This I didn’t expect, and it’s a decision by a 6-3 vote, with Jackson, Kagan, and Sotomayor dissenting. Trump is now apparently shielded from prosecution for official acts, but not private ones. That’s going to cause great confusion, but it’s also going to delay his trials, making it easier for him to win November’s election.
From the NYT; click the headlines to read (archived here, but the feed changes):
An excerpt as things unroll in real time:
The Supreme Court ruled on Monday that former President Donald J. Trump is entitled to some level of immunity from prosecution, a decision that will almost surely delay the trial of the case against him on charges of plotting to subvert the 2020 election past the coming election in November. The vote was 6 to 3, dividing along partisan lines.
Mr. Trump contended that he was entitled to absolute immunity from the charges, relying on a broad understanding of the separation of powers and a 1982 Supreme Court precedent that recognized such immunity in civil cases for actions taken by presidents within the “outer perimeter” of their official responsibilities. Lower courts rejected Mr. Trump’s claim, but the Supreme Court’s ruling may delay the case enough that Mr. Trump would be able to make it go away entirely if he prevails in November.
Here’s what to know:
The ruling: The justices said that Mr. Trump is immune from prosecution for official acts taken during his presidency but that there was a crucial distinction between official and private conduct. The case returns to the lower court, which will decide whether the actions Mr. Trump took were in an official or private capacity.
The charges: The former president faces three charges of conspiracy and one count of obstructing an official proceeding, all related to his efforts to cling to the presidency after his 2020 loss. He was indicted last August by the special counsel, Jack Smith, in one of two federal criminal cases against him; the other relates to the F.B.I. raid on his private club, Mar-a-Lago, in August 2022 that recovered missing government documents.
The trial timing: The prospects for a trial in the 2020 election interference case before the election seem increasingly remote. If Mr. Trump prevails at the polls, he could order the Justice Department to drop the charges. The bottom-line effect of the court’s ruling appears to be that the trial judge in Washington, Tanya S. Chutkan, is going to have to hold an evidentiary hearing on many, if not most, of the allegations in the special counsel’s indictment of Mr. Trump. The fact-finding process the court has ordered could take a while not only to conduct, but also to prepare for.
Lower courts ruled against Trump: Judge Chutkan of the Federal District Court in Washington denied Mr. Trump’s immunity request in December. “Whatever immunities a sitting president may enjoy, the United States has only one chief executive at a time, and that position does not confer a lifelong ‘get-out-of-jail-free’ pass,” she wrote. A unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit agreed in February.
Apparently the January 6 case will go back to an appellate court for further consideration, and that means that a lot of time will pass (way past the election) before this case is decided.
Click to read the ruling as a pdf that you can download:
We are well and truly screwed: the President can commit as many crimes as he wants so long as they are “official acts”, and he has nothing to lose by doing that. And if he gets elected in November, a prospect that seems increasingly likely, he could simply order the Justice Department to drop the whole case against him.
If you’re a lawyer or legal eagle, weigh in below.
Why would anyone be surprised? If anything, I’m a bit surprised that the hand-picked pro-Trump SCOTUS didn’t give him blanket immunity for everything including shooting some random person on 5th Avenue in broad daylight in New York. The DEMs pandering to Puritanical FAKE Left ultra-woke-ism prevented them getting a clear majority in congress which might have enabled Biden to undo the blatant stacking of SCOTUS with Trump’s toadies in time for Trump to be held accountable for at least a small part of his crime spree before the 2024 elections. It is almost as if Biden is secretly in Trump’s corner. It seems pretty obvious, given the results of their undermining of all fundamental values underpinning the US constitution which the PFL has been relentlessly engaged in, that the PFL is working for Trump while pretending to be all about social justice.
Yes, it does seem that what you call the PFL has been working to do everything they can to strengthen the extreme right. And now with people thinking about having a real convention, think how easy it will be for the woke Islamists to sabotage it.
When Obama started running for president, there were some black radicals who were protesting against him at his rallies. He just told them if they didn’t like him not to vote for him. And they were not a factor at future rallies. It might be too late for such level-headedness to be effective now. We sure do need it.
Wags are now pointing out on Twitter that, owing to this ruling, President Biden could now instruct the military to take Trump out with a Reaper drone strike, and, so long as that instruction was an “official act”, could do so with impunity.
