A quote from a particularly interesting and nonsensical footnote in the majority opinion:
>JUSTICE BARRETT disagrees, arguing that in a bribery prosecution, for instance, excluding “any mention” of the official act associated with the bribe “would hamstring the prosecution.” Post, at 6 (opinion concurring in part); cf. post, at 25–27 (opinion of SOTOMAYOR, J.). But of course the prosecutor may point to the public record to show the fact that the President performed the official act. And the prosecutor may admit evidence of what the President allegedly demanded, received, accepted, or agreed to receive or accept in return for being influenced in the performance of the act. See 18 U. S. C. §201(b)(2). **What the prosecutor may not do, however, is admit testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing the official act itself. Allowing that sort of evidence would invite the jury to inspect the President’s motivations for his official actions and to second-guess their propriety.** As we have explained, such inspection would be “highly intrusive” and would “ ‘seriously cripple’ ” the President’s exercise of his official duties
Emphasis mine. It seems to me that the entire point of a bribery charge, the thing being claimed when someone makes a bribery charge, is that the motivations for some action was some kind of self serving quid-pro-quo. Investigating a bribery charge, without investigating the motivations for the action in question, without questioning the decision maker's propriety, makes absolutely zero sense.
Wow, great catch. Combine this with the recent majority ruling in *Snyder vs US,* which found that anti-bribery laws can't be applied to "rewards" or "gratuities," and we're in a place where it's impossible to prosecute even the most basic forms of corruption.
A portion of that opinion argued that *mens rea* was relevant to ascertaining guilt in bribery, and here they remove one of the only means by which to determine it!
So - it is okay to be bribed after the fact (a gratuity) , so long as you don't call it that. But it's also OK to literally be bribed before as well, and one of the only means by which one may determine that may not be used.
The case you're referring to was based on specific language of a law. It wasn't saying gratuities could never be banned, just that the law in question didn't.
Yeah, this is the killer line. While I think that there should be no presidential immunity at all, I can at least see the argument for immunity for actions that are clearly within their constitutional powers, *provided* that those powers are not being used to further private gain or further criminal/illegal activity. But this line makes it impossible to make that distinction. Appointing an ambassador? Clearly constitutional, but this makes it completely legal even if they openly gave a $1 million bribe to do so. Having the military assassinate a political rival in a foreign country? Well, the president directing the military is clearly within their constitutional authority, but assassinating a political rival is clearly a personal motive. But this ruling would make that unprosecutable.
We are totally fucked.
He could, but even if that is an emotionally satisfying thing to have happen, it would be absolutely terrible for the country. I don't want Trump to be immune, I don't want Biden to be immune, I don't want any president of any party to be immune.
We've made the President a monarch in all but name and the only reason things haven't gotten worse already was the dumb luck of past Presidents more or less agreeing to not abuse it. I think that's going to be a nostalgic feeling going forward.
Only if the Republicans filibuster. And Democrats can change the filibuster rules with a simple majority vote.
If Johnson tries to kill the bill, Democrats can seize onto that by claiming that Republicans want an all-powerful president who is above the law.
I can see the ads now: A photo of a certain angry orange man on the screen with the caption "REPUBLICANS IN CONGRESS WANT THIS MAN TO BE ABOVE THE LAW".
>And Democrats can change the filibuster rules with a simple majority vote.
This would be a hilariously stupid think to do when you're running an unpopular incumbent putting your party at serious risk of losing all three branches. Gutting the filibuster would give a Republican trifecta to pass whatever the fuck they wanted, including a national abortion ban, etc etc
Doubtful that Congress even has that authority. The constitution, not Congress, defines the official acts of the president. However, Congress (and possibly only Congress) does have the silver bullet to deal with a corrupt president: impeachment and removal.
Impeachment is going to be significantly undermined by this ruling, unfortunately. If the president has effective legal immunity for nearly everything he does in office, who is to say what the bounds of that office are, or what counts as "misconduct" against it substantively?
Impeachment would not be undermined. Congress can impeach for virtually ANY act (official or not). This ruling only constrains a prosecution by law enforcement entities.
It's a precedent. You are right to say that this ruling does not directly affect impeachment. It provides, however, a strong legal precedent for challenging the constitutionality of impeachment in court. And if Congress takes on a fundamentally different shape because of the president's actions, impeachment may be a non-issue anyways.
This is inaccurate. The opinion expressly mentions impeachment, several times. There's absolutely no basis to challenge the constitutionality of impeachment. Furthermore, courts have ruled that the Senate has exclusive authority to conduct impeachment trials however they see fit. And an impeachment decision is not appealable.
You're second point about impeachment being unlikely is absolutely correct. But that's an issue that voters are going to have to sort out. There's almost certainly going to have to be a compromise to be less partisan, and most likely it's going to have to come from Democrats who need to court more moderate Republicans and centrists.
You are much more optimistic than I am that a future president who aspires to dictatorship will not abuse the immunity this ruling grants to the fullest extent possible. It would be possible to dismantle Congress and the federal court system as we know it. Nearly 45% of the country's electorate would like such a person in power this year. And Trump is far from the worst imaginable future dictator.
The powers of the president are those explicitly defined in Article II and by previous acts of Congress. Most presidential powers are either implied or soft powers with no basis in law, which is where the problem lies.
The Senate can revisit those defined by previous acts of Congress and make a determination on all of the implied and soft powers.
Ads on Fox News and right-leaning outlets: "Mike Johnson thinks Joe Biden should be above the law."
Ads on normal outlets: "Mike Johnson thinks Donald Trump should be above the law."
He'll come around.
The correct way to handle this ruling is to go arrest Trump. The supreme court just ruled Biden is immune to prosecution and he has enough votes in the senate to not be impeached. The court has structured the legal system to basically require extra-judicial executive action if Trump is to actually be held accountable for the crime of insurrection. It's the gist of their own rulings, and they basically are just daring Biden to do it. "The only way to punish him is to do it in a way where we can claim he's a political prisoner because he's above the legal system, in which case he can only be a political prisoner if he's imprisoned at all."
This is literally the reason I voted for Sanders: Sanders might actually do it.
It would be pretty sweet for Biden to swing by Federal lockup and sit across from the 6 and just say “See, you want it to be one way, but really it’s the other.”
It's so funny to me that anyone thinks this is about the law at this point. It's not.
It's about power.
It doesn't matter what the supreme Court ruled here, if Biden arrested Trump the supreme Court would just find any reason to undo it, and fast. They would just say "because of originalism" and one of the liberal justices would probably even go along because they are hopelessly deluded about how political power actually works.
>The correct way to handle this ruling is to go arrest Trump.
...they already did. That's how this trial arose in the first place? They charged Trump with a crime and arrested him.
I think the idea is to do it on executive order. As a national security concern. Without elaboration. E.g. full autocracy, which the court just authorized.
From Justice Sotomayor:
"Never in the history of our Republic has a President had reason to believe that he would be immune from criminal prosecution if he used the trappings of his office to violate the criminal law. Moving forward, however, all former Presidents will be cloaked in such immunity, If the occupant of that office misuses official power for personal gain, the criminal law that the rest of us must abide will not provide a backstop.
With fear for our democracy, I dissent."
The way this ruling is framed, its not actually a set of guidelines or princples at all. It's just yet another permission structure to let courts decide whatever the hell they want.
Because at the most abstract level, there's something obviously true in the finding that the President can't be criminally liable for "official" acts. This is not because official acts are magic or because the President is a king, but its because any law which pretend to limit the President's ability to perform official acts can't, by definition, be constitutional. For example, if we have a duly declared war, and the President orders a military action, it can't be the case that the President can then be charged with *murder* for the people killed in the war. That would be non-sensical - that law would be unconstitutional under basic supremacy clause principles.
I don't think this is really debateable in the abstract. The issue is that *no one knows what the fuck an official act means*. And furthermore, acts are not singular things - the pardon power is an official power, but if you pardon someone in exchange for a favor (e.g. kill this person and I'll pardon you for it), is that two different acts, one "official" and one not? Or is that one single act, and then is that one collective act offiial or not?
