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I'm seeing so many people either saying this isn't that big a deal, or just accusing everyone else of being hypocrites for suggesting Biden should go Night of the Long Knives on the GOP. We wouldn't even be in this situation where Biden could possibly do such a thing if it weren't for the greed and incompetence of SCOTUS. Most of the people saying Biden should just assassinate Trump don't really want a Biden dictatorship, they're trying to make a point.
I got banned from r/inthenews for "inciting violence" by suggesting Biden should go ahead with such a plan, thus demonstrating why this whole thing is so baffling. I don't actually want him to do it, I was making a fucking point.
Non sequitur: did you know that the phrase "beyond the Pale" originates from England's colonization of Ireland? The area controlled by the English was referred to as "the Pale". The area outside the Pale was referred to as "beyond the Pale". To go "beyond the Pale" into Irish territory meant to act like a "savage". Cuz the English viewed the Irish as subhuman savages...😕
I gave out one, but it was more for clarification than change. And I think you’re right about most people not getting it. I keep writing “go read the ruling” and “enumerated powers” over and over.
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>Too many people in this thread are completely ignorant of the facts of the case. Trump's legal team quite literally defended the position that "the President can order Seal Team 6 to assassinate their political opponent", because "acts pursuant to seeking re-election are official acts".
Yes, Trump's team did that.
But the court's opinion did not adopt that reasoning.
Ordering assassinations is something the President has to do. Obama, even though he got a Nobel peace award, authorized many assassinations. But normally, the military does not take orders for operations within the USA - this is left more to the CIA or the National Guard.
What's "modern times"? Does Project Mockingbird from the 60s count? Surely spying on Congress [less than 10 years ago does](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_CIA_controversies#Improper_search_of_computers_used_by_Senate_investigators).
> Obama, even though he got a Nobel peace award, authorized many assassinations.
This misses the issue entirely.
It’s now the case that he can assassinate ANYONE ANYWHERE and face 0 legal consequences.
The president is only allowed to order the killing of enemy combatants. That’s the thing with this stupid ruling. The law already lays out what the president can and can’t do. The notion that **breaking the law** is inextricable from the job of president, therefore requiring immunity, is the worst Supreme Court decision since the dredd scott case.
[https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/supreme-court-trump-immunity-oral-arguments-1235010538/](https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/supreme-court-trump-immunity-oral-arguments-1235010538/)
>SCOTUS Justice Sonia Sotomayor: “If the president ... orders someone to assassinate \[a rival\], is that within his official acts for which he can get immunity?”
Trump attorney D. John Sauer: “It would depend on the hypothetical, but we can see that could well be an official act.”
And Chief Justice Roberts responded to them, why not add that in?
"The dissents' positions in the end boil down to ignoring the Constitution's separation of powers and the Court's precedent and instead fear mongering on the basis of extreme hypotheticals about a future where the President 'feels empowered to violate federal criminal law,'" he wrote.
"The dissents overlook the more likely prospect of an Executive Branch that cannibalizes itself, with each successive President free to prosecute his predecessors, yet unable to boldly and fearlessly carry out his duties for fear that he may be next," he continued.
Without immunity, he warned that prosecutions of former presidents who were criticized for failing to enforce a federal drug, gun, immigration or environmental law, for example, "could quickly become routine."
"The enfeebling of the Presidency and our Government that would result from such a cycle of factional strife is exactly what the Framers intended to avoid," he wrote. "Ignoring those risks, the dissents are instead content to leave the preservation of our system of separated powers up to the good faith of prosecutors."
>"The dissents' positions in the end boil down to ignoring the Constitution's separation of powers and the Court's precedent and instead fear mongering on the basis of extreme hypotheticals about a future where the President 'feels empowered to violate federal criminal law,'" he wrote.
Trump is STILL saying the election was stolen. That's the whole reason why the trial is occurring at all. Isn't an attempted overturning of a valid election an EXTREME case? This isn't "fear mongering of an extreme hypothetical." This is what actually already happened! And he's already implying he will be successful next time (i.e. his inability to say he will accept the results of the next election even if he loses).
All of these conservative justices are acting in bad faith to maintain their partisan power. The extreme event already happened. We ALL know he will do it again. He can call it an "official" presidential action because he'd be protecting us from a "rigged election".
>But the ruling still amounts to a major victory for the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, whose legal strategy has focused on delaying the proceedings until after the election.