Not a bad idea.
Not so. Wags notwithstanding, it would constitute an illegal order that the military commander in charge of the drone forces would be obligated to refuse to obey. By law, the Army can’t be deployed on U.S. soil or against American citizens except in an declared emergency, insurrection, or to repel foreign invasion. Even if the President as Commander-in-Chief could give the order without fear of prosecution (because of immunity), the military would still be bound by American law. That is what it is to be an unlawful order. Immunity (partial) applies only to the President.
If the President were to assemble a drone he bought himself at Hobby Lobby and whacked his political opponent with it while controlling it from the Oval Office, then he might get away with it.
Yeah. Biden can only hire private hitmen for jobs like this.
Most of Trumps action on Jan 6 are now immune from evidence in trial.
A coup to remain in power is now legal and he cannot be touched for it.
Biden now has that power too, but watch SCOTUS delay applying this till after the election when Chutkan finally rules what is and isnt official acts or not. They are going to rue for whatever gives Trump more power, and deny what takes it away if he wins.
Trump could not beat ANY of these charges in a court of law. So hes having his cronies change the rules for him. Conservatives are like that.
The Supreme Court ruled that the person responsible for assuring free and fair elections can’t be prosecuted for requesting the DOJ to investigate allegations of electoral fraud.
They ruled that a President speaking with the Vice President is a role of the office, and that the Government would be unable to function were that unlawful.
That any of these charges are even in court is closer to a coup than the actions they relate to.
That is not what they ruled, because that is not what Trump was charged with! A president is allowed to do those things, no one charged him for those. Read the indictments if interested in the actual charges.
Not even close.
Cedric that is so full of wrong, I dont even know what to say.
But heres a short bit on just that very topic of communicating with the DOJ or other branches.
https://x.com/ElectionInnov/status/1807840980814450794?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1807840980814450794%7Ctwgr%5E5c526ed5693549162503e4fafbdecade04be033e%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cbc.ca%2Fnews%2Fworld%2Ftrump-supreme-court-immunity-1.7251423
If you think charges for the damage done to the Capitol are worse than what was done? There is no saving you.
We have to think about the long term. Imagine Trump reelected. This should limit any revenge on Biden and avoid tit-for-tat prosecutions further in the future. And Coel, very funny idea!
When historians write about the Weimar Republic they often point out easy wins that the state failed to take, and many of them were to do with the legal process: Political assassinations were common, but a clear pattern emerged whereby assassins of rightists were given harsh prison terms while assassins of leftists/liberals (whose victims included a cabinet minister, Walther Rathenau) were given slaps on the wrist. Most notoriously (in retrospect), Hitler could have been given 10 – 15 year’s hard labour for his role in the Munich Putsch, which might have kept him in prison till the late 1930s, but instead he got six months in cushy minimum security which he used to write Mein Kampf.
The failure to get cases against Trump to court much earlier in Biden’s term, before they could get embroiled in the next election cycle, strikes me as a similar basic mistake that anyone could have seen coming. Let’s hope it’s not a mistake with similar consequences.
I think the reason that it took so long to percolate up to the Supreme Court is that it had to make its slow way thru lower courts. Opposed and appealed all the way of course. But I don’t know.
I read that this ruling is largely what was expected. The Supremes decided the case on an abstract principle: official acts vs. personal acts—a principle that is easy to state. But that same principle is hard to enforce, as lower courts will have to figure out how to apply the distinction to specific acts. Essentially, this complicates the law and will delay the proceedings in this case and into the future.
I read today’s opinion and listened to the oral argument a couple of months ago at which time both sides pretty much abandoned their most absolute positions. Today’s decision was forseeable and was not only correct, but obviously so. The parameters set up apply not only to Trump but also to all presidents past and future. The Court remanded the case to the lower court to determine which of the many, many specific allegations against Trump had to do with his official duties and which were unofficial, issues which the DOJ and the lower court judge, in their even-handed totally non-partisan rush to get this adjudicated to stop Trump from winning the next election, paid no attention to. Now they have to. After that’s sorted out, I expect Jack Smith will still try to piece something together from a much smaller set of Legos. (The Fischer case, decided Friday, hobbles him further).
