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What, precisely, is the purpose of the U.S. Congress? In the second presidency of Donald Trump, it can be hard to determine. The authority to initiate armed conflict, traditionally viewed as a vital legislative power, has turned into a unclear prerogative of the presidential office in the time since the 9/11 attacks; the president, in recent months, has asserted additional of that power for himself, authorizing military actions on vessels in the Caribbean Sea.

The power of the purse appears to be largely been taken away from Congress too; currently, under the office of budget chief, Russell Vought, much of the ability to appropriate federal funds has likewise shifted to the presidency, with the administration claiming the authority to cancel congressionally authorized expenditures and attempting to redirect the money elsewhere. It’s as if they’re enacting any laws, either; virtually all legislation must currently be crammed into budget reconciliation bills, massive perennial essential omnibus legislation that can bypass the senate obstruction. But when these don’t pass – and increasingly, they do not – the federal government just ceases operations. At least, big parts of the administration do – and it’s not clear how many citizens are aware. At present, the federal government has been shut down for the entire month; there are no signs of it reopening anytime soon. But the presidency continues humming along.

And so the issue of control of Congress can appear somewhat irrelevant. Why should U.S. citizens be concerned who has a controlling share in a institution that has mostly rendered itself powerless?

How ‘screw Trump’ messaging could help the state of California’s Proposition 50 succeed

And yet Prop 50, the Golden State’s redistricting referendum that could provide five additional House seats to the Democratic Party if it is embraced by voters in a upcoming vote next month, has captured the political imagination of liberals nationwide. In part, it is a belated reaction to trends occurring in other states: Republican-controlled states have long embraced extreme biased redistricting while big Democratic-controlled such as California, New York and the Evergreen State draw their district lines via impartial independent commissions, an asymmetry that has resulted in closely divided House control and a longstanding feeling, by Democrats, that their party is at a disadvantage. The California proposal is explicitly intended as a countermove to a mid-decade redistricting that was recently approved in Texas, which installed boundaries that will give Republicans an additional five seats in the state congressional delegation next year; comparable redistricting moves are under way in states such as Missouri and the Hoosier State. (The left in the Old Dominion are likewise emulating the state’s lead in attempting to alter districts.)

The California initiative seems probable to pass, as Democratic and liberal electorate respond with fear and frustration to the president’s autocratic centralization of power and seek ways to restrain his most extreme impulses. But Prop 50 is not free from controversy. Some opponents warn that the action could have unintended consequences, with Democratic-controlled states’ efforts to change districts setting off a retaliatory cycle in which Republican-controlled states do even more to design their districts so as to eliminate any chance of Democratic competitiveness. Different critics have questioned the proposal on more purely ideological democratic bases: a district that is drawn in such a way that the result of the election is never really in doubt, they say, is one that cannot be said to be genuinely representative: it means, inevitably, that the power of dissenting views is muted, and that the process of debate, argument and convincing that is meant to define a functioning political system will be confined only to party primaries, if it happens at all.

It is valuable taking each of these criticisms on their own terms. The initial argument, that the measure will spur the right to alter their own maps in retaliation, does not hold up as a logical point: it is illogical to say that Republicans will be made to behave in antidemocratic ways by the left’s measures when they are already doing so without those actions. The GOP, I would observe, has required no any motivation of retaliation to change maps that secure long-term positions for themselves: they have been ready to do this for their own benefit, in the total lack of Democratic reciprocation, for a long time.

The other critique, in my view, is more significant, reflecting not just a tactical disagreement about how to address the GOP’s anti-democracy turn, but a sort of sad desire for a different nation than the one that the United States has turned into. It is true that in a more ideal situation – in the reality that the majority of the left, I think, desire and aspire to – the proposition would be distasteful to our values, and not required by our circumstances. It is not good to pack and crack targeted demographics; it is not good for elected officials to select their constituents, instead of the other way around; it is not good that elections are rendered noncompetitive. That these actions have become essential in order to impede the authoritarian advance of the president’s control and reduce the amount of suffering he is able to inflict is sad; it is a indication of how much we have declined from a state more like a representative government. But they are required. It is only once the battle against Trumpism has been successfully concluded that we can mourn what fighting it has transformed us into.

If the legislative branch fails to in reality have legislative, military or budgetary authority, what is it, exactly, that the proposition’s five new blue representatives will be sent to the capital to do? One aspect that the House and Senate still retains is subpoena power, and the ability to investigate. Even in our era of sclerotic politics and legislative decline, it has made use of that power to significant impact. In 2027, if Prop 50 passes and the state’s new representatives are sworn in, they will become a member of a body with the authority to probe the president, to broadcast their hearings into his conduct and to force members of his inner circle to testify. It’s significant, and more importantly, it’s not something that any Republican would do.

• The columnist is a news outlet writer