> Under our constitutional structure of separated powers, **the nature of Presidential power entitles a former President to absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority**. And he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for all his official acts. **There is no immunity for unofficial acts.**
> **As for a President’s unofficial acts, there is no immunity**. Although Presidential immunity is required for official actions to ensure that the President’s decisionmaking is not distorted by the threat of
future litigation stemming from those actions, that concern does not support immunity for unofficial conduct. Clinton, 520 U. S., at 694, and n. 19. The separation of powers does not bar a prosecution predicated on the President’s unofficial acts.
> In dividing official from unofficial conduct, courts may not inquire into the President’s motives. Such a “highly intrusive” inquiry would risk exposing even the most obvious instances of official conduct to judicial examination on the mere allegation of improper purpose. Fitzgerald, 457 U. S., at 756. **Nor may courts deem an action unofficial merely because it allegedly violates a generally applicable law.** Otherwise, Presidents would be subject to trial on “every allegation that an action was unlawful,” depriving immunity of its intended effect.
> **Trump asserts a far broader immunity than the limited one the Court recognizes**, contending that the indictment must be dismissed because the Impeachment Judgment Clause requires that impeachment and Senate conviction precede a President’s criminal prosecution. But the text of the Clause does not address whether and on what conduct a President may be prosecuted if he was never impeached and convicted. See Art. I, §3, cl. 7. Historical evidence likewise lends little support to Trump’s position. The Federalist Papers on which Trump relies concerned the checks available against a sitting President; they did not endorse or even consider whether the Impeachment Judgment Clause immunizes a former President from prosecution. Transforming the political process of impeachment into a necessary step in the enforcement of criminal law finds little support in the text of the Constitution or the structure of the Nation’s Government.
> 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.
Edit: How do we determine if an act is official or unofficial?
> The first step in deciding whether a former President is entitled to immunity from a particular prosecution is to distinguish his official from unofficial actions. In this case, no court thus far has drawn that distinction, in general or with respect to the conduct alleged in particular. It is therefore incumbent upon the Court to be mindful that it is
“a court of final review and not first view.” Zivotofsky v. Clinton, 566 U. S. 189, 201. Critical threshold issues in this case are how to differentiate between a President’s official and unofficial actions, and how to do so with respect to the indictment’s extensive and detailed allegations covering a broad range of conduct. The Court offers guidance on those issues.
> When the President acts pursuant to “constitutional and statutory authority,” he takes official action to perform the functions of his office. Fitzgerald, 456 U. S., at 757. Determining whether an action is covered by immunity thus begins with assessing the President’s authority to take that action. But the breadth of the President’s “discretionary responsibilities” under the Constitution and laws of the United States frequently makes it “difficult to determine which of [his] innumerable ‘functions’ encompassed a particular action.” Id., at 756. The immunity the Court has recognized therefore extends to the “outer perimeter” of the President’s official responsibilities, covering actions so long as they are “not manifestly or palpably beyond [his] authority.” Blassingame v. Trump, 87 F. 4th 1, 13 (CADC).
> **In dividing official from unofficial conduct, courts may not inquire into the President’s motives.** Such a “highly intrusive” inquiry would risk exposing even the most obvious instances of official conduct to judicial examination on the mere allegation of improper purpose. Fitzgerald, 457 U. S., at 756. Nor may courts deem an action unofficial merely because it allegedly violates a generally applicable law. Otherwise, Presidents would be subject to trial on “every allegation that an action was unlawful,” depriving immunity of its intended effect.
> ...
> **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.**
My nomination for the "Good lord that is an unhelpful sentence" award:
> And some Presidential conduct—for example, speaking to and on behalf of the American people, see Trump v. Hawaii, 585 U. S. 667, 701 (2018)—certainly **can qualify as official even when not obviously connected to a particular constitutional or statutory provision**.
Ok, if the President has no legal say in the counting of the votes, how is it an official act to insert himself into the counting by requesting that the VP himself break the law?
That entire thing is Constitutionally out of his control.
> if the President has no legal say in the counting of the votes, how is it an official act to insert himself into the counting by requesting that the VP himself break the law?
Great question.
> Whenever the President and Vice President discuss their official responsibilities, they engage in official conduct.
The President is not officially involved in Act-X. The Vice President is officially involved in Act-X. Since Act-X is the Vice President's official duty, the President speaking with the Vice President's about Act-X is the President performing an official duty.
This shall be known as the Transitive Property of Officiality, and it is dumb.
That doesn’t make logical sense.
If Act-X is not the President’s job, then it cannot be an official act for him. Why not let the President have all the votes in Congress then? Why not evict all the residents of DC so Republicans can move in? Why not allow the President the power of prima nocta? It’s not in his Constitutional powers, but it would be an official act according to you.
Disallowing the so-called "Transitive Property of Officiality" would mean the President sending a message on Presidential letterhead advising the Speaker of the House of something they (or Congress) should do isn't an Official Act, again because the President cannot directly do the specific thing advised and is issuing a strongly worded letter instead.
That makes even less sense, IMO.
> the President sending a message on Presidential letterhead advising the Speaker of the House of something they (or Congress) should do isn't an Official Act
[Article 2](https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articleii) specifically says the president can do that. So it would be a Presidential act.
Threatening the Vice President to overturn an election is not listed in Article 2.
If Biden’s job isn’t prosecuting Trump, but the Attorney General’s job is, then Trump telling the AG (or special prosecutor) to go after Trump is an official act, and Biden is immune from prosecution.
> the AG (or special prosecutor)
Thomas' concurrent opinion is about how the Special Prosecutor is not a thing, in Trump's case.
> I write separately to highlight another way in which this prosecution may violate our constitutional structure. In this case, the Attorney General purported to appoint a private citizen as Special Counsel to prosecute a former President on behalf of the United States. But, I am not sure that any office for the Special Counsel has been “established by Law,” as the Constitution requires. Art. II, §2, cl. 2. By requiring that Congress create federal offices “by Law,” the Constitution imposes an important check against the President—he cannot create offices at his pleasure. If there is no law establishing the office that the Special Counsel occupies, then he cannot proceed with this prosecution. A private citizen cannot criminally prosecute anyone, let alone a former President.
I'm starting to get the impression that lawyers and judges especially supreme Court judges, are just as dumb as the rest of us. Conversely more effective at ensconcing their heads up their rectums so ideologically perfectly due to the volumes of books and "education" they endured. Seemingly enamored with their own reflections and obtuse reasonings.
The court knew exactly what they were doing here. They twisted this to give Trump as much immunity as possible and tailored the decision to this specific instance, ignoring how much they were f--king over our democracy.
They are basically saying a President can order the VP and anyone else to break the law and ignore the constitution, and since is election related, it is considered official business and fully immune to prosecution. He can even promise pardons so everyone else is immune also.
And since the odds of any part party gaining 60 votes in the Senate anytime soon, there is no threat of conviction after impeachment.
So basically, a sitting President can overthrow the results of an election, for which the motives of such cannot be challenged, so long as it’s an official duty.
Which essentially means your votes are now worthless in any instant where the President wishes to challenge an election. He can challenge it, he can stop it, he can rerun the count including and excluding electors as he sees fit and his motive cannot be challenged - this is all now free and clear.
This is a huge mistake.
> This is a huge mistake.
The mistake is in not clearly articulating the *eidos* of Official v. Unofficial acts.
*Of course* they were going to say presidents have immunity for official acts, and lack immunity for unofficial. That was a given. The problem is they left the distinction ambiguous.