Obviously so? I vehemently disagree. Committing crimes as part of one’s “official duties” is not on.
I agree with you totally, Jerry. How do people not understand this? If Obama or Biden did the exact things as Trump, guess what their reaction would be !
Mike: +1. Well said. Forget Trump, he’s an old man who will probably be dead in 10 years. The republic survived his first term intact and will almost certainly survive him and his corruptions. The republic may not survive lawfare, using the criminal justice system in pursuit of political gains. That tactic is far more corrupt than one individual. The court may have just saved our nation from corrupt lawyers, prosecutors and judges who use the system to get people they personally despise. If so, today is a good day.
This is a really poor take. So it would be ok for the administration to assassinate Trump now as an “existential threat to the republic” and be immune from justice as long as no impeachment passes? Makes sense. Also enough of the lawfare nonsense please. Trump brazenly concocted a scheme to subvert the peaceful transfer of power. He is on record doing so. That hasn’t happened since 1861. It is “lawfare” to attempt to make sure that doesn’t happen again by holding him accountable for this?
Ted, two of the three New York cases were unquestionably lawfare. Both based on novel legal theories that had never been brought before and were targeted at Trump by Democratic prosecutors, at least one of whom promised to get Trump if elected. The dude was also charged with about forty separate charges by Jack Smith for playing whack a mole with some copies of records that he was entitled to have one day and not the next. Forty charges. Trump is a canary in the coal mine of the corruption that seems to be occurring on both the offensive and defensive teams in our criminal justice system.
Did he attempt to subvert an election? That’s the case that precipitated the SCOTUS decision. Is holding him accountable for this lawfare?
I agree the Bragg case should never have gone forward.
Calling holding Trump accountable for actually committing real crimes ‘lawfare’ is absolute baloney.
You and those like you wanted him to be completely immune from any bad acts he has ever done, and any acts taken to address that is ‘lawfare’.
Seriously, how do people like you have a vote?
Cam, I voted for Clinton and Biden and don’t give a darn about Trump. I care about this country and an honest and honorable justice system. Just sayin’.
An honest and honourable justice system would hold criminals, such as DT, accountable. That is not lawfare.
Now that all presidents have broad immunity for official acts , the DC case goes back down to lower courts. It will be decided in a hearing exactly what constitutes ” official acts”. More delays!
If you care about the US and an honest, honorable justice system, you should be horrified.
This was done to get most of the Jan 6 case off of Trumps back. Not because he was wronged, but because he cannot beat the merits of the case and had almost no chance on a court of law. GA case most of that goes away now too. Again: Trump cheated the system and got caught under the law and almost certainly would be convicted on the merits.
Does an honorable and honest justice system hold people accused of the law accountable and make them face the merits to win or lose by evidence and argument?
Or does just a system change the rules when conservative heads dont like that their guy is caught, and then change the rules for him?
That, and if he gets back in, hes abusing that ‘official act’ power immediately. The bar for prosecuting him if he gets back in office and does terrible things to people like you is now near insurmountable.
Just sayin’….
Obviously correct to remove all the criminal acts Trump committed and remove him from liability if he gets back in and commits more?
Thats an obvious take from a Trump conservative.
Trump getting charged and convicted has nothing at all to do with stopping him from running and getting in to office. He committed crimes and was being held accountable, and now thats gone.
The flip sode of your take, from a lawyer who has worked extensively with SCOTUS:
I enjoy so much of the content on Jerry’s site but can’t figure out the partisan political conversations like this one. Mike Savage and Suzi take the long & wide view (over time and across both parties this will seem like a reasonable development at the Supreme Court), and in response Ted Gold and Cam respond with absurdities (administrative assassination of Trump and questioning Mike and Suzi’s right to vote).
I think you are the one being absurd. Obviously the hypothetical is extreme for a purpose-to point out how illogical the ruling is. It is not meant to reflect something realistic. It is not hard at all to come up with less extreme examples which reflect how extreme this ruling is. Most relevant of all is the one that precipitated this case in the first place. That is, explain to me why a president who has been voted out of office should be immune from punishment from concocting an elaborate scheme to subvert a democratically determined election and then going forward to carry it out?
Not here to explain anything to you or others. Just commenting on the quality of the commentary. Also not American so I’m not very invested in either view.