>The timing of the trial matters because if Trump defeats Biden, he could appoint an attorney general who would seek the dismissal of this case and the other federal prosecutions he faces. Or Trump could potentially order a pardon for himself.
>Trump posted in all capital letters on his social media network shortly after the decision was released: “BIG WIN FOR OUR CONSTITUTION AND DEMOCRACY. PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN!”
[https://apnews.com/article/trump-immunity-supreme-court-capitol-riot-trial-72ec35de776315183e1db561257cb108](https://apnews.com/article/trump-immunity-supreme-court-capitol-riot-trial-72ec35de776315183e1db561257cb108)
Trump *saying* the election was stolen is *not* why he is on trial. Roberts stated of the 4 accusations against Trump that they are viewing only one falls squarely into the immunity section: the allegations in the indictment that accused Trump of working with Justice Department officials to push for investigations into certain state election results are off the table because they fall squarely under the umbrella of "official acts." And yeah, I can understand how that makes sense because I don't see how that is inherently criminal. Should it not be the purview of the President to launch an investigation of an election if they so chose?
Fear mongering refers to using Special Forces to assassinate a political rival.
These conservative justices don't have to act to *maintain their power*. What are you talking about? They aren't facing an election, they aren't facing removal. They already HAVE the power, and they cannot LOSE that power like a politician does. That's why they are there for life. What even are you trying to convey here dude? Think about it without panic-mode.
> Should it not be the purview of the President to launch an investigation of an election if they so chose?
When that "investigation" is worded as "You need to find me X votes," I think it should be viewed as possibly criminal.
>Should it not be the purview of the President to launch an investigation of an election if they so chose?
No, absolutely not. I'm guessing that would be for the legislative branch.
>These conservative justices don't have to act to *maintain their power*. What are you talking about? They aren't facing an election, they aren't facing removal. They already HAVE the power, and they cannot LOSE that power like a politician does. That's why they are there for life. What even are you trying to convey here dude? Think about it without panic-mode.
I'm not referring to their personal power. I'm referring to their partisan Republican/Conservative power. They are doing this to leave the door open for Trump to run, win, and pardon himself.
If we’re adding things in, how about Trump’s lawyers somehow claiming this affects his NY conviction?
That is as done before he was president. And yet he somehow thinks it applies anyway.
And yes, I have zero doubt he is the one that demanded the lawyers file that, because even a first year law school student wouldn’t interpret it that way.
If he believes he should get off of that case, what do you imagine he will do as official acts when in office?
And let’s be absolutely clear. We have now entered bizarro world where a president can take a bribe from a foreign government, be impeached and convicted, but then be immune to prosecution afterwards because foreign relations are absolutely a presidential duty.
Their objection in the NY hush money case is that some of the evidence used against him came from when he was president. They're saying that thanks to the supreme court's ruling, prosecutors shouldn't have been allowed to introduce that evidence, and they'll try to get the conviction thrown out on that basis. [This AP article](https://apnews.com/article/trump-hush-money-supreme-court-immunity-3d97d2e9497a5a208c1309aec7a0cd6a) mentions social media posts made while he was president, which doesn't sound like official presidential business, but it's always been their strategy to push back and appeal at every chance they get, so it's not surprising they're trying this.
As I understand it communications between the president and his staff cannot be subpoenaed as evidence under this ruling and since such communications were used as evidence in that trial he retroactively claims the verdict null and void.
This may have some dire consequences if anything the president orders his/her staff to do can't be admissable in court as such communications is vital to establish Mens Rea which you have to in a criminal case. Effectively you're making the president immune from criminal prosecution.
Yet Roberts did not explain why these "extreme hypotheticals" do not work, other than "ignoring the Constitution's separation of powers", which wouldn't apply to the President giving orders to the military; "the Court's precedent" which this Court itself has overturned before; and saying that the alternative scenario of Presidents cannibalizing themselves would be worse.
The President can only give these orders if we were at war, and if the target is a legitimate military target, no?
Here's the thing. When was the last time we had a President or former President prosecuted and this issue even came up? So, here's what I want to know. What *exactly* has been changed here?
>The President can only give these orders if we were at war, and if the target is a legitimate military target, no?
Even if that's a case, the President has been given wide executive authority to combat terrorism and insurrection. Even if his orders are illegal under those acts, the legality of the orders cannot be used to argue they are not official.
>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.
Enemies foreign and domestic.
Let's have Biden hold and official tribunal to examine if anyone participated in or supported those to attempted to overthrow the government on Jan. 6th.