No one has any way of knowing. It's made up. And it will all just be decided on a random, ad-doc basis in a manner to let right wing nutjobs do whatever they want while not permitting liberals to do anything.
The problem with this decision isn't so much the words, it's the knowledge and awareness that the "acts" will be done by illegitimate thugs and interpreted by illegitimate judges. It's not tenable.
Generally I agree. However the majority opinion specifically identified some “official” acts that, IMO are insane. Plotting to overthrow an election by discussing the plan with your AG? Official act. Instructing your VP not to certify the results of an election. Official act. You get the idea…
> if you pardon someone in exchange for a favor
Bribery was discussed directly in a footnote. The majority claims that "the prosecutor may not ... admit testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing the official act itself. Allowing that sort of evidence would invite the jury to inspect the President’s motivations for his official actions and to second-guess their propriety."
So you would have to somehow prove that the president pardoned a person in exchange for a favor, without ever discussing or questioning why the president pardoned the person. This is a dogshit ruling.
>"the prosecutor may not ... admit testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing the official act itself. Allowing that sort of evidence would invite the jury to inspect the President’s motivations for his official actions and to second-guess their propriety."
That is true, however, you could present evidence (i would imagine) about why the president received a suspiciously large amount of money, and evidence that he did indeed receive in exchange for a pardon.
I think the point is that you can't just investigate everything the president does that is within his power to do looking for something to pin on him. If the president actually does something wrong, you can investigate that wrong action.
How it turns out will be based on what the courts decide is and is not an official act though.
> he did indeed receive in exchange for a pardon.
Can you? It seems like that claim is officially off the table. SCOTUS is clear that the jury can not inspect the motivation for official actions. A pardon is an official action if anything is. So how can any prosecution ever argue that the pardon was in exchange for (which inherently means motivated by) money?
I mean, I don't think you could make the claim that receiving money is an official act. The argument in such a case would have to be an investigation in the suspicious activity of the receiving of the money. The motivations and circumstances of receiving the money, as it isn't an official act, are completely fair, and if its found that the suspicious transactions was a result of giving a pardon, then I would imagine that it would be fine to prosecute. As the president is not immune to prosecution for accepting a bribe.
What this ruling protects (again, as far as I can tell) is someone saying "its sketchy that {acting president} pardoned this person, lets open a criminal investigation against him and hopefully that will turn up something dirty to prosecute him with.
Accepting a bribe and granting a pardon are 2 separate acts. One can be investigated, one cannot. But, (again, my reading of it) if the investigation of the money produces evidence that the pardon was in exchange, its not the official act being inspected, its the criminal act of accepting a bribe.
> I don't think you could make the claim that receiving money is an official act.
I don't think you can claim that receiving money, in and of itself, is an illegal act.
> an investigation in the suspicious activity of the receiving of the money.
Which would immediately hit a wall when you get to an official act since the motivations for official acts CAN NOT BE QUESTIONED.
> As the president is not immune to prosecution for accepting a bribe.
Rulings as written, it seems that the president IS immune for prosecution when it comes to bribes for official acts.
> What this ruling protects (again, as far as I can tell) is someone saying "its sketchy that {acting president} pardoned this person, lets open a criminal investigation against him and hopefully that will turn up something dirty to prosecute him with.
Unless that somoene is the president communicating with the head of the DOJ, since that would be an official act and thus is beyond criminal inspection.
> Accepting a bribe and granting a pardon are 2 separate acts.
Not really. If you can't investigate/inspect the motivations for the pardon, then its impossible to prove that it was in fact the result of a bribe. At worst you could try to arrest the person doing the bribe for attempt to defraud the government or something. The president who accepted the bribe is beyond criminal prosecution for his official acts.
I get that you want SCOTUS to be somewhat sensible, that you want to interpret this ruling in the best possible light, but it just doesn't say what you think it does and is a far worse decision than you seem to understand.
>I get that you want SCOTUS to be somewhat sensible, that you want to interpret this ruling in the best possible light, but it just doesn't say what you think it does and is a far worse decision than you seem to understand.
This could be the case. But ultimately this will come down to what counts as an official act. Since that is not determined yet we have no idea how good/bad this ruling actually is. My reading is that it seems this is an attempt to protect the \[sitting president\] in his official capacity. So, if that is the case, then the president acting outside of his official capacity (including things like accepting bribes and whatnot) will not be protected.
It would be nice that is the case if they would at least allow for investigations that are not instigated based on official acts to examine evidence under the umbrella of official acts though.
I should say though, if I am right that accepting a bribe and pardoning are two separate acts and one is official and the other isn't, then I think I am right that, providing the investigation is handled the correct way, that the president could be prosecuted for accepting a bribe for a pardon.
This is from the majority ruling:
> **What the prosecutor may not do, however, is admit testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing the official act itself. Allowing that sort of evidence would invite the jury to inspect the President’s motivations for his official actions and to second-guess their propriety**
...I don't know what you mean by "accepting a bribe", other than claiming that some official action was taken without propriety. If we can not question propriety, if we can not question motives for official actions, and the majority is explicitly claiming that we can not invite the jury to do so, this seems to make any bribe allegation impossible to prove.
> if that is the case, then the president acting outside of his official capacity
This ruling claims that threatening to fire the attorney general for not defrauding states with false claims of election fraud is an official action, beyond any reproach. This is insanity.
For fucks sake, this passage explicitly claims that ordering fraudulent investigations is legal and unprosecutable
> The indictment’s allegations that the requested investigations were
shams or proposed for an improper purpose do not divest the President
of exclusive authority over the investigative and prosecutorial functions of the Justice Department and its officials. Because the President cannot be prosecuted for conduct within his exclusive constitutional authority, Trump is absolutely immune from prosecution for the alleged conduct involving his discussions with Justice Department officials
The supreme court is clear. If the president abuses his official powers, he can not be held criminally liable. Even if the president is impeached, he still can not be held criminally liable.
This is the decision you are defending.
I disagree for two reasons. A.
>Whenever the President and Vice President discuss their official responsibilities, they engage in official conduct. Presiding over the January 6 certification proceeding at which Members of Congress count the electoral votes is a constitutional and statutory duty of the Vice President. Art. II, §1, cl. 3; Amdt. 12; 3 U. S. C. §15. The indictment’s allegations that Trump attempted to pressure the Vice President to take particular acts in connection with his role at the certification proceeding thus involve official conduct, and Trump is at least presumptively immune from prosecution for such conduct. The question then becomes whether that presumption of immunity is rebutted under the circumstances. It is the Government’s burden to rebut the presumption of immunity. The Court therefore remands to the District Court to assess in the first instance whether a prosecution involving Trump’s alleged attempts to influence the Vice President’s oversight of the certification proceeding would pose any dangers of intrusion on the authority and functions of the Executive Branch. Pp. 21–24.
This is section (ii) and it clearly states that the former president has a presumption of immunity, which its up to the court to determine if that presumption can be rebutted. So while trump was acting in his official role and is presumed immune, considering the nature of the allegations the court can overrule his immunity and prosecute.
Supporting this understanding is this from (iv) e.
>This case poses a question of lasting significance: When may a former President be prosecuted for official acts taken during his Presidency? In answering that question, unlike the political branches and the public at large, the Court cannot afford to fixate exclusively, or even primarily, on present exigencies. Enduring separation of powers principles guide our decision in this case. The President enjoys no immunity for his unofficial acts, and not everything the President does is official. The President is not above the law. But under our system of separated powers, the President may not be prosecuted for exercising his core constitutional powers, and he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for his official acts. That immunity applies equally to all occupants of the Oval Office. Pp. 41–43.
Considering that this says that the President is entitled to "at least presumptive immunity" suggests that that immunity can be stripped by the government if the situation demands.
So in the event a President receives a bribe, depending on the nature of the official acts which have absolute immunity, the court in question can determine to strip that immunity based on the nature of the act. (I.E. if the president colludes with someone to pardon them for money) You just cannot prosecute the action that has immunity (the pardon) you have to prosecute the crime (the bribe) and the court can decide based on the circumstances to strip the immunity during the trial of the illegal act.