Absurdities? You mean like making sure a president is effectively immune from prosecution from anything now as long as they can declare it an official act? Biden has this now, but you know whom SCOTUS made this for: the guy whos lawyers argued that Trump should be immune for committing political assassinations of rivals.
And the bar to prosecuting terrible, formerly criminal acts of a sitting or former president is now effectively impossible?
Everyone has the right to vote and should. But if its done by who appear to be incredibly uninformed folks, it really makes one wonder.
Despite this ruling, Trump has said Biden will be jailed the day he leaves his presidency.
Wonder who will be doing that, hmm?
Well, yes, since you ask, I do wonder who would have the power to do that. Who indeed? I think the answer is “no one.”
“they should be going to jail on Monday not Steve Bannon!” — emphasis mine.
According to the New York Times, this is what Mr. Trump said on his Truth Social. (“They” refers to a list of his political enemies in both parties including President Biden.) The Times does not make any report that Mr. Trump threatened to arrest Mr. Biden or even predicted that he would be jailed after noon on Inauguration Day. Chalk this up to the same type of fantasy that has Mr. Trump in an orange jumpsuit.
ABC News says:
Just last week, during the first presidential debate in Atlanta, [before the SCOTUS ruling you are referring to — LM] when Trump was asked about his idea of “retribution,” he insisted, “My retribution is going to be success.” But he went on to say that Biden “could be a convicted felon as soon as he gets out of office,” claiming he has done “horrible things” as president.
The tense of grammar is absurdly wrong here, sure. It would be a neat trick to indict someone and convict him all in one half-day. But let’s allow Mr. Trump is relishing the thought that Mr. Biden would be at risk of felony prosecution by his Justice Dept. upon stepping down, and sure to be convicted.
“Should” and “could” are something anyone can say about anyone they dislike. (A commenter upthread even suggested it would be a good idea for President Biden to assassinate Mr. Trump.) A President has no authority to arrest anyone or order his arrest as of course Mr. Trump well knows and you surely do also. Even if he were, somehow, to direct military tribunals to bring charges against American civilians it would take some time before any of the targets got put behind bars without bail pending trial. So Mr. Biden being taken to jail on Marine One in handcuffs is absurd enough not to take it seriously. (A promise to nuke Tehran as soon as he gets the nuclear football, or a threat to abrogate NAFTA, again, would be another matter entirely….)
Let’s stick to what people actually said, and then have a thought as to whether they can actually do what they are alleged to have threatened. That’s why the “Lock her up” call and response was never more than bullshit. A vindictive President could well direct a compliant Justice Dept. to carry out a malicious politically motivated prosecution. That would not be bullshit. I predicted a couple of years ago that even a well-founded prosecution of a former President would lead to ritual prosecution of all future Presidents unless they died in office or were succeeded by a President of the same party, tempting them all to amass ill-gotten fortunes during office in order to fund the inevitable ruinous defence. Something to keep in mind if your kid ever says, “When I grow up I want to be President!”
If presidents are not given immunity, should Obama be charged with the murder of a U.S. citizen, Anwar Al-Aulaqi, on foreign soil?
You can thank the same movement giving the Executive Branch overarching powers the Constitution didn’t grant-which started under Bush after 9/11 and today’s rule greatly expands further-for why Obama couldn’t even be prosecuted for this *before* today:
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/10/the-secret-memo-that-explains-why-obama-can-kill-americans/246004/
Does this mean that your in favor of Bush, Obama and Trump all being tried for acts committed while president?
No one would bring charges against Obama or Bush. In these cases the malfeasant activities were cleared by the justice department. There was never any case-these were judicial grey zones (based on “war” claims) that each president took advantage of. These are loopholes Congress should have tried to close, but didn’t. This never happened in the case of Trump, far from it. He had no justification other than his nuts believe that there was massive voter fraud that no one had evidence of.
Look the issue is this-there are laws. Sometimes those laws are ambiguous or can be manipulated (Bush, Obama). But you can’t just decide that courts can’t be trusted to carry out laws that are clear. That’s nuts. The Constitution says absolutely zip about presidents being shielded from breaking laws, and in fact implies the opposite. This is the opposite of originalism and is completely illogical.