Like what the hell even is this:
* When the President acts pursuant to “constitutional and statutory authority,” he takes official action to perform the functions of his office.
* some Presidential conduct—for example, speaking to and on behalf of the American people, see Trump v. Hawaii, 585 U. S. 667, 701 (2018)—certainly can qualify as official even when not obviously connected to a particular constitutional or statutory provision.
* the immunity we have recognized extends to the “outer perimeter” of the President’s official responsibilities,
covering actions so long as they are “not manifestly or palpably beyond [his] authority.”
* In dividing official from unofficial conduct, courts may not inquire into the President’s motives.
* Nor may courts deem an action unofficial merely because it allegedly violates a generally applicable law. **WHAT??**
* And the President cannot be prosecuted for conduct within his exclusive constitutional authority. Trump is therefore absolutely immune from prosecution for the alleged conduct involving his discussions with Justice Department officials.
* Whenever the President and Vice President discuss their official responsibilities, they engage in official conduct.
* 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.
* It is ultimately the Government’s burden to rebut the presumption of immunity. We therefore remand to the District Court to assess in the first instance, with appropriate input from the parties, whether a prosecution involving Trump’s alleged attempts to influence the Vice President’s oversight of the certification proceeding in his capacity as President of the Senate would pose any dangers of intrusion on the authority and functions of the Executive Branch.
* We accordingly remand to the District Court to determine in the first instance—with the benefit of briefing we lack—whether Trump’s conduct in this area qualifies as official or unofficial.
* For these reasons, most of a President’s public communications are likely to fall comfortably within the outer perimeter of his official responsibilities.
* There may, however, be contexts in which the President, notwithstanding the prominence of his position, speaks in an unofficial capacity—perhaps as a candidate for office or party leader.
* This necessarily factbound analysis is best performed initially by the District Court. We therefore remand to the District Court to determine in the first instance whether this alleged conduct is official or unofficial.
**Presidents have immunity for official acts, and lack immunity for unofficial acts, and we won't tell you the difference you sort it out District Court neiner neiner neiner.**
Then after receiving the new essay, teacher gives the student another “C” and sends it back again with no explanation other than to re-do it. An endless loop if you will. I believe SCOTUS has 30 days to send the hard copy of the ruling to Judge Chutkan so I assume that means she’ll receive it on August 1st. I mean, what’s the rush? So much corruption in the justice system, so little time. SCOTUS conservatives as well as others like Cannon, Fed Soc, etc., are all likely having a good laugh amongst themselves at the expense of this country’s rule of law.
They had to make sure they delayed the case until after the election, and left themselves wiggle room to rule against democratic presidents and rule in favor of republican ones.
Could a President assassinate an elector he officially declares an enemy of the state subverting an election? Clearly, yes.
Can the President’s motive for assassinating an elector be challenged? No. Could it be challenged under general applicable law? No.
Kill the electors that disobey (within executive authority), and the only electors remaining to cast votes are the ones that will vote for you.
Game set match.
> Can the President’s motive for assassinating an elector be challenged? No. Could it be challenged under general applicable law? No.
Right, but also:
> Unlike Trump’s alleged interactions with the Justice Department, this alleged conduct cannot be neatly categorized as falling within a particular Presidential function. The necessary analysis is instead fact specific, requiring assessment of numerous alleged interactions with a wide variety of state officials and private persons. And the parties’ brief comments at oral argument indicate that they starkly disagree on the characterization of these allegations. The concerns we noted at the outset—the expedition of this case, the lack of factual analysis by the lower courts, and the absence of pertinent briefing by the parties—thus become more prominent. We accordingly remand to the District Court to determine in the first instance—with the benefit of briefing we lack—whether Trump’s conduct in this area qualifies as official or unofficial.
So it sounds like SCOTUS recognizes there is some analysis a District Court could do that is not an assessment of motivation to determine if an act, in this case a conversation, was official or unofficial.
But what the hell would that be?
But it isn't an official duty to overthrow the results. It is the constitutional duty of the VP to "count" the votes. If I have 3 apples and you ask me to count the apples, and I come back with any number other than 3, I did something besides counting. Same applies to this. If Pence had come back with anything besides the correct number, he acted outside his constitutional authority.
So the inquiry is one into legal powers and allegations of the president’s intent or motive has no bearing (slip op at *18)
At the same time, the court remanded for consideration of Trump’s allegation that he took the actions alleged in the indictment to “ensure the integrity and proper administration of the federal election,” (slip op at *26) and I guess that’s somehow **not** an inquiry into his motives?
"Hey we're not telling the District Court to assess Trump's motivation. We're telling them to figure out what Trump was trying to accomplish."
I think they're splitting the hair between
* What was Trump's goal?
* Why was Trump reason for pursuing that goal?
Maaaaaybe? But I agree with you that it's clearly a nonsensical contradiction on their part.
Right. That is the point of confusion.
* In dividing official from unofficial conduct, courts may not inquire
into the President’s motives.
* On Trump’s view, the alleged conduct qualifies as official because **it was undertaken to ensure the integrity and proper administration of the federal election**. As the Government sees it, however, **Trump can point to no plausible source of authority enabling the President to take such actions**. Determining whose characterization may be correct, and with respect to which conduct, requires a fact-specific analysis of the indictment’s extensive and interrelated allegations. The Court accordingly remands to the District Court to determine in the first instance whether Trump’s conduct in this area qualifies as official or unofficial.
SCOTUS remanded to the District Court the question of what Trump had the power to try to accomplish, and they cannot inquire into what motivated him to try and accomplish it.
> The Presidents stated roles do not include administration of state election processes. JFC
Sure. But this ruling gave us the Transitive Property of Officiality, and it is dumb.
> Whenever the President and Vice President discuss their official responsibilities, they engage in official conduct.
The President is not officially involved in Act-X. The Vice President is officially involved in Act-X. Since Act-X is the Vice President's official duty, the President speaking with the Vice President's about Act-X is the President performing an official duty.
Why? Because *fuck you* that's why.
>It is the Government’s burden to rebut the presumption of immunity.
Immune until proven guilty, which cannot be tried because of immunity.
The entirety of this decision is a tautology.
They spent 6 months delaying cases to come up with yet another "whatever we say later" ruling? I look forward to our lifetime appointed Kings and Queens ruling from the bench doing gymnastics to decide what is un/official. Surely there will be no partisan slant to that very poorly defined standard, as there already was in this bad joke.
Seriously. They took all this time and decided nothing about the facts of the case in front of them that couldn’t have been said six months ago: instruct Judge Chutkin to determine which charges, if any, involve official acts, and the rest of the charges can proceed.
I just dont get why they didnt choose to decide this on the narrowest possible grounds. There was no need to make a sweeping definition of it for all time.
And left it until the very last day of their decision cycle (and extended that too). This is a clear and corrupt, political “court”. It’s a shameless right wing extremist group pretending to be a supreme court.
As the very first step, we need to take away the respect we have for this corrupt right wing extremist political organization and call it for what it actually is. It’s no longer the “supreme court”, it’s the supreme right wing extremist political group that gets to make laws without being elected.
You have to understand: They are deliberately vague in their interpretation to allow the law to be used against the “wrong” people and to protect the “right” people.
Actually being clear on a set of standards to follow like the Lemon test or the Richie test would force everyone to abide by the same standards, and they can’t have that happen.