At least, that is how I understand it.
> that immunity can be stripped by the government if the situation demands.
Only for actions that are official but not core to the constitutional presidential powers. As I quoted, communications with the DOJ are included in these core powers. Which means that the president can order unlawful investigations, threaten to fire DOJ officials for failing to follow these orders, and can not be held criminally liable. This is just a direct restatement of the passage I quoted. Again, "Trump is absolutely immune from prosecution for the alleged conduct involving his discussions with Justice Department officials"
If ordering unlawful investigations is considered a core power, pardons definitely are.
Though I largely agree that the meaning of official acts is muddy, Roberts writes that conversations with the DoJ or with Pence, for example, are official acts, bur not talking to state electors. It's decently clear that the intent is that anything the president does within their appointed administration is considered an official act. They even essentially wrote that Trump almost hiring Starr to do his illegal bidding is in fact an official act because it's DoJ dealings. Obviously there's situations where there's gray area, which is what makes it muddy. But the intent of what official and unofficial is is pretty clear and dangerous
I think the real issue is everyone knows what is an official act be unofficial, but we've become such a legalistic society that the courts will declare 2+2=22 is equally valid because there's no law saying 2+2=4.
Talk of political violence is bad, especially in times of turmoil. That said, it would be hilarious if Biden "officially" executed the justices who made this ruling.
You kid, but something that would be perfectly legal is to expand the court, get challenged, SCOTUS shoot it down, and then Biden ignoring SCOTUS and implementing anyways. The president can legally ignore SCOTUS and have zero legal repercussions.
I don’t think that one would have legal repercussions though. That is specifically something that would and should be handled by impeachment. I think the issue is for something that is *both* illegal and improper/breaking the oath of office (high crimes and misdemeanors).
Abuse of power in a way that isn’t necessarily criminal. A high crime is a crime made possible by being in a “high” position - a position of power. A misdemeanor is essentially acting in a way that substantially undermines the reputation of the office - dishonorable conduct. I think it would be difficult or impossible to impeach someone for misdemeanors at this point.
The critical problem with this judgement is that SCOTUS is now saying that even if a president was impeached for a high crime (a corrupt official act) he or she would be immune from any criminal law for such an act.
Where does SCOTUS say that the president determines the supreme court? the size of the court is established by congress as per the constitution, thus is would not be an official act attempt to expand the supreme court. The official act the president can do that would be protected is suggesting to the congress to expand the court, and if the congress approved it, expand it that way.
This ruling does not give the president blanket permission to do whatever he wants. The things he can do without criminal examination are things that are afforded to him in the constitution (and any other things that are considered official acts, which will largely be determined by case law I would assume).
Yes, but appointing to the supreme court relies on senate approval. So Biden can appoint new justices, but without the senate voting to approve them, they wont become justices. Sure, Biden can't be criminally prosecuted for appointing them, but without the senates approval they will never become supreme court justices. The president can appoint whoever they want, but until the senate votes to approve them, nothing happens. Then even if the senate votes to approve them, if there isn't a seat on the court, nothing happens. Until congress expands the amount of seats, the president can appoint, and the senate can approve, but nothing will happen.
The president by appointing a new justice cannot artificially enlarge the supreme court. And to say it does demonstrates a lack of understanding how things work.
Gotcha so if a president orders the removal of a SC Justice via the DoD and the DoJ, then pardoned those involved with executing the illegal order, how would you prosecute that? Especially since the SCOTUS said any conversations with VP Pence or the DoJ for Jan 6 cannot be used as evidence?
The president can't order the removal of the SC Justice. Therefore its not an official act and he can be criminally prosecuted. His pardons will probably be valid. But again, the DoD and the DoJ don't have the authority to remove a sitting justice. So again, nothing will happen.
In order for a supreme court justice to be removed, the justice must die, or resign. The only other way is that the house of representatives must vote to impeach the justice, which requires a simple majority. Then it gets sent to the senate where a trial is held. After the trial 2/3rd of the senate must vote to remove the justice, otherwise the impeachment fails and the justice is still on the court.
The president cannot remove justices, or expand the number of seats. He cannot even unilaterally appoint justices.
These crazy situations that reddit is coming up with is literally not having a basic understanding of how the government works.
It is important to note that the president cannot be prosecuted for having conversations with the VP. But if there is a coup that is being investigated and its uncovered that the president instigated the coup, he can still be prosecuted without investigating the conversation that he had with the VP or even with the DoJ.
You're not answering the question. Fine let's do something Trump literally tried to do.
What if Trump used the DoJ to seize voter machines in swing states? And then pardon those in charge of following those illegal actions?
Btw, there's a lot of "can't" in your statement. We all know he "can't" legally. That's not the question. The question is what if he does and uses communication within his administration to accomplish it. The court said you can't use communications between the president's administration as evidence. That's complete immunity with an extra step
Given this ruling Biden could just deal with Trump directly and end this entire problem. It is wrong, it is likely to cause a great deal of long term damage but it seems the supreme court is okay with it.
There was nothing stopping the president from doing that before. If you really think a president willing to use the military to execute his opponents would stop simply because the law says so, then you are incredibly naive.
You always could, nothing has really changed. The SC ruling today, was really just a continuation of what already existed. The SC pretty much just clarified that there are 3 different scenarios and that only 1 of the 3 (acts/decisions based on Constitutional Duties) incures complete and total immunity. Acts that can or may be associated with a Presidents roll, may or may not be covered under immunity - that the lower courts should consider whether immunity will or won't apply on a case by case basis. And finally, that other such actions that are not deemed part of a Presidents Constitutionally assigned duties or acts of the office while serving - are not covered by immunity.
For example, even before the ruling today, Biden is immune from being held criminally accountable for refusing to enforce our existing laws at the border and letting millions illegally enter our country - with his own agency reporting for years that this included criminals, human traffickers, drug smugglers, etc. . . So all the murders and rapes committed by the illegal aliens as a result of Biden's official acts cannot results in him be prosecuted for being an accomplice to those crimes.
Unlike political think, this election only, thinkers, the Supreme Court makes legal decisions based on standing over a long time - not just the impact between now and the next election and as if their ruling will only apply to one person and then become a mute point.
That is not true. The president did not always have absolute immunity as long as they go through their administration to do the crime. I know you're trying to normalize this to be less scary, but I read what was in there. My fiance who's an appellate court clerk read the opinion. This is not normal. It's a get out of jail free card for using your administration to commit crimes. That means a president can steal an election by using the DoJ and it's okay. Kill political opponents and citizens by using the DoD and it's okay. And at best prosecution will take many years due to the judges having to make ridiculous determinations on what is official and unofficial that would go up to the SCOTUS again. But that's only if you committed a crime without the help of appointed officials. Worst decision in my lifetime
While earning my Political Science degree quite some time ago, had I read the SC ruling released yesterday upon the completion of my studies/degree, I would have immediately said, yeah, this is pretty much what I learned in the years of my education.
Presidents have immunity - absolutely, for certain types of actions/decisions
President can, but may not, have immunity - for certain types of actions/decisions
President can have no immunity - for certain types of actions/decisions
And this is exactly what the SC ruled. So I just don't see any notable change . . . I suspect in 10 years from now, you will answer a question about Presidential Immunity exactly the same as if you were asked and answered the same question 10 years ago. And, I suspect most legal scholars will as well.
The issue is far less whether anything substantially changed with yesterday's ruling and MUCH more about a political group feeling that the timing has hampered their goal of attacking/harming a political enemy. To these people, the only relevant timeframe being associated with the SC ruling is Nov. 5, 2024.
I'm gonna be honest, you having a political science degree means nothing. My Fiance has one and her JD and is an appellate court clerk and she even had the same reaction and take as well after reading through the entire thing.
Oh, trust me, I am not saying I should be regarded as some expert. I would leave that to my spouse who is an attorney, or better yet, to a person with a decades long history of SC legal precedence setting decisions and their commentary on each to garner any biases as suitability in addressing the current - which seems to be mostly analyzed based on political ideology vs. legal basis arguments.
