supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/audio/2023/23-939
here is a link to the arguments from yest…
This is seeming more and more like what is going to happen. That way they can pretend to preserve democracy (most presidents don’t have total immunity) while immunizing trump for any past and future crimes. It was bad enough when I thought they were “just” taking this case to help trump delay, delay, delay.
No it won’t, because he can pardon them.
If this has already been posted, then I apologize for repeating it, but I think it’s perfectly on point:
After listening to the arguments yesterday and the comments/questions by Roberts, Alito, Thomas, Gorsuch and Beer Guy, a legal expert commented that the SCOTUS should just pack up and move their headquarters to the RNC because it has become simply an arm of the Republican party.
The above listed justices have become nothing more than partisan hacks. This is what we can expect from this SCOTUS going forward, and I hope people will vote accordingly. I know for certain that I never want to see another Republican appointee on the SCOTUS for the rest of my life.
I thought Roberts showed skepticism with his one-legged stool point: That an action might have both an official and unofficial component and it may not be possible to prosecute the unofficial component due to the immunity given for the official component (e.g. taking payment to appoint someone an ambassador).
His other point seemed to criticize the lower court’s ruling which I didn’t quite follow TBH.
Heather Cox Richardson’s newsletter today quoted some scathing opinions.
“I am in shock that a lawyer stood in the U.S. Supreme Court and said that a president could assassinate his political opponent and it would be immune as ‘an official act,’” lawyer Marc Elias, whose firm defends democratic election laws, wrote today on social media. He added: “I am in despair that several Justices seemed to think this answer made perfect sense.”
Constitutional law professor Anthony Michael Kreis was more concrete in his reaction; he found it “[u]nbelievable that Supreme Court justices who see forgiving student loans, mandating vaccines, and regulating climate change as a slippery slope toward tyranny were not clear-eyed on questions of whether a president could execute citizens or stage a coup without being prosecuted.”
As Justice Elena Kagan noted today: “The framers did not put an immunity clause into the Constitution. They knew how to; there were immunity clauses in some state constitutions. They didn’t provide immunity to the president. And, you know—not so surprising—they were reacting against a monarch who claimed to be above the law. Wasn’t the whole point that the president was not a monarch and the president was not supposed to be above the law?”
What I hated about his questioning is that it not-so-subtly validates the position Trump and his lawyers are taking: That there is a problem here to solve. There isn’t.
For our entire history, we have well understood that no one is above the law – not even a president. By posing questions that create conditions for this to be the case, Roberts is in effect engaging in a validation of the position that the Constitution as written and has been applied for all our history until Trump requires a brand new modification.
There’s only one aberration from the original Constitutional interpretation since our founding. It’s Trump. The justices I named simply refused to talk about the case before them, actively swaying the discussion away from it whenever it was raised and instead preferring to pose all sorts of “But what if?” bullshit questions having nothing to do with their function to rule on the case at bar. Which is only Trump.
Listening to these so-called strict constructionists/originalists twist themselves into partisan pretzels to craft new interpretations of our founding principle that no one is above the law made me sick.
Totally agree. Nothing good Biden can do about this.
If Trump wins, he is going to order his Justice Department to arrest Joe and Hunter Biden, and if both aren’t charged, it will only be because DJT did a bad job of finding a toady AG. That’s not going to be affected by the ruling here. All this case will do is spell out rules for how to draft a post-presidential indictment so as to meet SCOTUS requirements.
As I posted with links last year, it is pretty normal that when a national leader is held accountable by a court, there are follow-up prosecutions with later leaders. That would be unfortunate for the innocent future lawfare victim, but I expect the courts will still remain honest enough that Biden would be acquitted. Biden having to go through that would be bad, but not a threat to democracy.
Republicans on the Supreme Court are not protecting Biden when they protect Trump.
If the Supreme Court rules that Jack Smith indicted on too many counts, does anyone have a link listing what current indictment counts would likely survive or be stricken? I’ve missed that.
These dumbfucks are coming pretty close to ensuring we are about to experience Civil War 2.0 or American Revolution 2.0 or both.
If they rule that the president has some sort of immunity that will result inevitably in disaster, we need a constitutional amendment immediately to clear this up. Biden can argue that he is neutralizing his own potential for using excessive power.
Would the red states object to solving the problem via amendment? Maybe. Maybe they’d be salivating over the notion of Trump winning and using that power afterward. Or maybe they’d be afraid of Biden using it right now. Since the red states are run by dumbfucks, they’d probably vote in the most stupid manner possible, i.e., not supporting a reasonable amendment.
The amendment should also include the provision that the president may not pardon himself, a former president, any member of his own family, or anyone party to a conspiracy in which the president has participated, etc.
SCOTUS is corrupt, it’s pretty clear. They’re essentially openly Republican operatives. Democrats should expand the court the moment they have control of all three branches.
Totally agree with this. I felt like the questions like “What about an assassination? What about a coup? What about a one-legged stool? What about this? What about that?” lent the case more credence then it deserved. It was like SCOTUS was brainstorming presidential powers on the fly.
Was Clinton’s perjury charge criminal or civil? And yes I know it was a state charge not a federal one.
That’s exactly what they were doing: Fishing around for a basis to fix a non-existent problem.
And even if they ultimately issue a bog standard ruling when all is said and done – which, frankly, I don’t think they are going to do – they will have accomplished the delay that Trump wants in this case.
I also believe they are going to try and create a carve out for Trump when they do rule. It’s as partisan as it gets. These are not good justices.
Here’s a gift link to an opinion piece in the New York Times that outlines my perceptions of the hearing well:
Absolutely agree. If it comes out like this, Biden should immediately announce that he’s supporting an amendment to fix this shit, and make the whole election a referendum on this question. “Send me back to the Whitehouse with a Democratic Congress, and Day One, we’ll send an amendment to the states for ratification.”
There is no reason why that process can’t begin right now, right?
As I listened to (most of) the questioning from (most of) the conservative majority, I realized: the Judicial Overton Window has shifted dramatically and is now effectively a picture frame highlighting the handsome visage of … One Associate Justice Clarence Thomas.
We (SDMB) talk about minimizing the use of cliches like “Yeah, but what if we … didn’t?”
And, yet…
Yikes.
At this point, it becomes a political question. You could start it now, but would that be the best strategy?
Any sort of immunity, or just of the type Trump wants? I thought it was generally accepted that the PotuS did have to have at least a little bit to actually be able to wield presidential powers?
I wrote:
So yeah, the kind Trump wants, but probably even significantly less than that could be a big problem.
The Supreme Court already ruled a long time ago that the president is immune for civil damages.
Oooooh, I misread and thought you were missing a comma and were saying ”if they rule he has some kind of immunity, that would result in disaster”!