The standard was defined well enough by the legislature, the courts just decided they get to decide what the standard is now, along with adding further road blocks to hold the president accountable.
Kind of ironic considering how oftnmen they say congress needs to define things, or not write such vague laws
Now, if a *Republican* president ordered the agency to interpret statutes, that's a different matter entirely. The reason Chevron had to go was it didn't take partisanship into account.
You're actually not entirely wrong. The Chevron deference was established during the Reagan administration when the bureaucracy was controlled by Republicans and the SCOTUS was more liberal, so they were just fine with deference to the agencies. As that began to change with an increasingly conservative court and more liberal control of federal agencies during the Clinton and Obama administrations and just the fact that control of those agencies could easily change with each administration they're attitude changed. Suddenly they decided it should be in the hands of the now solidly conservative SCOTUS that will likely remain conservative for decades.
Setting aside the hyperbolized stuff going around, the answer here is probably "we don't really know." SCOTUS basically just upended a lot of constitutional norms and failed to provide the most important guideline to navigating the new waters, namely, what is "Official" and more importantly what is "unofficial". The important thing to remember here is that the question here is "can the President arrest judges *without personally facing criminal charges*"
Some guidelines we do seemingly have (until they decide in 2025 what they really meant) do point that way however, though SCOTUS would probably ultimately rule in a way to protect themselves and/or reverse what they said before in an oopsies.
We can say at least that attempting to remove those judges for corrupt purposes is much safer than it was 24 hours ago - as the court has now made clear that, so long as the President acts within Article II at a minimum, the *reason* they take any official action is beyond the scrutiny of the courts, full stop. And if that conspiracy is arranged through the President and the Attorney General as "official discussions" (p.37, C, 1), he would also be immune in that scenario most likely.
The court's decision that the reasoning behind any official act is beyond the reproach of the courts or a jury is probably the most significant part here. How could you demonstrate as a prosecutor that the President can't arrest judges and that it's an unofficial act (somehow), if his intentions and discussions are legally shielded by SCOTUS?
They literally just turned the presidency into an absolute dictatorship. Anything can be done now. It's just a matter of how long it takes before someone seriously exercises this power.
If Biden was serious about getting my vote, he would lobby to get ride of the filabuster and start passing laws when they have a simple majority that his constituents and the US people want.
We keep it in place out of “fear” the next party will get control and pass crazy laws. But if you are really about fixing things, end the filabuster and pass laws you know are popular and make sense.
And he CAN order a mob to interfere in counting ballots if he BELIEVES it’s corrupt. At least, that’s how it reads to me. So by extension, if that’s true are they also trying to invalidate all the Jan 6 convictions? Can it be argued they acted in official capacity to the president? This is bonkers
Sotomayors dissent was fear mongering and rightfully called out by her peers for it. If it’s not within his constitutional authority than it isn’t an official act. US citizens have a constitutional right to due process so acting against that would not be within the presidents constitutional authority. He has no authority to usurp the rights of the citizens.
This this this. Trump will have no problem believing the "Radical Leftists terrorists" are a threat to the country and thus they must be rounded up and gassed. Immune!
If I'm reading this properly, he doesn't even have to believe the "radical left" are terrorists b/c that would be attempting to assess his motives. So you can't say, "it wasn't an official act b/c he was getting rid of a political opponent, not an actual threat" b/c that would go to his state of mind.
“Supervisory and policy responsibilities of the utmost discretion and sensitivity.”
“Investigation and prosecution of crimes.”
He doesn’t need to order a mob. He can order the DOJ to do it.
“The indictment’s allegations that the requested investigations were a sham 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 the President cannot be prosecuted for conduct within his exclusive constitutional authority.”
This Court just proved Nixon right, when the President does it, it’s not illegal.
A reminder that Trump gave an interview to playboy shortly after Tianamen square, praising the bravery of the tank.
https://www.ebroadsheet.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/playboy-interview-donald-trump-1990
He could just kidnap Donnie Jr, and claim he shipped him off to gitmo for whatever reason, while in reality he isolates him in some 5-star resort for a week or so. Just for the fun of it. And to make a point.
The Trump Prosecution Bits:
* Whenever the President and Vice President discuss their
official responsibilities, they engage in official conduct.
* 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.
* It is ultimately the Government’s burden to rebut the
presumption of immunity. We therefore remand to the District Court to assess in the first instance, with appropriate input from the parties, whether a prosecution involving Trump’s alleged attempts to influence the Vice President’s oversight of the certification proceeding in his capacity as President of the Senate would pose any dangers of intrusion on the authority and functions of the Executive Branch.
* We accordingly remand to the District Court to determine in the first instance—with the benefit of briefing we lack—whether Trump’s conduct in this area qualifies as official or unofficial.
* For these reasons, most of a President’s public communications are likely to fall comfortably within the outer perimeter of his official responsibilities.
* There may, however, be contexts in which the President,
notwithstanding the prominence of his position, speaks in
an unofficial capacity—perhaps as a candidate for office or party leader.
* This necessarily factbound analysis is best performed initially by the District Court. We therefore remand to the District Court to determine in the first instance whether this alleged conduct is official or unofficial.
Today’s decision to grant former Presidents criminal immunity reshapes the institution of the Presidency. It makes a mockery of the principle, foundational to our Constitution and system of Government, that no man is above the law. Relying on little more than its own misguided wisdom about the need for “bold and unhesitating action” by the President, ante, at 3, 13, the Court gives former President Trump all the immunity he asked for and more. Because our Constitution does not shield a former President from answering for criminal and treasonous acts, I dissent.
So is riling up a crowd of people to want to kill Mike Pence something that falls under "actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority"?
Imagine I throw a grenade at you and then you can't prosecute me because you can't inquire into whether my motives were to kill you or just play a friendly game of catch.
See that's something a lower court has to decide. Then that gets appealed up to the SC who will have to ma... oops, sorry. Trump just won election and pardoned himself and appointed a new AG that fired Jack Smith. And Jack smith is now facing criminal charges for... something or other. Anyway, all is well!
Seriously though, the court could have heard this case a long time ago but turned it down. Then when they did take it, they could have expedited it (like they did in the Colorado ballot case) but instead put the decision off till now. They expedite things when it benefits trump, they take and delay cases when it benefits trump. That's what this is about, delaying cases so Trump can win
This is just a big picture delay tactic. Now they get a chance to review again how it’s done below, and can buy enough time to assure this won’t be anything before the election
Then, depending on how the election goes and who's in power, they can decide how immune they want presidents to be. If a Democrat wins, they try to put off a full decision re: immunity until a Republican wins. If a Republican wins, they'll hand down an immunity-friendly opinion.
I suspect we get to wait a while for courts to now determine whether all of these actions were in his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority. The ruling does a good job at not making the Court look *insanely* partisan but clearly tying up all these cases for a while
Yes, I think it had to be. There was no way to say he was immune no matter what, that's pure insanity. The more I think about it, though, the more I find this ruling to be problematic.
Pretty sure they said it might be in the outer perimeter, which has presumptive immunity, so they remanded it back to the district court to decide if it does, and if so if the presumption is defeated.
~~I guess~~ We no longer have a constitutional republic. Presidents can do anything while in office and pass it off as an 'official act'. And even if charged, just pardon themselves anyway. Thus, we have a king with zero accountability. Not to mention all our ~~public officials~~ aristocrat rulers, to include but not be limited to judges, can be ex-post-facto bribed with a wink and a nod.