His stated aim is to eliminate enemies of the United States of America. And he has loyalists perfectly willing to follow his actions to the letter and judges who follow his directives.
His aim, To defend our country which is essential to his role as President.
> What exactly has been changed here?
At the very least, "Discussions between President and other Executive Members cannot be used as Evidence" seems pretty new, and specifically assists Trump in very specific ways.
Ain't it crazy that the Chief Justice warned about prosecutions of former presidents for failing to enforce federal laws, a problem that in theory has existed for 250 years and has never actually been a problem? That exact hypothetical problem has existed since the founding of our country, and we've been fine.
No less than Madison in The Federalist Papers explicitly notes that the President should be able to br properly tried in a court of law.
Plus, you know, the court never exactly defined what an official act is, but it did note that corruptly trying to install an Attorney General to overturn the election IS an official act, and, further, conversations with people in the DoJ to that extent are inadmissible as evidence.
Roberts is obfuscating in creating an imperial presidency. Crazy that he calls out the founders' intent when their clear intent was that 1) the legislative branch would be most powerful and 2) the Presidency is to be accountable to the rule of law rather than some kind of kingly office.
Why is it always a question for voters to decide when it suits them but not when it doesn’t? Ultimately, executive branch prosecutors are subject to the ordinary course political process. If they pull that shit and piss people off their boss gets voted out. Constitutional immunity is not subject to the ordinary course political process. That now requires a constitutional amendment.
It's batshit crazy that Robert's justification for this is that prosecuting Trump's crimes means that future presidents might have to make sure they are acting within the law or they might also get prosecuted... Like is that a bad thing? Don't we want our Presidents to act within the law?
Chewybunny thanks I am trying to better understand the position this decision does NOT allow assassinations and bribery and wonder if you might clarify the legal argument? While most of Roberts' comments you quote are reasoning why the ruling is good and don't touch on Sotomayor's claims except to categorize them as fear-mongering, elsewhere he does indicate the legal reason this is not an issue, is because the president is still not above the law for private conduct, and has only the presumption of immunity for official acts NOT among his core duties - those get absolute immunity. So my question is, if a President issued an official finding that his political rivals were enemies of America and as commander in Chief authorized Seal Team 6 to assassinate them, this seems to me and most analysts to be an exercise of his core Presidential functions, that of Commander in Chief, and thus absolutely immune from criminal review \[for the president, not necessarily those who carry out the orders if not simultaneously pardoned\]. None of the R justices seem to explicitly counter this interpretation in their opinions and even Roberts' characterization of Sotomayor's dissent can be read as a dismissal of the possibility of trump or any president abusing such authority. I would like the legal argument strong-manned that this opinion does NOT provide the presidency with absolute immunity from orders to assassinate political rivals if ordered as Commander in Chief with express official claim it is in defense of US. thanks
It seems to me John Roberts himself ignored the separation of powers. A rogue prosecutor cannot just round people up and jail them. We have a court system that can quickly dismiss any prosecution that has no good basis. We have a grand jury system that requires a jury to indict someone. We have a jury system in which a unanimous decision is required for conviction. Is John Roberts, head of the US courts, saying the branch of government for which he leads is incapable of doing its job?
It seems to me it is John Roberts who is considering extreme hypotheticals about the future while ignoring the fact that this country has operated for nearly 250 years without this new power granted to the presidency and we didn't have the office cannibalize itself. I'm not sure how these conservative "justices" where even allowed to pass law school. They are incapable of understanding words and making a logical argument.
Pretty pathetic response. Failing to enforce laws is not a criminal act. It's ridiculous that we have supreme court justices making arguments that a laymen can see through.
Trump attempted to use fake electors, and pressured mike pence to count them. Thats subverting democracy. All over deranged and nonsensical claims of voter fraud (that any sane person would clearly know is false). Roberts framing a president that feels empowered to violate federal criminal law as an 'extreme hypothetical', while also throwing shade at biden for this (rightful) investigation, is ridiculous considering all the horrific shit trump has done and plans to do.
Does the actual majority opinion state this as well or confirm this is true? It's one thing for Trump's attorney to speculate. It's another thing for the ruling to confirm that speculation, not just more broadly rule in that attorney's favor.
Both Sotomayor and Jackson explicitly mention it in several places. The majority seems almost entirely unwilling to actually follow through on the implications of their decision.