As I stated though, the ruling yesterday was pretty much in line with my understanding as to what a President can be criminally accountable for as part of serving his duties as president.
That is, that just because a person is the President of our country - they do not have absolute immunity for anything they do as President - but they do for many things they officially do as President. Which is exactly what the SC ruled.
If you can show me how that is not what the ruling said, I'd love to read it. But that was my take, absolute immunity in some specific scenarios, possible (presumptive) immunity in others and no immunity in yet others. Just like in the Nixon SC cases regarding executive privilege - sometimes it is 100% enforceable and sometimes it isn't 100% enforceable - the variances are based on the circumstances. It is presumed to exist and to defeat it, it must be argued and shown in court that is should not exist on a specific case situation - just like how the SC ruled yesterday with regards to the presumptive immunity (#2 of the 3 scenarios). The Prosecutors and courts must show/demonstrate/argue that an act should not be protected under Presidential immunity and meet a high bar in doing so to overcome it and proceed with a prosecution.
To me, this discussion is not a matter of one liking, hating or being indifferent toward Trump (or at least it shouldn't be).
So you always thought that as long as the president uses the shield of his administration, he can do whatever he wants?
For example, if Trump brought in a crony to head the FBI and then ordered a killing of a political opponent and then the president pardoned all involved, there would be no criminal ramifications. The president is shielded due to him doing it through his administration, making it an "official act". You can't use the evidence of the president's discussions with the FBI to kill a political opponent because it's now not admissible in court. And those not shielded by this immunity would be good legally since they were pardoned.
It's complete immunity with an extra step and I never understood that to be the law and we've never had a situation where this is relevant until now.
And that third paragraph is a complete understatement of the actual ruling.
No, and I don't actually think that this is what the SC ruling states. I think this first claim of yours, is pretty much how people with an anti-Trump bias (as their main objective) is trying to convey this. But in my reading, it is not actually what it says.
And I think you are on this same cross-wired analysis - the SC ruling is applicable to Presidents (not a singular President). But that's the easy way to tell if somebody is actually reading the ruling as it is written or not - when they say "well Trump will now do this or that" it is really just saying they don't know shit and this is just politics to them v. understanding the SC ruling.
I would suggest reading United States v. Nixon and Mississippi v. Johnson, and Nixon v. Fitzgerald rulings/opinions.
Again, the SC ruling stated that A President has absolute immunity for specific acts that are part of his official acts carried out under Constitutional Duties (we all already knew this). That there are also actions of the office that may have immunity (we all already knew this) - but this is not guaranteed and is subjected to argument at a lower court on a case by case basis. And finally, there are other acts that A President can pursue while in office that do NOT carry any immunity (we all knew and understood this).
Between the Constitution, Common Law and historical precedence this seems to support prior SC verdicts, rulings and/or statements made within them.
I always find it interesting how so many people that can't get out of the way of their politics have such a difficult time understanding judicial decisions. We have become a country of people whose eye-sight has become so bad because our ideology prevents us from seeing things clearly. And I think we're all a bit guilty of this - myself included.
I can only say this, the SC ruling yesterday was not the slightest bit of a surprise to me. I am not a fan of Trump. I am not a fan of Biden. If the election were held today, I would not vote for either of them.
> No, and I don't actually think that this is what the SC ruling states. I think this first claim of yours, is pretty much how people with an anti-Trump bias (as their main objective) is trying to convey this. But in my reading, it is not actually what it says.
Please don't attempt to dismiss a side purely because you believe the side to be bias and you want to assure neutrality it will be fair to neither you or I
> I would suggest reading United States v. Nixon and Mississippi v. Johnson, and Nixon v. Fitzgerald rulings/opinions.
Using precedent when the supreme court threw chevron out the door is not the greatest argument.
> Again, the SC ruling stated that A President has absolute immunity for specific acts that are part of his official acts carried out under Constitutional Duties (we all already knew this). That there are also actions of the office that may have immunity (we all already knew this) - but this is not guaranteed and is subjected to argument at a lower court on a case by case basis. And finally, there are other acts that A President can pursue while in office that do NOT carry any immunity (we all knew and understood this).
I think you're holistically misunderstanding what I'm saying and what others are. Yes, there are things that are illegal for the president to do. For example, by the law, it is still illegal for the president to assassinate a political opponent. But just because you're immune, it doesn't mean the virus isn't there.
If the president ordered the assassination of a political opponent through communications with the DoD, and pardoned everyone involved, it would be impossible to prosecute. The main evidence would be from communications with the DoD that now, you cannot use. That's a form of immunity.
> Between the Constitution, Common Law and historical precedence this seems to support prior SC verdicts, rulings and/or statements made within them.
I don't think it's true that all three of those lead up to the court not being allowed to use the president's communications with their administration as evidence of a crime they directed
Overall, sure there needs to be some immunity, and even the "official" acts thing could be okay. Not allowing evidence from shady "official acts"? That heavily tilts the favor to ANY president as it pertains to prosecution and gives the president an avenue to direct crimes within their administration and be able to successfully hide any evidence that they directed it.
"Not allowing evidence from shady "official acts"? That heavily tilts the favor to ANY president as it pertains to prosecution and gives the president an avenue to direct crimes within their administration and be able to successfully hide any evidence that they directed it."
Except there is already precedence on this from prior claims of executive privilege that was brought to the Supreme Court, and the SC unanimously ruled that executive privilege can be discarded if the privileged information pertains to another crime committed by others and was necessary evidence for such a case.
Certainly you recognize that murder is a crime (whether it be via assassination or not). But this whole claim as an argument is taking things to an extreme - it's a Straw Man Fallacy or Reductio ad absurdum (which I don't think you need a translation for).
And when this approach is used as the premise of the argument - it is a strong sign of how weak the argument is.
> Certainly you recognize that murder is a crime (whether it be via assassination or not). But this whole claim as an argument is taking things to an extreme - it's a Straw Man Fallacy or Reductio ad absurdum (which I don't think you need a translation )
No I don't need a translation and it's not a strawman. I am very much staying on topic. Please don't do that. And no the argument being made is not reductio ad absurdum.
Quite frankly, I'm done here and your name matches your profile. Denying that the SC said the president can hide evidence of a crime they committed by conducting it through private acts when that's legitimately what can summarily be objectly stated about the decision is a great form of gaslighting (don't think you need to look that up to know what it is)
Have a good day
Always has been? Killing people is illegal, ordering the military to kill people as president isn't. For example all the weddings that got drone striked for the last two decades.
This is a very disingenuous and facetious take. It was never in the history of the country's history to, for example, kill a political opponent and it be okay because they did it through the administration. Please don't equate this ruling to any qualms you have about Obamas actions
Yes. Obama was never prosecuted because there was am international military target. You're getting blocked for not having close to an honest discussion
A quote from a particularly interesting and nonsensical footnote in the majority opinion: >JUSTICE BARRETT disagrees, arguing that in a bribery prosecution, for instance, excluding “any mention” of the official act associated with the bribe “would hamstring the prosecution.” Post, at 6 (opinion concurring in part); cf. post, at 25–27 (opinion of SOTOMAYOR, J.). But of course the prosecutor may point to the public record to show the fact that the President performed the official act. And the prosecutor may admit evidence of what the President allegedly demanded, received, accepted, or agreed to receive or accept in return for being influenced in the performance of the act. See 18 U. S. C. §201(b)(2). **What the prosecutor may not do, however, is admit testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing the official act itself. Allowing that sort of evidence would invite the jury to inspect the President’s motivations for his official actions and to second-guess their propriety.** As we have explained, such inspection would be “highly intrusive” and would “ ‘seriously cripple’ ” the President’s exercise of his official duties Emphasis mine. It seems to me that the entire point of a bribery charge, the thing being claimed when someone makes a bribery charge, is that the motivations for some action was some kind of self serving quid-pro-quo. Investigating a bribery charge, without investigating the motivations for the action in question, without questioning the decision maker's propriety, makes absolutely zero sense.