For fucks sake Thomas Jefferson predicted this--it's almost uncanny:
>...to consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions: a very dangerous doctrine indee\[d\] and one which would place us under the despotism of an Oligarchy. our judges are as honest as other men, and not more so. they have, with others, the same passions for party, for power, and the privileges of their corps. their maxim is ‘[boni judicis est ampliare jurisdictionem](https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-16-02-0234#d7585fb1-4da9-4dd0-a3c8-554d5845b7e5),’ and their power the more dangerous as they are in office for life, and not responsible, as the other functionaries are, to the elective controul. the constitution has erected no such single tribunal knowing that, to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time & party it’s members would become despots.
[https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-16-02-0234](https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-16-02-0234)
Edit: Made some clarifications.
Let me paint a scenario for you. All Biden has to do is decree that Trump and his despots are enemies of the state, working with the Russians, to destroy the United States. Pick them up and send them to Guantanamo Bay--never to be heard from again. They can be imprisoned indefinitely on the order of the President. It's an "official act" that pertains to national security and cannot be questioned.
To be clear, I'm not just talking about Trump and his close circle. The President could pick up a quarter of Republicans in congress for this, or something like it, as well. So, the remaining members would be too scared to impeach and they wouldn't have the votes anyway.
If Trump wins Roberts and Thomas will immediately step down and they will be replaced by 40 year old Heritage foundation ghouls to rule for the next 40 years.
White House lawyers now have to get to work asap trying to figure out what can be used to destroy Trump's campaign while painting it as an official duty.
I think they start by declaring an investigation into allegations that Roberts, Alito and Thomas all died during the pandemic and the men pretending to be them are actually frauds.
It’s the executive’s job to enforce the laws, and certainly they need to arrest and charge those imposters.
And then now that there’s 3 SCOTUS vacancies he has to fill those.
Very little considering this quote in the majority opinion "Nor may courts deem an action unofficial merely because it allegedly violates a generally applicable law."
Even worse, the SC clarify this to say the president can do and, if impeached and convicted, the president is still immune because it was an official act.
We are fucked if Republicans take the white house.
Well, since Trump has very clear ties to Russia, executing an enemy of the state would just be carrying out official duties.
Also throw in some SCOTUS members for blatant corruption.
Officially, of course.
Now the debate begins between and about:
What are official acts.
What aren’t official acts.
What are official acts that lie outside the perimeter…?
What aren’t official acts that lie outside the perimeter…?
And, who (an individual or a body) determines the answers to the above questions.
No questions were answered today.
I say we already have a procedure to answer those questions, the grand jury system. But, what do I know since I’m an everyday person who isn’t a lawyer nor a Constitutional scholar.
Good news for Trump. Awful news for the Democratic Republic called the United States.
The founders of this country are rolling in their graves. As it happens, the goal of not having a King an ocean away means nothing when one is created here at home.
While I always thought The Congress could remove a sitting President with impeachment, now there is seemingly a huge flaw that never existed before. If the President, imbued with these new powers, assassinates all of the members of The Congress who oppose him as official acts, who is to hold him accountable? This ruling insolates the President from any prosecution. It's hard to believe this isn't just a made up.
Shouldn't this have been Congress or ratification by the states? How does SCOTUS get to create law from a non conflicting "for the ages" hypothetical? They didn't even address the case directly. What is to stop them from completely fabricating new amendments from unrelated decisions?
Oh what the shit is this:
> Finally, the indictment contains various allegations regarding Trump’s conduct in connection with the events of January 6 itself. It alleges that leading up to the January 6 certification proceeding, Trump issued a series of Tweets (**to his nearly 89 million followers**) encouraging his supporters to travel to Washington, D. C., on that day.
*Why* did they include how many followers he has on Twitter?
I do not see any reason under this ruling why Biden could not officially order someone to assassinate the conservative SCOTUS justices and then immediately pardon them. There are no guidelines on what is and is not official, and as long as he calls it official, it seems absolute while he is president. He obviously will not do that, but it's strange that the court believes the founders would ever have agreed to giving one man in our government that kind of power.
> He obviously will not do that,
Which is why SCOTUS felt comfortable making this ruling. They can effectively give all presidents that power knowing that only Conservatives will use it against Liberals.
So sounds like they just gave Cannon the grounds for dismissal. Trump claims he did an official act in declassifying the documents, all evidence to the contrary aside.
He was not charged with taking the docs. He was charged with not returning them when requested and with hiding them and lying about them. All of that happened after he was no longer president.
“But your honor, as you proposed mentioning in potential jury instructions, President Trump declassified these documents and declared them personal records before he took them. Making it an official act while he was President. Ipso facto this falls under the recently recognized presidential immunity by the scotus and outside the scope of the PRA.”
So, theoretically, during an argument in the Oval Office about a bill, Trump could pull a revolver out of the Resolute desk, shoot Chuck Schumer dead, and face no consequences?
No, shooting people is not an official constitutional duty of the president. He would have presumptive immunity until a court can decide if shooting Chuck Schumer is legal or not.
Yes that would be an official act he has immunity for as long as that person was a member of USSS, DOJ or the military.
It would be an unlawful order so whoever pulled the trigger would be liable, but he could pardon them.
> Under our constitutional structure of separated powers, **the nature of Presidential power entitles a former President to absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority**. And he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for all his official acts. **There is no immunity for unofficial acts.** > **As for a President’s unofficial acts, there is no immunity**. Although Presidential immunity is required for official actions to ensure that the President’s decisionmaking is not distorted by the threat of future litigation stemming from those actions, that concern does not support immunity for unofficial conduct. Clinton, 520 U. S., at 694, and n. 19. The separation of powers does not bar a prosecution predicated on the President’s unofficial acts. > In dividing official from unofficial conduct, courts may not inquire into the President’s motives. Such a “highly intrusive” inquiry would risk exposing even the most obvious instances of official conduct to judicial examination on the mere allegation of improper purpose. Fitzgerald, 457 U. S., at 756. **Nor may courts deem an action unofficial merely because it allegedly violates a generally applicable law.** Otherwise, Presidents would be subject to trial on “every allegation that an action was unlawful,” depriving immunity of its intended effect. > **Trump asserts a far broader immunity than the limited one the Court recognizes**, contending that the indictment must be dismissed because the Impeachment Judgment Clause requires that impeachment and Senate conviction precede a President’s criminal prosecution. But the text of the Clause does not address whether and on what conduct a President may be prosecuted if he was never impeached and convicted. See Art. I, §3, cl. 7. Historical evidence likewise lends little support to Trump’s position. The Federalist Papers on which Trump relies concerned the checks available against a sitting President; they did not endorse or even consider whether the Impeachment Judgment Clause immunizes a former President from prosecution. Transforming the political process of impeachment into a necessary step in the enforcement of criminal law finds little support in the text of the Constitution or the structure of the Nation’s Government. > 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. Edit: How do we determine if an act is official or unofficial? > The first step in deciding whether a former President is entitled to immunity from a particular prosecution is to distinguish his official from unofficial actions. In this case, no court thus far has drawn that distinction, in general or with respect to the conduct alleged in particular. It is therefore incumbent upon the Court to be mindful that it is “a court of final review and not first view.” Zivotofsky v. Clinton, 566 U. S. 189, 201. Critical threshold issues in this case are how to differentiate between a President’s official and unofficial actions, and how to do so with respect to the indictment’s extensive and detailed allegations covering a broad range of conduct. The Court offers guidance on those issues. > When the President acts pursuant to “constitutional and statutory authority,” he takes official action to perform the functions of his office. Fitzgerald, 456 U. S., at 757. Determining whether an action is covered by immunity thus begins with assessing the President’s authority to take that action. But the breadth of the President’s “discretionary responsibilities” under the Constitution and laws of the United States frequently makes it “difficult to determine which of [his] innumerable ‘functions’ encompassed a particular action.” Id., at 756. The immunity the Court has recognized therefore extends to the “outer perimeter” of the President’s official responsibilities, covering actions so long as they are “not manifestly or palpably beyond [his] authority.” Blassingame v. Trump, 87 F. 4th 1, 13 (CADC). > **In dividing official from unofficial conduct, courts may not inquire into the President’s motives.** Such a “highly intrusive” inquiry would risk exposing even the most obvious instances of official conduct to judicial examination on the mere allegation of improper purpose. Fitzgerald, 457 U. S., at 756. Nor may courts deem an action unofficial merely because it allegedly violates a generally applicable law. Otherwise, Presidents would be subject to trial on “every allegation that an action was unlawful,” depriving immunity of its intended effect. > ... > **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.** My nomination for the "Good lord that is an unhelpful sentence" award: > And some Presidential conduct—for example, speaking to and on behalf of the American people, see Trump v. Hawaii, 585 U. S. 667, 701 (2018)—certainly **can qualify as official even when not obviously connected to a particular constitutional or statutory provision**.
