeply alarming. That actually would be a full-blown constitutional crisis then.

So when it comes to the administration ignoring court orders or acting outside the Constitution

or usurping some congressional powers as well, the question the Democrats get asked a lot is what can you do, right?

And here exactly is what House Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries, had to say on that

on Friday.

Take a listen.

They control the House, the Senate, and the presidency.

It's their government.

What leverage do we have?

So Senator Kim, what's the answer to that question? What leverage do we have? So Senator Kim, what's the answer to that question?

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