America is slowly sinking into a lawless mess. Trump has no respect for the law, or anything that isnt him and his ego. Our politics in the UK is a bit shabby, but nothing like the shambols the US has become.
Between this decision, the debate where Biden almost certainly sealed his own fate and that of the country’s, and Le Pen’s triumph in France, the past few days have been horrible for Western democracies.
For real
People getting to see who they’re voting for, and voting, and knowing that the person for whom they vote will be legally allowed to do their job: These things are not horrible for Western democracies, they’re the very essence of them.
It isn’t horrible for people to get to see the candidates they’re potentially voting for, and to get an idea of their shortcomings.
It is horrible if, when that happens, it seems like they have a choice between someone who’s not up to the job and someone who if elected will undermine the institutions of democracy.
(Of course you might think that actually Biden’s in better shape than some people thought, or that actually Trump isn’t much of a threat to democracy. But that’s not the same thing as saying that someone who’s worried after the recent debate thinks “people getting to see who they’re voting for” is horrible.)
It isn’t horrible for people to vote.
It is horrible if they vote for candidates who, if elected, will do horrible things.
(Of course you might think that actually France’s far right would be good for the country if elected, or that actually they aren’t likely to get much power despite recent gains. But that’s not the same thing as saying that someone who’s worried after recent election results in France thinks “people voting” is horrible.)
It isn’t horrible for presidents to be legally allowed to do their job.
It is horrible if they are ruled to be above the law, to such an extent that ordering political assassinations and the like would not be clearly illegal for them.
(Of course you might think that the recent SCOTUS decision wouldn’t actually let a president claim immunity from “officially” ordering a political opponent murdered, or that no US president would ever consider doing such a thing even if able, or that actually political assassinations are fine. And that similar things apply to other less-melodramatic bad things a president might want to do. But that’s not the same thing as saying that someone who’s worried about that SCOTUS decision thinks “knowing that the person for whom they vote will be legally allowed to do their job” is horrible.)
(Actually, I think the strongest response to concern about the recent SCOTUS ruling is more like “The right way to deal with the possibility of a sitting US president doing official things in an official capacity isn’t the legal system but some combination of impeachment and the likelihood of not getting re-elected”. But this too is not the same thing as claiming that someone concerned about it doesn’t like the idea that presidents should be able to do their job.)
Lawyers Miichael Popok and Ben Meiselas discuss the legal implications: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6li1UZ4cyzM
If this ruling had been on the books in 1974 Nixon would have been completely immune from consequences for Watergate as all of the conversations and tape would have fallen under official presidential actions and as long as he resigned (instead of being impeached) he would have been free. Obviously this seemed absurd in 1974-it is why Ford pardoned him. Otherwise he could have been prosecuted….
People are also looking at the dangers incorrectly in the near future. The discussion seems to be “oh now Trump can’t just ‘Lock Her Up’.” This misses the point. The next time when Trump is elected he won’t have anyone like Barr, Pence, etc. there to call BS. It will be Kash Patel and other minions. So when the 2028 electron rolls around, what prevents subverting that election in the MAGA direction?
So it’s King Joseph now? Hmmmm….. the possibilities!
Sideshow.
Joe Biden – condoned by the lame Democrat establishment – has blown it by not facing the electoral roadblock of NOT his age but his clearly fading cognitive capabilities.
6 months from the election let alone 4.5 years from now.
He displays a similar irresponsible self-obsession to his opponent
He was a hero 2020 seeing off Trump, now the plain opposite in helping him.
Watching this from Canada, I recommend for everyone to take the time to see some movies from an excellent Youtube series “Fall Of Civilizations.” These are long, 3-hour videos, but the lessons of history are priceless. Looking at today’s US in this light, we see two leaders, each having half of US population behind him, whose actions directly or indirectly lead to weakening of American cause, protestations of supporters notwithstanding. Great leaders think about their country and their legacy before they think about themselves. Lesser leaders waste the time history gives them – on self-aggrandizement, questionable causes, and personal vendettas. The collapse happens frequently at times when there is no available way out of mediocre leadership. The country simply falls prey to neighbors who had better luck. I just hope that we catch this before it’s too late, but the fact that the two sides can’t even communicate in a way that is intelligible to the other side is extremely worrying.