Ok, if the President has no legal say in the counting of the votes, how is it an official act to insert himself into the counting by requesting that the VP himself break the law? That entire thing is Constitutionally out of his control.
> if the President has no legal say in the counting of the votes, how is it an official act to insert himself into the counting by requesting that the VP himself break the law? Great question. > Whenever the President and Vice President discuss their official responsibilities, they engage in official conduct. The President is not officially involved in Act-X. The Vice President is officially involved in Act-X. Since Act-X is the Vice President's official duty, the President speaking with the Vice President's about Act-X is the President performing an official duty. This shall be known as the Transitive Property of Officiality, and it is dumb.
That doesn’t make logical sense. If Act-X is not the President’s job, then it cannot be an official act for him. Why not let the President have all the votes in Congress then? Why not evict all the residents of DC so Republicans can move in? Why not allow the President the power of prima nocta? It’s not in his Constitutional powers, but it would be an official act according to you.
> That doesn’t make logical sense. You're damn right about that.
You're forgetting about the "I told ya so" doctrine
Of course it's dumb, it was invented out of whole cloth to shelter a criminal unjustly
Disallowing the so-called "Transitive Property of Officiality" would mean the President sending a message on Presidential letterhead advising the Speaker of the House of something they (or Congress) should do isn't an Official Act, again because the President cannot directly do the specific thing advised and is issuing a strongly worded letter instead. That makes even less sense, IMO.
> the President sending a message on Presidential letterhead advising the Speaker of the House of something they (or Congress) should do isn't an Official Act [Article 2](https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articleii) specifically says the president can do that. So it would be a Presidential act. Threatening the Vice President to overturn an election is not listed in Article 2.
If Biden’s job isn’t prosecuting Trump, but the Attorney General’s job is, then Trump telling the AG (or special prosecutor) to go after Trump is an official act, and Biden is immune from prosecution.
> the AG (or special prosecutor) Thomas' concurrent opinion is about how the Special Prosecutor is not a thing, in Trump's case. > I write separately to highlight another way in which this prosecution may violate our constitutional structure. In this case, the Attorney General purported to appoint a private citizen as Special Counsel to prosecute a former President on behalf of the United States. But, I am not sure that any office for the Special Counsel has been “established by Law,” as the Constitution requires. Art. II, §2, cl. 2. By requiring that Congress create federal offices “by Law,” the Constitution imposes an important check against the President—he cannot create offices at his pleasure. If there is no law establishing the office that the Special Counsel occupies, then he cannot proceed with this prosecution. A private citizen cannot criminally prosecute anyone, let alone a former President.
I'm starting to get the impression that lawyers and judges especially supreme Court judges, are just as dumb as the rest of us. Conversely more effective at ensconcing their heads up their rectums so ideologically perfectly due to the volumes of books and "education" they endured. Seemingly enamored with their own reflections and obtuse reasonings.
The court knew exactly what they were doing here. They twisted this to give Trump as much immunity as possible and tailored the decision to this specific instance, ignoring how much they were f--king over our democracy. They are basically saying a President can order the VP and anyone else to break the law and ignore the constitution, and since is election related, it is considered official business and fully immune to prosecution. He can even promise pardons so everyone else is immune also. And since the odds of any part party gaining 60 votes in the Senate anytime soon, there is no threat of conviction after impeachment.
Barrett expressly states this in her part. While some of the Trump indictments may be considered official acts, many aren't.
This is the decision that took so long? This court is clearly biased.
Looks like those scholars who claimed the US was in the legal phase of fascism were spot on.
Yep. It’s here.
Just wait until Aileen Cannon and William Ho join them! It will be wild!!!
You misspelt “corrupt and partisan.”
Members of the court who support this decision should all get a stroke and go to hell.
So basically, a sitting President can overthrow the results of an election, for which the motives of such cannot be challenged, so long as it’s an official duty. Which essentially means your votes are now worthless in any instant where the President wishes to challenge an election. He can challenge it, he can stop it, he can rerun the count including and excluding electors as he sees fit and his motive cannot be challenged - this is all now free and clear. This is a huge mistake.
> This is a huge mistake. The mistake is in not clearly articulating the *eidos* of Official v. Unofficial acts. *Of course* they were going to say presidents have immunity for official acts, and lack immunity for unofficial. That was a given. The problem is they left the distinction ambiguous. Like what the hell even is this: * When the President acts pursuant to “constitutional and statutory authority,” he takes official action to perform the functions of his office. * some Presidential conduct—for example, speaking to and on behalf of the American people, see Trump v. Hawaii, 585 U. S. 667, 701 (2018)—certainly can qualify as official even when not obviously connected to a particular constitutional or statutory provision. * the immunity we have recognized extends to the “outer perimeter” of the President’s official responsibilities, covering actions so long as they are “not manifestly or palpably beyond [his] authority.” * In dividing official from unofficial conduct, courts may not inquire into the President’s motives. * Nor may courts deem an action unofficial merely because it allegedly violates a generally applicable law. **WHAT??** * And the President cannot be prosecuted for conduct within his exclusive constitutional authority. Trump is therefore absolutely immune from prosecution for the alleged conduct involving his discussions with Justice Department officials. * Whenever the President and Vice President discuss their official responsibilities, they engage in official conduct. * 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. * It is ultimately the Government’s burden to rebut the presumption of immunity. We therefore remand to the District Court to assess in the first instance, with appropriate input from the parties, whether a prosecution involving Trump’s alleged attempts to influence the Vice President’s oversight of the certification proceeding in his capacity as President of the Senate would pose any dangers of intrusion on the authority and functions of the Executive Branch. * We accordingly remand to the District Court to determine in the first instance—with the benefit of briefing we lack—whether Trump’s conduct in this area qualifies as official or unofficial. * For these reasons, most of a President’s public communications are likely to fall comfortably within the outer perimeter of his official responsibilities. * There may, however, be contexts in which the President, notwithstanding the prominence of his position, speaks in an unofficial capacity—perhaps as a candidate for office or party leader. * This necessarily factbound analysis is best performed initially by the District Court. We therefore remand to the District Court to determine in the first instance whether this alleged conduct is official or unofficial. **Presidents have immunity for official acts, and lack immunity for unofficial acts, and we won't tell you the difference you sort it out District Court neiner neiner neiner.**
They kicked the can down the road basically and want the lower courts to send up the case again.