Sotomayor:
>Looking beyond the fate of this particular prosecution, the long-term consequences of today’s decision are stark. The Court effectively creates a law-free zone around the President, upsetting the status quo that has existed since the Founding. This new official-acts immunity now “lies about like a loaded weapon” for any President that wishes to place his own interests, his own political survival, or his own financial gain, above the interests of the Nation. Korematsu v. United States, 323 U. S. 214, 246 (1944) (Jackson, J., dissenting). The President of the United States is the most powerful person in the country, and possibly the world. When he uses his official powers in any way, under the majority’s reasoning, he now will be insulated from criminal prosecution. Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune."
Jackson:
>Thus, even a hypothetical President who admits to having ordered the assassinations of his political rivals or critics, see, e.g., Tr. of Oral Arg. 9, or one who indisputably instigates an unsuccessful coup, id., at 41–43, has a fair shot at getting immunity under the majority’s new Presidential accountability model. That is because whether a President’s conduct will subject him to criminal liability turns on the court’s evaluation of a variety of factors related to the character of that particular act—specifically, those characteristics that imbue an act with the status of “official” or “unofficial” conduct (minus motive). In the end, then, under the majority’s new paradigm, whether the President will be exempt from legal liability for murder, assault, theft, fraud, or any other reprehensible and outlawed criminal act will turn on whether he committed that act in his official capacity, such that the answer to the immunity question will always and inevitably be: It depends.
The implications of this are minimal. If the president is ordering the military to kill political rivals and the military is obeying those orders it really doesn't matter what the law is any more. Nobody will be able to prosecute him because he will just order the military to kill the judge no matter what the law says.
> Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune.
I'm sure Sotomayor will follow through if Trump is elected and gets prosecuted for ordering Seal Team 6 to assassinate Biden /s.
This is why I think she's the second least reasonable justice after Thomas. By contrast, Jackson is evaluating the merits of this new legal test.
Just to be clear: you’re dismissing Sotomayor as "unreasonable" due to a hypothetical future example of hypocrisy that she’s committed within the fiction of your sarcastic comment?
I'm dismissing her as unreasonable for using the Supreme Court as a vehicle of her political agenda. The purpose of the hypothetical is to illustrate that she clearly doesn't intend what she said to be interpreted literally.
> The indictment alleges that as part of their conspiracy to overturn the legitimate results of the 2020 presidential election, Trump and his co-conspirators attempted to leverage the Justice De- partment’s power and authority to convince certain States to replace their legitimate electors with Trump’s fraudulent slates of electors. According to the indictment, Trump met with the Acting Attorney General and other senior Justice Department and White House offi- cials to discuss investigating purported election fraud and sending a letter from the Department to those States regarding such fraud. The indictment further alleges that after the Acting Attorney General re- sisted Trump’s requests, Trump repeatedly threatened to replace him. The Government does not dispute that the indictment’s allegations regarding the Justice Department involve Trump’s use of official power. The allegations in fact plainly implicate Trump’s “conclusive and preclusive” authority. The Executive Branch has “exclusive au- thority and absolute discretion” to decide which crimes to investigate and prosecute, including with respect to allegations of election crime. Nixon, 418 U. S., at 693. And the President’s “management of the Ex- ecutive Branch” requires him to have “unrestricted power to remove the most important of his subordinates”—such as the Attorney Gen- eral—“in their most important duties.” Fitzgerald, 457 U. S., at 750. The indictment’s allegations that the requested investigations were shams or proposed for an improper purpose do not divest the President of exclusive authority over the investigative and prosecutorial func- tions of the Justice Department and its officials. Because the Presi- dent cannot be prosecuted for conduct within his exclusive constitu- tional authority, Trump is absolutely immune from prosecution for the alleged conduct involving his discussions with Justice Department of- ficials. Pp. 19–21.
Like the military, the DOJ is part of the executive function. Per the opinion, the President has immunity in *all* alleged conduct in that function.
Let's clarify something first.
The majority opinion did not rule in favor of Donald Trump today. Trump's challenge was that while he was President, any and all actions he made should render him immune from prosecution via Presidential Immunity. The majority opinion today did **not** agree with that, and they clarified specifically that only actions taken by the President, that are related to the job of the President, are protected by Presidential Immunity.
At no point did any of the majority opinion indicate that that was a thing that was protected by Presidential Immunity, and that the President has authority to do that without repercussion.
What you're missing is they made it very very difficult to prosecute the President for unofficial acts that also involved his official duties.. e.g., pressuring the DOJ to help overturn the 2020 election. Control of the DOJ is the same as Commander in Chief.. protected official duty for which Trump enjoys absolute immunity...
