For example, it’s a crime to pretend to be an officer or employee of the United States when one isn’t. A federal statute reads: “Whoever falsely assumes or pretends to be an officer or employee acting under the authority of the United States or any department, agency or officer thereof, and acts as such, or in such pretended character demands or obtains any money, paper, document, or thing of value, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.”

Note that the first offense defined by the law involves simply falsely assuming or pretending to be a U.S. officer or employee — there’s no demand for money required. So, imagine an outgoing Cabinet member, such as a secretary of defense or homeland security, who’s been fired by a legitimate president immediately upon being sworn in on Jan. 20. That outgoing Cabinet member would violate this criminal prohibition if he or she were still to purport to exercise executive branch authority; for example, if the ex-secretary of defense ordered a military operation or ex-homeland security secretary issued an immigration edict, powers that no longer belong to officials ousted from the executive branch.

This would be an extraordinarily risky thing for any outgoing Cabinet official to do — even if they believed the certified election results were wrong.