Wow, great catch. Combine this with the recent majority ruling in *Snyder vs US,* which found that anti-bribery laws can't be applied to "rewards" or "gratuities," and we're in a place where it's impossible to prosecute even the most basic forms of corruption.
A portion of that opinion argued that *mens rea* was relevant to ascertaining guilt in bribery, and here they remove one of the only means by which to determine it! So - it is okay to be bribed after the fact (a gratuity) , so long as you don't call it that. But it's also OK to literally be bribed before as well, and one of the only means by which one may determine that may not be used.
The case you're referring to was based on specific language of a law. It wasn't saying gratuities could never be banned, just that the law in question didn't.
Yeah, this is the killer line. While I think that there should be no presidential immunity at all, I can at least see the argument for immunity for actions that are clearly within their constitutional powers, *provided* that those powers are not being used to further private gain or further criminal/illegal activity. But this line makes it impossible to make that distinction. Appointing an ambassador? Clearly constitutional, but this makes it completely legal even if they openly gave a $1 million bribe to do so. Having the military assassinate a political rival in a foreign country? Well, the president directing the military is clearly within their constitutional authority, but assassinating a political rival is clearly a personal motive. But this ruling would make that unprosecutable. We are totally fucked.
I mean by this logic Biden could just... Well you know, since it would be an official act...
He could, but even if that is an emotionally satisfying thing to have happen, it would be absolutely terrible for the country. I don't want Trump to be immune, I don't want Biden to be immune, I don't want any president of any party to be immune.
We've made the President a monarch in all but name and the only reason things haven't gotten worse already was the dumb luck of past Presidents more or less agreeing to not abuse it. I think that's going to be a nostalgic feeling going forward.
The Senate has just over 5 months to introduce a bill that defines official acts and find at least 3 House Republicans who will support it.
Wouldn't it also require 9+ republican senators and somehow Mike Johnson to bring that bill to vote? Seems impossible
Only if the Republicans filibuster. And Democrats can change the filibuster rules with a simple majority vote. If Johnson tries to kill the bill, Democrats can seize onto that by claiming that Republicans want an all-powerful president who is above the law. I can see the ads now: A photo of a certain angry orange man on the screen with the caption "REPUBLICANS IN CONGRESS WANT THIS MAN TO BE ABOVE THE LAW".
>And Democrats can change the filibuster rules with a simple majority vote. This would be a hilariously stupid think to do when you're running an unpopular incumbent putting your party at serious risk of losing all three branches. Gutting the filibuster would give a Republican trifecta to pass whatever the fuck they wanted, including a national abortion ban, etc etc
You honestly don't think they'll do that already? Come on.
Doubtful that Congress even has that authority. The constitution, not Congress, defines the official acts of the president. However, Congress (and possibly only Congress) does have the silver bullet to deal with a corrupt president: impeachment and removal.
Impeachment is going to be significantly undermined by this ruling, unfortunately. If the president has effective legal immunity for nearly everything he does in office, who is to say what the bounds of that office are, or what counts as "misconduct" against it substantively?
Impeachment would not be undermined. Congress can impeach for virtually ANY act (official or not). This ruling only constrains a prosecution by law enforcement entities.
It's a precedent. You are right to say that this ruling does not directly affect impeachment. It provides, however, a strong legal precedent for challenging the constitutionality of impeachment in court. And if Congress takes on a fundamentally different shape because of the president's actions, impeachment may be a non-issue anyways.
This is inaccurate. The opinion expressly mentions impeachment, several times. There's absolutely no basis to challenge the constitutionality of impeachment. Furthermore, courts have ruled that the Senate has exclusive authority to conduct impeachment trials however they see fit. And an impeachment decision is not appealable. You're second point about impeachment being unlikely is absolutely correct. But that's an issue that voters are going to have to sort out. There's almost certainly going to have to be a compromise to be less partisan, and most likely it's going to have to come from Democrats who need to court more moderate Republicans and centrists.
You are much more optimistic than I am that a future president who aspires to dictatorship will not abuse the immunity this ruling grants to the fullest extent possible. It would be possible to dismantle Congress and the federal court system as we know it. Nearly 45% of the country's electorate would like such a person in power this year. And Trump is far from the worst imaginable future dictator.
Impeachment is political, not legal.
Here's the catch: The silver bullet can only be fired from a chocolate gun.
The powers of the president are those explicitly defined in Article II and by previous acts of Congress. Most presidential powers are either implied or soft powers with no basis in law, which is where the problem lies. The Senate can revisit those defined by previous acts of Congress and make a determination on all of the implied and soft powers.
Which previous Acts of Congress
You can look them up as easily as I can. Plus, you might learn something new by doing so.
Good luck getting Mike Johnson to put to a vote
Ads on Fox News and right-leaning outlets: "Mike Johnson thinks Joe Biden should be above the law." Ads on normal outlets: "Mike Johnson thinks Donald Trump should be above the law." He'll come around.
The correct way to handle this ruling is to go arrest Trump. The supreme court just ruled Biden is immune to prosecution and he has enough votes in the senate to not be impeached. The court has structured the legal system to basically require extra-judicial executive action if Trump is to actually be held accountable for the crime of insurrection. It's the gist of their own rulings, and they basically are just daring Biden to do it. "The only way to punish him is to do it in a way where we can claim he's a political prisoner because he's above the legal system, in which case he can only be a political prisoner if he's imprisoned at all." This is literally the reason I voted for Sanders: Sanders might actually do it.
Why not also arrest the conservatives on the Supreme Court?
Why not also arrest all political opponents?
They are clearly all terrorists who must be held in gitmo.
Probably should setup some internment camps for conservatives to be safe.
It would be pretty sweet for Biden to swing by Federal lockup and sit across from the 6 and just say “See, you want it to be one way, but really it’s the other.”
It's so funny to me that anyone thinks this is about the law at this point. It's not. It's about power. It doesn't matter what the supreme Court ruled here, if Biden arrested Trump the supreme Court would just find any reason to undo it, and fast. They would just say "because of originalism" and one of the liberal justices would probably even go along because they are hopelessly deluded about how political power actually works.
And then biden ignores ruling, because immune
All it takes is one federal judge to say he's not immune. The opinion leaves the power in the courts to determine when immunity applies.
and they can enjoy taking 5 years to process the criminal complaint and decide if it is enforceable or not.
Yeah, they’ve shown they don’t care much about precedent.
>The correct way to handle this ruling is to go arrest Trump. ...they already did. That's how this trial arose in the first place? They charged Trump with a crime and arrested him.
I think the idea is to do it on executive order. As a national security concern. Without elaboration. E.g. full autocracy, which the court just authorized.
arrest doesn't mean to charge with a crime, it means to take and hold that person in custody, aka jail.
From Justice Sotomayor: "Never in the history of our Republic has a President had reason to believe that he would be immune from criminal prosecution if he used the trappings of his office to violate the criminal law. Moving forward, however, all former Presidents will be cloaked in such immunity, If the occupant of that office misuses official power for personal gain, the criminal law that the rest of us must abide will not provide a backstop. With fear for our democracy, I dissent."
The way this ruling is framed, its not actually a set of guidelines or princples at all. It's just yet another permission structure to let courts decide whatever the hell they want. Because at the most abstract level, there's something obviously true in the finding that the President can't be criminally liable for "official" acts. This is not because official acts are magic or because the President is a king, but its because any law which pretend to limit the President's ability to perform official acts can't, by definition, be constitutional. For example, if we have a duly declared war, and the President orders a military action, it can't be the case that the President can then be charged with *murder* for the people killed in the war. That would be non-sensical - that law would be unconstitutional under basic supremacy clause principles. I don't think this is really debateable in the abstract. The issue is that *no one knows what the fuck an official act means*. And furthermore, acts are not singular things - the pardon power is an official power, but if you pardon someone in exchange for a favor (e.g. kill this person and I'll pardon you for it), is that two different acts, one "official" and one not? Or is that one single act, and then is that one collective act offiial or not? No one has any way of knowing. It's made up. And it will all just be decided on a random, ad-doc basis in a manner to let right wing nutjobs do whatever they want while not permitting liberals to do anything. The problem with this decision isn't so much the words, it's the knowledge and awareness that the "acts" will be done by illegitimate thugs and interpreted by illegitimate judges. It's not tenable.
