Yep, Roberts – the guy who engineered the outcome of Citizens United – is now the moderate swing vote! How far the Court has drifted to the far right! At least Roberts is smart enough to know that and likely to act to preserve some semblance of legitimate jurisprudence.
If Trump were allowed declare America a fascist dictatorship today do you think he would do it? Do you think today’s Republican Party values democracy and capitalism?
Congress may seek 8 years of Trump’s business records from his accounting firm, appeals court rules.
The actual story right now is only about three sentences, so I don’t think I can quote more. This could be another pretty big blow, though.
Well shut my mouth. It turns out she is testifying, in defiance of State Department orders, even though she remains an employee.
Maybe we’ll one day be able to read his biography:
Balls and Strikes: John Roberts, the justice with the guts to strike down tyranny.
I’m not going to be able to go back to a slower cycle of news, whenever it happens.
My broader point is that anyone who can look at this administration and today’s Republican Party and say “now that’s a step too far. They’d never do that.” What world do you live in? They are willing to do anything including tearing down the walls of democracy to retain power. To pretend that anything is beyond the walls of what Republicans consider “fair play” is dissociated from reality.
“House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) have both pledged to return thousands in campaign donationsmade by 2 foreign-born Trump donors who were arrested this week for allegedly scheming to buy influence with U.S. politicians, Vice News and the Miami Herald report.”
I imagine there will be quite a few more Republicans who suddenly discover that they inadvertently accepted campaign donations from these shady characters.
But they will still keep the ‘interest’.
I’m a little disappointed that the appeals court ruling was 2-1. I’d be interested to know what the reason for the dissent was.
The cynics on Twitter claim that Judge Rao is auditioning for the Supremes against Judge Barrett.
This is the damage that Trump judicial appointees will do. Article 1 powers of oversight are delineated in black letter terms. There is no Constitutional restraint on those powers. Here is Trump’s judge trying to limit those powers of oversight to only impeachment proceedings, in their pursuit of the Unitary Executive bullshit.
These people are so scary.
Dissent was Judge Rao.
Appointed by Trump to fill the seat vacated by Kavanaugh.
Rao’s dissent:
"Investigations of impeachable offenses simply are not, and never have been, within Congress’s legislative power."
Seriously?
ETA Holy shit that was the quote. Unbelievable.
Yes.
To be a bit less batshit insane, she argued that investigations of the President should only be within the framework of an impeachment investigation.
Note I said “a bit less”.
She appears to hold the idea that only the Executive Branch can perform any criminal investigation function, so that if Congress comes across evidence of criminal wrongdoing they are limited to 1) initiating impeachment against any wrongdoer(s) and 2) presumably request that the Executive perform the investigation for them - and can’t investigate further under the theory of legislative business.
This seems to overlook the basic fact that Congress makes the criminal laws in the first place, and also ignores the concern that the people in charge of criminal investigations may be the ones performing criminal acts in the first place. I believe the majority’s smackdown that this construction “enfeebles” Congress is correct.
As I understand, Congress can examine anyone’s returns for the purpose of determining if changes to the tax laws are warranted. They don’t need to be part of a criminal investigation at all.
Tell that to the toadies trump has packed the courts with! I wonder if they just keep bleating it enough can it become a legal precedent? I’m a little surprised they’re pushing the unitary executive so hard since they wouldn’t like it if a Democrat president was operating under the “rules” they want for trump.