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What, precisely, is the purpose of the U.S. Congress? In the second Trump administration, it can be hard to determine. The authority to declare war, traditionally viewed as a crucial legislative power, has become a murky prerogative of the executive branch in the years since the 9/11 attacks; Trump, in recent months, has asserted even more of that control for his administration, conducting strikes on vessels in the Caribbean.

The authority over spending appears to be largely been stripped from the legislative branch too; now, under the leadership of budget chief, Russell Vought, much of the ability to allocate federal funds has also shifted to the executive, with the administration claiming the ability to cancel legislatively approved expenditures and seeking to redirect the money to other uses. It’s as if they’re passing any laws, either; virtually all legislation must now be crammed into budget reconciliation bills, huge perennial must-spend comprehensive bills that can circumvent the senate obstruction. But when these fail to be approved – and increasingly, they don’t – the government simply shuts down. That is, large sections of the administration do – and it’s not clear how many people notice. At present, the federal government has been closed for the entire month; there are no signs of it reopening anytime soon. But the executive branch keeps on operating smoothly.

And so the question of dominance of Congress can appear somewhat irrelevant. Why should Americans be concerned who holds a majority in a body that has largely abolished itself?

How ‘oppose the president’ rhetoric may assist the state of California’s Proposition 50 prevail

And yet Prop 50, California’s redistricting referendum that could provide five additional congressional positions to the Democratic Party if it is approved by the electorate in a special election next month, has seized the political imagination of liberals nationwide. In part, it is a delayed response to developments occurring in other states: Republican-controlled states have long embraced dramatic biased redistricting while big blue states such as California, the Empire State and the Evergreen State create their district lines via impartial redistricting panels, an asymmetry that has led to closely divided control of the House and a long-term sense, by Democrats, that their party is bringing a knife to a gun fight. The state proposal is explicitly intended as a countermove to a mid-term redrawing of maps that was recently approved in Texas, which implemented boundaries that will give the GOP an additional five positions in the state House representation next year; similar redistricting moves are under way in states such as Missouri and Indiana. (The left in the Old Dominion are likewise following the state’s example in seeking to redistrict.)

The California initiative seems probable to be approved, as Democratic and liberal electorate respond with fear and frustration to Trump’s autocratic centralization of power and seek ways to restrain his most extreme tendencies. But the proposition is not without controversy. Some critics warn that the action could have unintended consequences, with Democratic-controlled states’ attempts to redistrict triggering a retaliatory cycle in which red states do additional to draw their maps so as to foreclose any chance of opposition party success. Others have critiqued the measure on more purely ideological democratic grounds: a district that is created in such a manner that the outcome of the vote is not in doubt, they say, is one that cannot be said to be truly democratic: it means, inevitably, that the influence of dissenting voices is suppressed, and that the procedure of deliberation, discussion and convincing that is supposed to define a healthy democratic process will be limited only to party primaries, if it occurs at all.

It is worth considering each of these criticisms on their own terms. The initial argument, that Prop 50 will spur the right to alter their own maps in retaliation, fails as a logical argument: it does not make sense to claim that Republicans will be compelled to act in undemocratic ways by Democrats’ measures when they are already doing so in the absence of those actions. The GOP, I would observe, has not needed any incentive of revenge to change boundaries that guarantee long-term seats for their party: they have been willing to do this for their own benefit, in the total lack of Democratic reciprocation, for years.

The other objection, in my view, is more significant, expressing not just a tactical disagreement about how to address the Republicans’ undemocratic shift, but a kind of melancholic desire for a different nation than the one that the US has turned into. It is true that in a more ideal world – in the reality that the majority of Democrats, I think, yearn for and aspire to – the proposition would be unappealing to our principles, and not mandated by our situation. It is not good to manipulate targeted population groups; it is not good for politicians to select their voters, instead of the other way around; it is not good that elections are made noncompetitive. That these measures have become necessary in order to impede the authoritarian creep of Trump’s control and lessen the level of suffering he is capable to cause is unfortunate; it is a sign of how much we have fallen from a state more like a representative government. But they are necessary. It is only after the fight against the current administration’s ideology has been won that we can mourn what opposing it has transformed us into.

If the legislative branch does not in practice have lawmaking, military or budgetary authority, what is it, exactly, that Prop 50’s additional five blue house members will be dispatched to Washington to do? One aspect that Congress continues to holds is subpoena power, and the ability to examine. Even in our era of stagnant government and legislative decline, it has made use of that power to significant impact. In 2027, if Prop 50 is approved and the state’s additional representatives are take office, they will find themselves a part of a institution with the power to probe Trump, to televise their hearings into his actions and to force members of his inner circle to give evidence. It’s significant, and crucially, it’s not something that any conservative would do.

• Moira Donegan is a news outlet columnist