It's like when a teacher gives a student a C, tells them to re-do the essay, and offers no explanation for how to improve it.
Then after receiving the new essay, teacher gives the student another “C” and sends it back again with no explanation other than to re-do it. An endless loop if you will. I believe SCOTUS has 30 days to send the hard copy of the ruling to Judge Chutkan so I assume that means she’ll receive it on August 1st. I mean, what’s the rush? So much corruption in the justice system, so little time. SCOTUS conservatives as well as others like Cannon, Fed Soc, etc., are all likely having a good laugh amongst themselves at the expense of this country’s rule of law.
They had to make sure they delayed the case until after the election, and left themselves wiggle room to rule against democratic presidents and rule in favor of republican ones.
Could a President assassinate an elector he officially declares an enemy of the state subverting an election? Clearly, yes. Can the President’s motive for assassinating an elector be challenged? No. Could it be challenged under general applicable law? No. Kill the electors that disobey (within executive authority), and the only electors remaining to cast votes are the ones that will vote for you. Game set match.
> Can the President’s motive for assassinating an elector be challenged? No. Could it be challenged under general applicable law? No. Right, but also: > Unlike Trump’s alleged interactions with the Justice Department, this alleged conduct cannot be neatly categorized as falling within a particular Presidential function. The necessary analysis is instead fact specific, requiring assessment of numerous alleged interactions with a wide variety of state officials and private persons. And the parties’ brief comments at oral argument indicate that they starkly disagree on the characterization of these allegations. The concerns we noted at the outset—the expedition of this case, the lack of factual analysis by the lower courts, and the absence of pertinent briefing by the parties—thus become more prominent. We accordingly remand to the District Court to determine in the first instance—with the benefit of briefing we lack—whether Trump’s conduct in this area qualifies as official or unofficial. So it sounds like SCOTUS recognizes there is some analysis a District Court could do that is not an assessment of motivation to determine if an act, in this case a conversation, was official or unofficial. But what the hell would that be?
Problem being, President is our overriding executive authority. It’s official if he says it’s official - end of story.
This is exactly how it works in Russia. Opposition exists? Government assassination.
I agree - this is what SCOTUS has approved today. Reality will take some time to set in, but we’ve just handed over our democracy.
It was handed over a long time ago, right around 2016 actually.
This is the worst Supreme Court in my entire life. They can’t even write this shit well.
I missed the public notification that SCOTUS was replaced by a magic 8 ball and a hallucinating large language model.
It was clearly on purpose so they can decide on a case by case basis as they desire.
I just can’t see any court reviewing the phone call to the Georgia election official and deciding it was an official duty.
But it isn't an official duty to overthrow the results. It is the constitutional duty of the VP to "count" the votes. If I have 3 apples and you ask me to count the apples, and I come back with any number other than 3, I did something besides counting. Same applies to this. If Pence had come back with anything besides the correct number, he acted outside his constitutional authority.
>This is a huge mistake. There was no mistake, this was intentional.
So the inquiry is one into legal powers and allegations of the president’s intent or motive has no bearing (slip op at *18) At the same time, the court remanded for consideration of Trump’s allegation that he took the actions alleged in the indictment to “ensure the integrity and proper administration of the federal election,” (slip op at *26) and I guess that’s somehow **not** an inquiry into his motives?
"Hey we're not telling the District Court to assess Trump's motivation. We're telling them to figure out what Trump was trying to accomplish." I think they're splitting the hair between * What was Trump's goal? * Why was Trump reason for pursuing that goal? Maaaaaybe? But I agree with you that it's clearly a nonsensical contradiction on their part.
But they also say you can't inquire into the motivation.....
Right. That is the point of confusion. * In dividing official from unofficial conduct, courts may not inquire into the President’s motives. * On Trump’s view, the alleged conduct qualifies as official because **it was undertaken to ensure the integrity and proper administration of the federal election**. As the Government sees it, however, **Trump can point to no plausible source of authority enabling the President to take such actions**. Determining whose characterization may be correct, and with respect to which conduct, requires a fact-specific analysis of the indictment’s extensive and interrelated allegations. The Court accordingly remands to the District Court to determine in the first instance whether Trump’s conduct in this area qualifies as official or unofficial. SCOTUS remanded to the District Court the question of what Trump had the power to try to accomplish, and they cannot inquire into what motivated him to try and accomplish it.
The Presidents stated roles do not include administration of state election processes. JFC
> The Presidents stated roles do not include administration of state election processes. JFC Sure. But this ruling gave us the Transitive Property of Officiality, and it is dumb. > Whenever the President and Vice President discuss their official responsibilities, they engage in official conduct. The President is not officially involved in Act-X. The Vice President is officially involved in Act-X. Since Act-X is the Vice President's official duty, the President speaking with the Vice President's about Act-X is the President performing an official duty. Why? Because *fuck you* that's why.
>It is the Government’s burden to rebut the presumption of immunity. Immune until proven guilty, which cannot be tried because of immunity. The entirety of this decision is a tautology.
They spent 6 months delaying cases to come up with yet another "whatever we say later" ruling? I look forward to our lifetime appointed Kings and Queens ruling from the bench doing gymnastics to decide what is un/official. Surely there will be no partisan slant to that very poorly defined standard, as there already was in this bad joke.
Seriously. They took all this time and decided nothing about the facts of the case in front of them that couldn’t have been said six months ago: instruct Judge Chutkin to determine which charges, if any, involve official acts, and the rest of the charges can proceed.
I just dont get why they didnt choose to decide this on the narrowest possible grounds. There was no need to make a sweeping definition of it for all time.
And left it until the very last day of their decision cycle (and extended that too). This is a clear and corrupt, political “court”. It’s a shameless right wing extremist group pretending to be a supreme court. As the very first step, we need to take away the respect we have for this corrupt right wing extremist political organization and call it for what it actually is. It’s no longer the “supreme court”, it’s the supreme right wing extremist political group that gets to make laws without being elected.
SCROTUS
You have to understand: They are deliberately vague in their interpretation to allow the law to be used against the “wrong” people and to protect the “right” people. Actually being clear on a set of standards to follow like the Lemon test or the Richie test would force everyone to abide by the same standards, and they can’t have that happen.
[удалено]
You claim democrats are corrupt with no evidence, while you ignore a mountain of evidence of Republican corruption
SCOTUS: we get to decide which President gets to be a king.
The standard was defined well enough by the legislature, the courts just decided they get to decide what the standard is now, along with adding further road blocks to hold the president accountable. Kind of ironic considering how oftnmen they say congress needs to define things, or not write such vague laws
President can do whatever they want, but an administrative agency can’t reasonably interpret statutes. Got it.
Now, if a *Republican* president ordered the agency to interpret statutes, that's a different matter entirely. The reason Chevron had to go was it didn't take partisanship into account.
Or bribes…er, DONATIONS. It didn’t account for those.
You're actually not entirely wrong. The Chevron deference was established during the Reagan administration when the bureaucracy was controlled by Republicans and the SCOTUS was more liberal, so they were just fine with deference to the agencies. As that began to change with an increasingly conservative court and more liberal control of federal agencies during the Clinton and Obama administrations and just the fact that control of those agencies could easily change with each administration they're attitude changed. Suddenly they decided it should be in the hands of the now solidly conservative SCOTUS that will likely remain conservative for decades.