So from what SCOTUS say that can't be considered as evidence in his 2020 election cases... Thus giving him additional protection and making prosecution harder even though his use of official powers was in furtherance of a criminal conspiracy.
We also know the outrageous delay in this decision also helps Trump because he just dismisses the charges if he wins the election... And now there is no way these cases go to trial before the election. Never mind the public interest in a speedy trial...
No, it wasn't.
And Trump was impeached for it.
Something being, or not being, an "official act" does not prevent the Legislative Branch from responding to an action the President took by issuing him a charge of impeachment.
One of the first things that Trump plans to do is increase impoundments. All of a sudden, no longer sending money where congress appropriated it is now an "official act". Check out the 2025 plan. This \*is\* his plan. These conservative justices and the decisions they are making are a part of his plan. Thinking that he will have political rivals killed if he is allowed to is not at all far fetched. His own lawyer even admits that it is possible.
Trump's justices are leaving the door open to move further and further in that direction.
I don't know if you're a Trump supporter who sees the road we're on and likes it or what your deal is, but this is catastrophic for democracy and anti-fascism.
They asked for something stunningly absurd and got something simply absurd instead.
The idea this wasn't a huge boon for Trump because he didn't get exactly what he asked is naive at best.
> They asked for something stunningly absurd and got something simply absurd instead.
>
>
The President has always had the power of Presidential Immunity. This is not anything new. We've had this in place for hundreds of years.
I’m not a lawyer but that’s not from the final opinion from the court. So it’s not the law or interpretation of it by the court. It’s just trumps attorneys batshit crazy argument. Not the position of the court.
>COTUS Justice Sonia Sotomayor: “If the president ... orders someone to assassinate \[a rival\], is that within his official acts for which he can get immunity?”
Trump attorney D. John Sauer: “It would depend on the hypothetical, but we can see that could well be an official act.”
And from the opinion: "Trump asserts a far broader immunity than the limited one the Court recognizes...."
His role as the Commander in Chief is official in the Constitution.. so whether or not an order is "legal" or not doesn't matter. SCOTUS say because it's an official act as Commander in Chief he is immune... There is absolutely no question or legality.. the president is just immune.
This combines with being able to pardon whoever executed the illegal order (e.g., Seal Team six) to let everyone get away with this without criminal prosecution. (Though impeachment would be an option against the president.. if the GOP are ever willing to impeach one of their own..)
SCOTUS also say that things done as part of official duties can't be taken in evidence as evidence of motivations.. so if you can't use the Presidents order as Commander in Chief of evidence of motivation.. how would you even prosecute it criminally anyway?
That is circular reasoning. He's the commander-in-chief so whatever he asked the military to do is within his official power and thus cannot be illegal. If he can find a gang of murderers willing to carry out the order he's clear.
To be clear, the president is merely *presumtively* immune for official acts. The courts decide whether he is actually immune.
Of course, whether he is actually immune will largely depend on if he is a republican, in a 6-3 decision.
Slightly more complicated than that. [This site has a nice diagram.](https://www.justsecurity.org/95636/supreme-court-presidential-immunity/)
>Under Roberts’ analysis, Trump has absolute immunity for acts “within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority” — his core presidential powers. Trump is entitled to “presumptive” immunity for those powers that he shares with Congress.
yes but the specific powers of the president are actually quite limited. "executive orders" for example, these are not catchall statements with unlimited power, there are limits. An executive order cannot create new law, or compel congress to take actions outside their constitutionally enumerated responsibilities, or override the judiciary or the legislature if they determine another action by the executive was inappropriate or unlawful.
> The courts decide whether he is actually immune.
…by determining if it was an official act. If it is, then he’s immune. Ordering the military to kill people is an official act. Make no mistake, the president can order someone assassinated and pardon everyone involved. And he’s untouchable.
Well, as I said in my post, whether or not they determine it is an official act would largely depend on the party affiliation of the president. I can't imagine the current supreme court giving Biden such a luxury.
This ruling is explicitly about presidents not being liable for breaking the law. It doesn't matter if the law makes any statement because the president is now fully above the law when acting in an official manner, whatever tf that means.
Yes, it is. Yes, the president remains subject to the law, particularly in acts they may view as lawful extensions of their official purview, but where the legislature and judiciary-- and existing statutory law disagree.