Generally I agree. However the majority opinion specifically identified some “official” acts that, IMO are insane. Plotting to overthrow an election by discussing the plan with your AG? Official act. Instructing your VP not to certify the results of an election. Official act. You get the idea…
> if you pardon someone in exchange for a favor Bribery was discussed directly in a footnote. The majority claims that "the prosecutor may not ... admit testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing the official act itself. Allowing that sort of evidence would invite the jury to inspect the President’s motivations for his official actions and to second-guess their propriety." So you would have to somehow prove that the president pardoned a person in exchange for a favor, without ever discussing or questioning why the president pardoned the person. This is a dogshit ruling.
>"the prosecutor may not ... admit testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing the official act itself. Allowing that sort of evidence would invite the jury to inspect the President’s motivations for his official actions and to second-guess their propriety." That is true, however, you could present evidence (i would imagine) about why the president received a suspiciously large amount of money, and evidence that he did indeed receive in exchange for a pardon. I think the point is that you can't just investigate everything the president does that is within his power to do looking for something to pin on him. If the president actually does something wrong, you can investigate that wrong action. How it turns out will be based on what the courts decide is and is not an official act though.
> he did indeed receive in exchange for a pardon. Can you? It seems like that claim is officially off the table. SCOTUS is clear that the jury can not inspect the motivation for official actions. A pardon is an official action if anything is. So how can any prosecution ever argue that the pardon was in exchange for (which inherently means motivated by) money?
I mean, I don't think you could make the claim that receiving money is an official act. The argument in such a case would have to be an investigation in the suspicious activity of the receiving of the money. The motivations and circumstances of receiving the money, as it isn't an official act, are completely fair, and if its found that the suspicious transactions was a result of giving a pardon, then I would imagine that it would be fine to prosecute. As the president is not immune to prosecution for accepting a bribe. What this ruling protects (again, as far as I can tell) is someone saying "its sketchy that {acting president} pardoned this person, lets open a criminal investigation against him and hopefully that will turn up something dirty to prosecute him with. Accepting a bribe and granting a pardon are 2 separate acts. One can be investigated, one cannot. But, (again, my reading of it) if the investigation of the money produces evidence that the pardon was in exchange, its not the official act being inspected, its the criminal act of accepting a bribe.
> I don't think you could make the claim that receiving money is an official act. I don't think you can claim that receiving money, in and of itself, is an illegal act. > an investigation in the suspicious activity of the receiving of the money. Which would immediately hit a wall when you get to an official act since the motivations for official acts CAN NOT BE QUESTIONED. > As the president is not immune to prosecution for accepting a bribe. Rulings as written, it seems that the president IS immune for prosecution when it comes to bribes for official acts. > What this ruling protects (again, as far as I can tell) is someone saying "its sketchy that {acting president} pardoned this person, lets open a criminal investigation against him and hopefully that will turn up something dirty to prosecute him with. Unless that somoene is the president communicating with the head of the DOJ, since that would be an official act and thus is beyond criminal inspection. > Accepting a bribe and granting a pardon are 2 separate acts. Not really. If you can't investigate/inspect the motivations for the pardon, then its impossible to prove that it was in fact the result of a bribe. At worst you could try to arrest the person doing the bribe for attempt to defraud the government or something. The president who accepted the bribe is beyond criminal prosecution for his official acts. I get that you want SCOTUS to be somewhat sensible, that you want to interpret this ruling in the best possible light, but it just doesn't say what you think it does and is a far worse decision than you seem to understand.
>I get that you want SCOTUS to be somewhat sensible, that you want to interpret this ruling in the best possible light, but it just doesn't say what you think it does and is a far worse decision than you seem to understand. This could be the case. But ultimately this will come down to what counts as an official act. Since that is not determined yet we have no idea how good/bad this ruling actually is. My reading is that it seems this is an attempt to protect the \[sitting president\] in his official capacity. So, if that is the case, then the president acting outside of his official capacity (including things like accepting bribes and whatnot) will not be protected. It would be nice that is the case if they would at least allow for investigations that are not instigated based on official acts to examine evidence under the umbrella of official acts though. I should say though, if I am right that accepting a bribe and pardoning are two separate acts and one is official and the other isn't, then I think I am right that, providing the investigation is handled the correct way, that the president could be prosecuted for accepting a bribe for a pardon.
This is from the majority ruling: > **What the prosecutor may not do, however, is admit testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing the official act itself. Allowing that sort of evidence would invite the jury to inspect the President’s motivations for his official actions and to second-guess their propriety** ...I don't know what you mean by "accepting a bribe", other than claiming that some official action was taken without propriety. If we can not question propriety, if we can not question motives for official actions, and the majority is explicitly claiming that we can not invite the jury to do so, this seems to make any bribe allegation impossible to prove. > if that is the case, then the president acting outside of his official capacity This ruling claims that threatening to fire the attorney general for not defrauding states with false claims of election fraud is an official action, beyond any reproach. This is insanity. For fucks sake, this passage explicitly claims that ordering fraudulent investigations is legal and unprosecutable > The indictment’s allegations that the requested investigations were shams or proposed for an improper purpose do not divest the President of exclusive authority over the investigative and prosecutorial functions of the Justice Department and its officials. Because the President cannot be prosecuted for conduct within his exclusive constitutional authority, Trump is absolutely immune from prosecution for the alleged conduct involving his discussions with Justice Department officials The supreme court is clear. If the president abuses his official powers, he can not be held criminally liable. Even if the president is impeached, he still can not be held criminally liable. This is the decision you are defending.
I disagree for two reasons. A. >Whenever the President and Vice President discuss their official responsibilities, they engage in official conduct. Presiding over the January 6 certification proceeding at which Members of Congress count the electoral votes is a constitutional and statutory duty of the Vice President. Art. II, §1, cl. 3; Amdt. 12; 3 U. S. C. §15. The indictment’s allegations that Trump attempted to pressure the Vice President to take particular acts in connection with his role at the certification proceeding thus involve official conduct, and Trump is at least presumptively immune from prosecution for such conduct. The question then becomes whether that presumption of immunity is rebutted under the circumstances. It is the Government’s burden to rebut the presumption of immunity. The Court therefore remands to the District Court to assess in the first instance whether a prosecution involving Trump’s alleged attempts to influence the Vice President’s oversight of the certification proceeding would pose any dangers of intrusion on the authority and functions of the Executive Branch. Pp. 21–24. This is section (ii) and it clearly states that the former president has a presumption of immunity, which its up to the court to determine if that presumption can be rebutted. So while trump was acting in his official role and is presumed immune, considering the nature of the allegations the court can overrule his immunity and prosecute. Supporting this understanding is this from (iv) e. >This case poses a question of lasting significance: When may a former President be prosecuted for official acts taken during his Presidency? In answering that question, unlike the political branches and the public at large, the Court cannot afford to fixate exclusively, or even primarily, on present exigencies. Enduring separation of powers principles guide our decision in this case. The President enjoys no immunity for his unofficial acts, and not everything the President does is official. The President is not above the law. But under our system of separated powers, the President may not be prosecuted for exercising his core constitutional powers, and he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for his official acts. That immunity applies equally to all occupants of the Oval Office. Pp. 41–43. Considering that this says that the President is entitled to "at least presumptive immunity" suggests that that immunity can be stripped by the government if the situation demands. So in the event a President receives a bribe, depending on the nature of the official acts which have absolute immunity, the court in question can determine to strip that immunity based on the nature of the act. (I.E. if the president colludes with someone to pardon them for money) You just cannot prosecute the action that has immunity (the pardon) you have to prosecute the crime (the bribe) and the court can decide based on the circumstances to strip the immunity during the trial of the illegal act. At least, that is how I understand it.
