Biden gets the blame for agency action
Kathryn E. Kovacs 18, Professor at the University of Rutgers School of Law, JD from Georgetown University Law Center, BA in Psychology from Yale University, “Rules About Rulemaking and The Rise of the Unitary Executive”, Administrative Law Review, 70 Admin. L. Rev. 515, Summer 2018, Lexis
Clearly, there are other reasons for this phenomenon: among them, the President's desire to take political credit or, on the flip side, his recognition that, whatever the outcome, he will be saddled with the political blame. The American public seems to equate the President with the Fourth Branch. Advances in technology and media may be exacerbating this effect. This phenomenon, however, cuts both ways. The President may be inclined to make policy decisions himself so that he can take the credit if the outcome is politically popular, but he may prefer to leave policymaking to his subordinates so that he can distance himself if the outcome is not politically popular. This does not, therefore, account fully for the dramatic [*557] rise in presidential direct action described below.
[FOOTNOTE]
Daniel A. Farber, Presidential Administration Under Trump 23 (Aug. 9, 2017) (unpublished manuscript), https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3015591 (envisioning a "feedback cycle in which presidents take control of major agency decisions, fortifying the public's tendency to assign blame to the president for unpopular outcomes, which in turn strengthens the pressure on the president to assert control"); see also COOPER, supra note 333, at 65, 95; Cary Coglianese & Kristin Firth, Separation of Powers Legitimacy: An Empirical Inquiry into Norms About Power, 164 U. PA. L. REV. 1869, 1900 (2016) (finding that people are more likely to blame the President for poor agency outcomes than they are to credit him for positive agency outcomes); Kagan, supra note 1, at 2310; Stack, supra note 334, at 264, 317.