The Take Care Clause

Article II, Section 3 provides that the President shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed. The phrase is written as a duty, and the framers chose it partly in reaction to English kings who had claimed power to suspend or dispense with acts of Parliament. Together with the presidential oath to faithfully execute the office, the clause makes the President responsible for enforcing laws passed by Congress, including laws the President opposed, while leaving the details of enforcement to the executive branch.

The clause has been read as a grant of power as well as a duty. Supporters of the unitary executive theory argue that the President can only fulfill it by controlling and removing the officials who carry out the laws, an argument the Supreme Court accepted in part in Seila Law in 2020. Courts have also held that the clause does not let the President order officials to disobey a clear legal duty, as in Kendall v. United States ex rel. Stokes in 1838, and in Mississippi v. Johnson in 1867 the Court refused to enjoin the President directly from enforcing a law.

The clause is central to debates over prosecutorial discretion and non-enforcement. Presidents of both parties have set enforcement priorities, such as the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program created in 2012, and in January 2025 President Trump ordered the Justice Department not to enforce the law banning TikTok for a period, later extending the pause several times. In January 2026 a deal placing TikTok's U.S. operations in a new joint venture controlled by American investors closed, which the administration said satisfied the law. Supporters say limited resources and executive judgment require such choices, while critics say declining to enforce a statute amounts to the suspending power the clause was meant to forbid. In United States v. Texas in 2023 the Court held that states generally lack standing to challenge enforcement priorities.