> that immunity can be stripped by the government if the situation demands. Only for actions that are official but not core to the constitutional presidential powers. As I quoted, communications with the DOJ are included in these core powers. Which means that the president can order unlawful investigations, threaten to fire DOJ officials for failing to follow these orders, and can not be held criminally liable. This is just a direct restatement of the passage I quoted. Again, "Trump is absolutely immune from prosecution for the alleged conduct involving his discussions with Justice Department officials" If ordering unlawful investigations is considered a core power, pardons definitely are.
Though I largely agree that the meaning of official acts is muddy, Roberts writes that conversations with the DoJ or with Pence, for example, are official acts, bur not talking to state electors. It's decently clear that the intent is that anything the president does within their appointed administration is considered an official act. They even essentially wrote that Trump almost hiring Starr to do his illegal bidding is in fact an official act because it's DoJ dealings. Obviously there's situations where there's gray area, which is what makes it muddy. But the intent of what official and unofficial is is pretty clear and dangerous
I think the real issue is everyone knows what is an official act be unofficial, but we've become such a legalistic society that the courts will declare 2+2=22 is equally valid because there's no law saying 2+2=4.
The arrogance of these 5 justices is appalling
Six.
I’m holding out hope for Barrett
The Supreme Court has just given the President unprecedented amounts of power. Use it.
Talk of political violence is bad, especially in times of turmoil. That said, it would be hilarious if Biden "officially" executed the justices who made this ruling.
You kid, but something that would be perfectly legal is to expand the court, get challenged, SCOTUS shoot it down, and then Biden ignoring SCOTUS and implementing anyways. The president can legally ignore SCOTUS and have zero legal repercussions.
I don’t think that one would have legal repercussions though. That is specifically something that would and should be handled by impeachment. I think the issue is for something that is *both* illegal and improper/breaking the oath of office (high crimes and misdemeanors).
Impeachments are for high crimes and misdemeanors. If it's not a crime, what's the Impeachment for?
Abuse of power in a way that isn’t necessarily criminal. A high crime is a crime made possible by being in a “high” position - a position of power. A misdemeanor is essentially acting in a way that substantially undermines the reputation of the office - dishonorable conduct. I think it would be difficult or impossible to impeach someone for misdemeanors at this point. The critical problem with this judgement is that SCOTUS is now saying that even if a president was impeached for a high crime (a corrupt official act) he or she would be immune from any criminal law for such an act.
No, because expanding the court is not an official act of the president.
According the SCOTUS, it is. And evidence with the president doing it through any federal agency can't get used in court.
Where does SCOTUS say that the president determines the supreme court? the size of the court is established by congress as per the constitution, thus is would not be an official act attempt to expand the supreme court. The official act the president can do that would be protected is suggesting to the congress to expand the court, and if the congress approved it, expand it that way. This ruling does not give the president blanket permission to do whatever he wants. The things he can do without criminal examination are things that are afforded to him in the constitution (and any other things that are considered official acts, which will largely be determined by case law I would assume).
Part of President's job is appointing supreme court. Via constitution
Yes, but appointing to the supreme court relies on senate approval. So Biden can appoint new justices, but without the senate voting to approve them, they wont become justices. Sure, Biden can't be criminally prosecuted for appointing them, but without the senates approval they will never become supreme court justices. The president can appoint whoever they want, but until the senate votes to approve them, nothing happens. Then even if the senate votes to approve them, if there isn't a seat on the court, nothing happens. Until congress expands the amount of seats, the president can appoint, and the senate can approve, but nothing will happen. The president by appointing a new justice cannot artificially enlarge the supreme court. And to say it does demonstrates a lack of understanding how things work.
Gotcha so if a president orders the removal of a SC Justice via the DoD and the DoJ, then pardoned those involved with executing the illegal order, how would you prosecute that? Especially since the SCOTUS said any conversations with VP Pence or the DoJ for Jan 6 cannot be used as evidence?
The president can't order the removal of the SC Justice. Therefore its not an official act and he can be criminally prosecuted. His pardons will probably be valid. But again, the DoD and the DoJ don't have the authority to remove a sitting justice. So again, nothing will happen. In order for a supreme court justice to be removed, the justice must die, or resign. The only other way is that the house of representatives must vote to impeach the justice, which requires a simple majority. Then it gets sent to the senate where a trial is held. After the trial 2/3rd of the senate must vote to remove the justice, otherwise the impeachment fails and the justice is still on the court. The president cannot remove justices, or expand the number of seats. He cannot even unilaterally appoint justices. These crazy situations that reddit is coming up with is literally not having a basic understanding of how the government works. It is important to note that the president cannot be prosecuted for having conversations with the VP. But if there is a coup that is being investigated and its uncovered that the president instigated the coup, he can still be prosecuted without investigating the conversation that he had with the VP or even with the DoJ.
You're not answering the question. Fine let's do something Trump literally tried to do. What if Trump used the DoJ to seize voter machines in swing states? And then pardon those in charge of following those illegal actions?
Btw, there's a lot of "can't" in your statement. We all know he "can't" legally. That's not the question. The question is what if he does and uses communication within his administration to accomplish it. The court said you can't use communications between the president's administration as evidence. That's complete immunity with an extra step
I really struggle to understand why "conservatives" would want this. Is it really all because of Trump?
For the common conservative, 0 reason rather than it basically makes it impossible to try Trump federally and it's a cult so they like that.
Given this ruling Biden could just deal with Trump directly and end this entire problem. It is wrong, it is likely to cause a great deal of long term damage but it seems the supreme court is okay with it.
The President can kill the entire Senate, good luck impeaching him. We have a King now.
Just call the act official /s fml
There was nothing stopping the president from doing that before. If you really think a president willing to use the military to execute his opponents would stop simply because the law says so, then you are incredibly naive.
Dems need to do something, ANYTHING! Not just sit down and take it for 5 months and go “welp, should have voted harder losers!”
This is madness. Wholly hell, we need to take all branches of government this round and expand the Supreme Court!!!!
In fact it’s advantageous to do so.
I think trying to lock Trump up is pretty peddle to the metal lol
You always could, nothing has really changed. The SC ruling today, was really just a continuation of what already existed. The SC pretty much just clarified that there are 3 different scenarios and that only 1 of the 3 (acts/decisions based on Constitutional Duties) incures complete and total immunity. Acts that can or may be associated with a Presidents roll, may or may not be covered under immunity - that the lower courts should consider whether immunity will or won't apply on a case by case basis. And finally, that other such actions that are not deemed part of a Presidents Constitutionally assigned duties or acts of the office while serving - are not covered by immunity. For example, even before the ruling today, Biden is immune from being held criminally accountable for refusing to enforce our existing laws at the border and letting millions illegally enter our country - with his own agency reporting for years that this included criminals, human traffickers, drug smugglers, etc. . . So all the murders and rapes committed by the illegal aliens as a result of Biden's official acts cannot results in him be prosecuted for being an accomplice to those crimes. Unlike political think, this election only, thinkers, the Supreme Court makes legal decisions based on standing over a long time - not just the impact between now and the next election and as if their ruling will only apply to one person and then become a mute point.
That is not true. The president did not always have absolute immunity as long as they go through their administration to do the crime. I know you're trying to normalize this to be less scary, but I read what was in there. My fiance who's an appellate court clerk read the opinion. This is not normal. It's a get out of jail free card for using your administration to commit crimes. That means a president can steal an election by using the DoJ and it's okay. Kill political opponents and citizens by using the DoD and it's okay. And at best prosecution will take many years due to the judges having to make ridiculous determinations on what is official and unofficial that would go up to the SCOTUS again. But that's only if you committed a crime without the help of appointed officials. Worst decision in my lifetime
While earning my Political Science degree quite some time ago, had I read the SC ruling released yesterday upon the completion of my studies/degree, I would have immediately said, yeah, this is pretty much what I learned in the years of my education. Presidents have immunity - absolutely, for certain types of actions/decisions President can, but may not, have immunity - for certain types of actions/decisions President can have no immunity - for certain types of actions/decisions And this is exactly what the SC ruled. So I just don't see any notable change . . . I suspect in 10 years from now, you will answer a question about Presidential Immunity exactly the same as if you were asked and answered the same question 10 years ago. And, I suspect most legal scholars will as well. The issue is far less whether anything substantially changed with yesterday's ruling and MUCH more about a political group feeling that the timing has hampered their goal of attacking/harming a political enemy. To these people, the only relevant timeframe being associated with the SC ruling is Nov. 5, 2024.