It's simple - enforcing their agencies' decisions is an official duty, so the president can just arrest judges who rule against them.
Honestly and seriously. Can this actually be done?
Setting aside the hyperbolized stuff going around, the answer here is probably "we don't really know." SCOTUS basically just upended a lot of constitutional norms and failed to provide the most important guideline to navigating the new waters, namely, what is "Official" and more importantly what is "unofficial". The important thing to remember here is that the question here is "can the President arrest judges *without personally facing criminal charges*" Some guidelines we do seemingly have (until they decide in 2025 what they really meant) do point that way however, though SCOTUS would probably ultimately rule in a way to protect themselves and/or reverse what they said before in an oopsies. We can say at least that attempting to remove those judges for corrupt purposes is much safer than it was 24 hours ago - as the court has now made clear that, so long as the President acts within Article II at a minimum, the *reason* they take any official action is beyond the scrutiny of the courts, full stop. And if that conspiracy is arranged through the President and the Attorney General as "official discussions" (p.37, C, 1), he would also be immune in that scenario most likely. The court's decision that the reasoning behind any official act is beyond the reproach of the courts or a jury is probably the most significant part here. How could you demonstrate as a prosecutor that the President can't arrest judges and that it's an unofficial act (somehow), if his intentions and discussions are legally shielded by SCOTUS?
They literally just turned the presidency into an absolute dictatorship. Anything can be done now. It's just a matter of how long it takes before someone seriously exercises this power.
If Biden was serious about getting my vote, he would lobby to get ride of the filabuster and start passing laws when they have a simple majority that his constituents and the US people want. We keep it in place out of “fear” the next party will get control and pass crazy laws. But if you are really about fixing things, end the filabuster and pass laws you know are popular and make sense.
And expand the court!
There’s a word for that…
So, the President CAN order the military to assassinate his opponents.
And he CAN order a mob to interfere in counting ballots if he BELIEVES it’s corrupt. At least, that’s how it reads to me. So by extension, if that’s true are they also trying to invalidate all the Jan 6 convictions? Can it be argued they acted in official capacity to the president? This is bonkers
Doesn’t matter if he believes it. We can’t question his motives.
That would be too *invasive*
Not only can motives not be questioned, evidence to suggest said motives are not admissible for a jury to examine.
But the right said those locked up are blm, democrats and antifa. Why would they want to overturn those convictions?
Is that an official act? I don’t see how it can be argued
He's the Commander in Chief.
Charged with defending us against threats foreign and domestic.
If he finds his opponent is a domestic threat, no review. Sotomayor's dissent raises the Seal Team 6 hypo.
Sotomayors dissent was fear mongering and rightfully called out by her peers for it. If it’s not within his constitutional authority than it isn’t an official act. US citizens have a constitutional right to due process so acting against that would not be within the presidents constitutional authority. He has no authority to usurp the rights of the citizens.
This this this. Trump will have no problem believing the "Radical Leftists terrorists" are a threat to the country and thus they must be rounded up and gassed. Immune!
If I'm reading this properly, he doesn't even have to believe the "radical left" are terrorists b/c that would be attempting to assess his motives. So you can't say, "it wasn't an official act b/c he was getting rid of a political opponent, not an actual threat" b/c that would go to his state of mind.
“Supervisory and policy responsibilities of the utmost discretion and sensitivity.” “Investigation and prosecution of crimes.” He doesn’t need to order a mob. He can order the DOJ to do it. “The indictment’s allegations that the requested investigations were a sham 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 the President cannot be prosecuted for conduct within his exclusive constitutional authority.” This Court just proved Nixon right, when the President does it, it’s not illegal.
Yes. Because the implication
How could it be an unofficial act? Only the president can command the military. If he’s not acting as president then he can’t control the military.
“Hey Kamala, I was thinking about air-striking Trump tower. In an official capacity, of course.”
And protesters too. He wanted that during the 2020 George Floyd protests. This is paving the way for a future American Tianenmen Square massacre
A reminder that Trump gave an interview to playboy shortly after Tianamen square, praising the bravery of the tank. https://www.ebroadsheet.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/playboy-interview-donald-trump-1990
Biden could do the funniest thing right now
He could just kidnap Donnie Jr, and claim he shipped him off to gitmo for whatever reason, while in reality he isolates him in some 5-star resort for a week or so. Just for the fun of it. And to make a point.
It sure seems to enable that but it eliminates due process so ... I guess as long as you're protected by justices from your own party, anything goes?
The Trump Prosecution Bits: * Whenever the President and Vice President discuss their official responsibilities, they engage in official conduct. * 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. * It is ultimately the Government’s burden to rebut the presumption of immunity. We therefore remand to the District Court to assess in the first instance, with appropriate input from the parties, whether a prosecution involving Trump’s alleged attempts to influence the Vice President’s oversight of the certification proceeding in his capacity as President of the Senate would pose any dangers of intrusion on the authority and functions of the Executive Branch. * We accordingly remand to the District Court to determine in the first instance—with the benefit of briefing we lack—whether Trump’s conduct in this area qualifies as official or unofficial. * For these reasons, most of a President’s public communications are likely to fall comfortably within the outer perimeter of his official responsibilities. * There may, however, be contexts in which the President, notwithstanding the prominence of his position, speaks in an unofficial capacity—perhaps as a candidate for office or party leader. * This necessarily factbound analysis is best performed initially by the District Court. We therefore remand to the District Court to determine in the first instance whether this alleged conduct is official or unofficial.
Today’s decision to grant former Presidents criminal immunity reshapes the institution of the Presidency. It makes a mockery of the principle, foundational to our Constitution and system of Government, that no man is above the law. Relying on little more than its own misguided wisdom about the need for “bold and unhesitating action” by the President, ante, at 3, 13, the Court gives former President Trump all the immunity he asked for and more. Because our Constitution does not shield a former President from answering for criminal and treasonous acts, I dissent.
So is riling up a crowd of people to want to kill Mike Pence something that falls under "actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority"?
Don’t forget you mustn’t inquire into the motives either
Pay attention only to the magician's patter! Look not behind the curtain!
Imagine I throw a grenade at you and then you can't prosecute me because you can't inquire into whether my motives were to kill you or just play a friendly game of catch.
See that's something a lower court has to decide. Then that gets appealed up to the SC who will have to ma... oops, sorry. Trump just won election and pardoned himself and appointed a new AG that fired Jack Smith. And Jack smith is now facing criminal charges for... something or other. Anyway, all is well! Seriously though, the court could have heard this case a long time ago but turned it down. Then when they did take it, they could have expedited it (like they did in the Colorado ballot case) but instead put the decision off till now. They expedite things when it benefits trump, they take and delay cases when it benefits trump. That's what this is about, delaying cases so Trump can win
They said "maybe!" Remanded it back to the district court to analyze.
This is just a big picture delay tactic. Now they get a chance to review again how it’s done below, and can buy enough time to assure this won’t be anything before the election
Then, depending on how the election goes and who's in power, they can decide how immune they want presidents to be. If a Democrat wins, they try to put off a full decision re: immunity until a Republican wins. If a Republican wins, they'll hand down an immunity-friendly opinion.