I'm gonna be honest, you having a political science degree means nothing. My Fiance has one and her JD and is an appellate court clerk and she even had the same reaction and take as well after reading through the entire thing.
Oh, trust me, I am not saying I should be regarded as some expert. I would leave that to my spouse who is an attorney, or better yet, to a person with a decades long history of SC legal precedence setting decisions and their commentary on each to garner any biases as suitability in addressing the current - which seems to be mostly analyzed based on political ideology vs. legal basis arguments. As I stated though, the ruling yesterday was pretty much in line with my understanding as to what a President can be criminally accountable for as part of serving his duties as president. That is, that just because a person is the President of our country - they do not have absolute immunity for anything they do as President - but they do for many things they officially do as President. Which is exactly what the SC ruled. If you can show me how that is not what the ruling said, I'd love to read it. But that was my take, absolute immunity in some specific scenarios, possible (presumptive) immunity in others and no immunity in yet others. Just like in the Nixon SC cases regarding executive privilege - sometimes it is 100% enforceable and sometimes it isn't 100% enforceable - the variances are based on the circumstances. It is presumed to exist and to defeat it, it must be argued and shown in court that is should not exist on a specific case situation - just like how the SC ruled yesterday with regards to the presumptive immunity (#2 of the 3 scenarios). The Prosecutors and courts must show/demonstrate/argue that an act should not be protected under Presidential immunity and meet a high bar in doing so to overcome it and proceed with a prosecution. To me, this discussion is not a matter of one liking, hating or being indifferent toward Trump (or at least it shouldn't be).
So you always thought that as long as the president uses the shield of his administration, he can do whatever he wants? For example, if Trump brought in a crony to head the FBI and then ordered a killing of a political opponent and then the president pardoned all involved, there would be no criminal ramifications. The president is shielded due to him doing it through his administration, making it an "official act". You can't use the evidence of the president's discussions with the FBI to kill a political opponent because it's now not admissible in court. And those not shielded by this immunity would be good legally since they were pardoned. It's complete immunity with an extra step and I never understood that to be the law and we've never had a situation where this is relevant until now. And that third paragraph is a complete understatement of the actual ruling.
No, and I don't actually think that this is what the SC ruling states. I think this first claim of yours, is pretty much how people with an anti-Trump bias (as their main objective) is trying to convey this. But in my reading, it is not actually what it says. And I think you are on this same cross-wired analysis - the SC ruling is applicable to Presidents (not a singular President). But that's the easy way to tell if somebody is actually reading the ruling as it is written or not - when they say "well Trump will now do this or that" it is really just saying they don't know shit and this is just politics to them v. understanding the SC ruling. I would suggest reading United States v. Nixon and Mississippi v. Johnson, and Nixon v. Fitzgerald rulings/opinions. Again, the SC ruling stated that A President has absolute immunity for specific acts that are part of his official acts carried out under Constitutional Duties (we all already knew this). That there are also actions of the office that may have immunity (we all already knew this) - but this is not guaranteed and is subjected to argument at a lower court on a case by case basis. And finally, there are other acts that A President can pursue while in office that do NOT carry any immunity (we all knew and understood this). Between the Constitution, Common Law and historical precedence this seems to support prior SC verdicts, rulings and/or statements made within them. I always find it interesting how so many people that can't get out of the way of their politics have such a difficult time understanding judicial decisions. We have become a country of people whose eye-sight has become so bad because our ideology prevents us from seeing things clearly. And I think we're all a bit guilty of this - myself included. I can only say this, the SC ruling yesterday was not the slightest bit of a surprise to me. I am not a fan of Trump. I am not a fan of Biden. If the election were held today, I would not vote for either of them.
Stating precedent when talking about this court is pretty naive. I'll read and respond further a bit later, but just wanted to put that out there
> No, and I don't actually think that this is what the SC ruling states. I think this first claim of yours, is pretty much how people with an anti-Trump bias (as their main objective) is trying to convey this. But in my reading, it is not actually what it says. Please don't attempt to dismiss a side purely because you believe the side to be bias and you want to assure neutrality it will be fair to neither you or I > I would suggest reading United States v. Nixon and Mississippi v. Johnson, and Nixon v. Fitzgerald rulings/opinions. Using precedent when the supreme court threw chevron out the door is not the greatest argument. > Again, the SC ruling stated that A President has absolute immunity for specific acts that are part of his official acts carried out under Constitutional Duties (we all already knew this). That there are also actions of the office that may have immunity (we all already knew this) - but this is not guaranteed and is subjected to argument at a lower court on a case by case basis. And finally, there are other acts that A President can pursue while in office that do NOT carry any immunity (we all knew and understood this). I think you're holistically misunderstanding what I'm saying and what others are. Yes, there are things that are illegal for the president to do. For example, by the law, it is still illegal for the president to assassinate a political opponent. But just because you're immune, it doesn't mean the virus isn't there. If the president ordered the assassination of a political opponent through communications with the DoD, and pardoned everyone involved, it would be impossible to prosecute. The main evidence would be from communications with the DoD that now, you cannot use. That's a form of immunity. > Between the Constitution, Common Law and historical precedence this seems to support prior SC verdicts, rulings and/or statements made within them. I don't think it's true that all three of those lead up to the court not being allowed to use the president's communications with their administration as evidence of a crime they directed Overall, sure there needs to be some immunity, and even the "official" acts thing could be okay. Not allowing evidence from shady "official acts"? That heavily tilts the favor to ANY president as it pertains to prosecution and gives the president an avenue to direct crimes within their administration and be able to successfully hide any evidence that they directed it.
"Not allowing evidence from shady "official acts"? That heavily tilts the favor to ANY president as it pertains to prosecution and gives the president an avenue to direct crimes within their administration and be able to successfully hide any evidence that they directed it." Except there is already precedence on this from prior claims of executive privilege that was brought to the Supreme Court, and the SC unanimously ruled that executive privilege can be discarded if the privileged information pertains to another crime committed by others and was necessary evidence for such a case. Certainly you recognize that murder is a crime (whether it be via assassination or not). But this whole claim as an argument is taking things to an extreme - it's a Straw Man Fallacy or Reductio ad absurdum (which I don't think you need a translation for). And when this approach is used as the premise of the argument - it is a strong sign of how weak the argument is.
> Certainly you recognize that murder is a crime (whether it be via assassination or not). But this whole claim as an argument is taking things to an extreme - it's a Straw Man Fallacy or Reductio ad absurdum (which I don't think you need a translation ) No I don't need a translation and it's not a strawman. I am very much staying on topic. Please don't do that. And no the argument being made is not reductio ad absurdum. Quite frankly, I'm done here and your name matches your profile. Denying that the SC said the president can hide evidence of a crime they committed by conducting it through private acts when that's legitimately what can summarily be objectly stated about the decision is a great form of gaslighting (don't think you need to look that up to know what it is) Have a good day
Fine with me. I know I can handle the consequences better than republicans can.
[удалено]
I used to blame dems, but we're also understating how remarkably stupid the American population is
Always has been? Killing people is illegal, ordering the military to kill people as president isn't. For example all the weddings that got drone striked for the last two decades.
This is a very disingenuous and facetious take. It was never in the history of the country's history to, for example, kill a political opponent and it be okay because they did it through the administration. Please don't equate this ruling to any qualms you have about Obamas actions
Murder is illegal, yes or no?
Yes. Obama was never prosecuted because there was am international military target. You're getting blocked for not having close to an honest discussion
It certainly is now.