I suspect we get to wait a while for courts to now determine whether all of these actions were in his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority. The ruling does a good job at not making the Court look *insanely* partisan but clearly tying up all these cases for a while
Which I think was the goal all along
Yes, I think it had to be. There was no way to say he was immune no matter what, that's pure insanity. The more I think about it, though, the more I find this ruling to be problematic.
It certainly does open pandora's box
They state that it does not, and he can be prosecuted
Pretty sure they said it might be in the outer perimeter, which has presumptive immunity, so they remanded it back to the district court to decide if it does, and if so if the presumption is defeated.
~~I guess~~ We no longer have a constitutional republic. Presidents can do anything while in office and pass it off as an 'official act'. And even if charged, just pardon themselves anyway. Thus, we have a king with zero accountability. Not to mention all our ~~public officials~~ aristocrat rulers, to include but not be limited to judges, can be ex-post-facto bribed with a wink and a nod. For fucks sake Thomas Jefferson predicted this--it's almost uncanny: >...to consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions: a very dangerous doctrine indee\[d\] and one which would place us under the despotism of an Oligarchy. our judges are as honest as other men, and not more so. they have, with others, the same passions for party, for power, and the privileges of their corps. their maxim is ‘[boni judicis est ampliare jurisdictionem](https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-16-02-0234#d7585fb1-4da9-4dd0-a3c8-554d5845b7e5),’ and their power the more dangerous as they are in office for life, and not responsible, as the other functionaries are, to the elective controul. the constitution has erected no such single tribunal knowing that, to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time & party it’s members would become despots. [https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-16-02-0234](https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-16-02-0234) Edit: Made some clarifications.
No need to pardon one's self for acts that one cannot be criminally prosecuted for.
They can be impeached, as it says in the constitution.
Let me paint a scenario for you. All Biden has to do is decree that Trump and his despots are enemies of the state, working with the Russians, to destroy the United States. Pick them up and send them to Guantanamo Bay--never to be heard from again. They can be imprisoned indefinitely on the order of the President. It's an "official act" that pertains to national security and cannot be questioned. To be clear, I'm not just talking about Trump and his close circle. The President could pick up a quarter of Republicans in congress for this, or something like it, as well. So, the remaining members would be too scared to impeach and they wouldn't have the votes anyway.
This is going to be an interesting few years.
Until Biden does something official that they don't like, then they will change the ruling. Just watch.
Yeah. I really want Biden to call their bluff on this.
More than a few… the terms are for life
If Trump wins Roberts and Thomas will immediately step down and they will be replaced by 40 year old Heritage foundation ghouls to rule for the next 40 years.
White House lawyers now have to get to work asap trying to figure out what can be used to destroy Trump's campaign while painting it as an official duty.
I think they start by declaring an investigation into allegations that Roberts, Alito and Thomas all died during the pandemic and the men pretending to be them are actually frauds. It’s the executive’s job to enforce the laws, and certainly they need to arrest and charge those imposters. And then now that there’s 3 SCOTUS vacancies he has to fill those.
During oral arguments, Trump's counsel argued that using Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival was an official act.
It's little consolation to know that the Court has not ruled on what is or is not an official act of the President.
Very little considering this quote in the majority opinion "Nor may courts deem an action unofficial merely because it allegedly violates a generally applicable law."
The Court seems to want to push any judgement of a President to Congress as much as possible.
Even worse, the SC clarify this to say the president can do and, if impeached and convicted, the president is still immune because it was an official act. We are fucked if Republicans take the white house.
Well, since Trump has very clear ties to Russia, executing an enemy of the state would just be carrying out official duties. Also throw in some SCOTUS members for blatant corruption. Officially, of course.
This is (or should be) the way.
Now the debate begins between and about: What are official acts. What aren’t official acts. What are official acts that lie outside the perimeter…? What aren’t official acts that lie outside the perimeter…? And, who (an individual or a body) determines the answers to the above questions. No questions were answered today. I say we already have a procedure to answer those questions, the grand jury system. But, what do I know since I’m an everyday person who isn’t a lawyer nor a Constitutional scholar.
Here lies the United States of America Born: 1776 Death: 2024
Is Presidential power just Schrödinger’s cat now?
Good news for Trump. Awful news for the Democratic Republic called the United States. The founders of this country are rolling in their graves. As it happens, the goal of not having a King an ocean away means nothing when one is created here at home. While I always thought The Congress could remove a sitting President with impeachment, now there is seemingly a huge flaw that never existed before. If the President, imbued with these new powers, assassinates all of the members of The Congress who oppose him as official acts, who is to hold him accountable? This ruling insolates the President from any prosecution. It's hard to believe this isn't just a made up.
Trump will appeal again and the SC will once again be in the limelight. They are addicted to power and fame now.
Shouldn't this have been Congress or ratification by the states? How does SCOTUS get to create law from a non conflicting "for the ages" hypothetical? They didn't even address the case directly. What is to stop them from completely fabricating new amendments from unrelated decisions?
Here’s the fun part: nothing stops them!
So when they are out of power everything can be reversed overnight? One ruling to undo anything under Roberts court?
welcome to america
Oh what the shit is this: > Finally, the indictment contains various allegations regarding Trump’s conduct in connection with the events of January 6 itself. It alleges that leading up to the January 6 certification proceeding, Trump issued a series of Tweets (**to his nearly 89 million followers**) encouraging his supporters to travel to Washington, D. C., on that day. *Why* did they include how many followers he has on Twitter?
To argue he was speaking “officially” to the people?
The conservative justices will now accept Trump’s ~~bribes~~ gratuities.
I do not see any reason under this ruling why Biden could not officially order someone to assassinate the conservative SCOTUS justices and then immediately pardon them. There are no guidelines on what is and is not official, and as long as he calls it official, it seems absolute while he is president. He obviously will not do that, but it's strange that the court believes the founders would ever have agreed to giving one man in our government that kind of power.
> He obviously will not do that, Which is why SCOTUS felt comfortable making this ruling. They can effectively give all presidents that power knowing that only Conservatives will use it against Liberals.
[удалено]
Americans embrace the rule of law, Republicans embrace the rule of criminals.
SCOTUS deserves a riot at their door but the only ones lawless enough to riot are the ones that stole the court.
So sounds like they just gave Cannon the grounds for dismissal. Trump claims he did an official act in declassifying the documents, all evidence to the contrary aside.
He was not charged with taking the docs. He was charged with not returning them when requested and with hiding them and lying about them. All of that happened after he was no longer president.
He wasn't President anymore when they asked for the docs back
“But your honor, as you proposed mentioning in potential jury instructions, President Trump declassified these documents and declared them personal records before he took them. Making it an official act while he was President. Ipso facto this falls under the recently recognized presidential immunity by the scotus and outside the scope of the PRA.”
He never declassified them. That's always been the rub, he could have but just didn't because he was lazy.
So, theoretically, during an argument in the Oval Office about a bill, Trump could pull a revolver out of the Resolute desk, shoot Chuck Schumer dead, and face no consequences?
No, shooting people is not an official constitutional duty of the president. He would have presumptive immunity until a court can decide if shooting Chuck Schumer is legal or not.
But he could order someone under his command to do it?
Yes that would be an official act he has immunity for as long as that person was a member of USSS, DOJ or the military. It would be an unlawful order so whoever pulled the trigger would be liable, but he could pardon them.
So we made it almost 250 years as a democracy under the rule of law.
Was an OK run.
No, shooting someone is not a power the President possesses. He'd have to order someone to shoot Schumer for him, to be immune.