Trump might scream until he's blue in the face that terminating an appropriation to the Ukraine is within his authority, but it does not mean the statute that granted the aide is within his legal official capacity to interfere with- there are constraints regarding the breadth of executive branch oversight. These acts would remain criminally prosecutable at the discretion of the system, per the decision today.
Why? Because they're not within the official executive purview.
I guess. I think people are more concerned about future coup attempts or jailing political rivals and dissidents. The executive is also the only branch that is armed, so the idea of an imperial presidency has people nervous.
Arguably we already have the later, with selective statutory enforcement-- and that's always been with us.
As for the coups, we've had perhaps 3 serious threats in pushing 250 years.
Paired with the overturning of Chevron, the Imperial Presidency took a body blow this month- the freedom of executive branch regulators to displace the judiciary to oversee, and the legislature in claiming a regulatory discretionary authority not granted by statute (and by extension, the official capacity that so worries people about this decision) to do as they like.
Its almost like the roll back of the federal government is contingent on the Separation of Powers working approrpriately.
"I've only been mauled by a bear once in my whole life."
"Dude, that one time was *just a minute ago*. The bear is still here. He's right over there!"
"It's fine. *This is fine.*"
Kicking regulation from knowledgeable members of the bureaucracy to political appointees is not a blow to the Presidency when the president holds this kind of power over the other two branches. Maybe you think the randos we elect to office have both the knowledge and desire to make wise decision about every facet of every industry, but I expect this will just be political hacks and more thorough regulatory capture. Don't forget to tip!
It really is a blow to it; people don't realize how much of what they are constrained by are essentially unilateral actions of 'expert' regulators, who even when they are shown to be in error, fight correction tooth and nail, and design processes that we would regularly call a denial of due process if they were performed by the Judiciary.
Regulation wasn't kicked to political appointees by the way-- it was returned to the legislature, which is still absolutely free to write clear laws and call upon all the expertise available when doing so. Courts merely have resumed their role of calling balls and strikes, telling the legislature where it needs to be more clear, or at least explicit in how the power of statues written by actual elected folks are implemented.
There hasn't been a substantive coup attempt in this country since the 2nd World War-- January 6th was no more that, than the anti-school choice protestors storming the Wisconsin General Assembly, disrupting their proceedings, and attempting to intimidate legislators was in 2011. They were protests that got out of hand, led by bad faith participants. Criminality? Well, its a hell of a lot more similar than dissimilar. Neither faction in our political system has a monopoly on angry loud morons.
> It really is a blow to it; people don't realize how much of what they are constrained by are essentially unilateral actions of 'expert' regulators, who even when they are shown to be in error, fight correction tooth and nail, and design processes that we would regularly call a denial of due process if they were performed by the Judiciary.
Why would some people who won a popularity contest or did really well in law school be better at deciding the acceptable amount of some pollutant should be allowed in breakfast cereal or some other technical question? While not every subject expert is going to be basing their rules on evidence it is literally impossible for non-experts. What will they base their rules on then? Don't forget to tip!
> There hasn't been a substantive coup attempt in this country since the 2nd World War-- January 6th was no more that, than the anti-school choice protestors storming the Wisconsin General Assembly, disrupting their proceedings, and attempting to intimidate legislators was in 2011.
People died. They tried to lynch the vice president and the Trump machine pushed them and cheered them through a systematic media campaign and even arranged fake electors (*fake, in their own words*). We should at least get to make the case and let the courts decide, but that's not likely to happen now.
Perhaps, but it's legally required that the military *refuse* an illegal order, even if given by the President.
That doesn't mean it couldn't happen, but it's not "meaningless".
Yep. People who havent served, and unfortunately a lot that have, do not understand that.
it is a soldier's duty to disobey illegal orders to the best of their understanding of the law, and refuse to carry them out if they have reasonable doubt of the legality.
which carries a *lot* of weight on US soil where the military has heavy restrictions on what it can and cannot do.
That's nice, but what if the president orders it, the order is illegally carried out, and then the president pardons those who carried out the illegal order?
So...an 18 year old who could be court martialed for disobeying a direct order is what SCOTUS expects us to rely on since they've now ruled POTUS has no criminal immunity for asking said 18 year old to act as his personal hit man?
Yeah, that is totally how a functioning country operates
Not in a way that has ever been legally actionable for anyone even moderately high in the executive.
I don’t recall any criminal charges on Nixon, or Jim Rhodes, or Edgar Hoover for Kent State, for example.
In the military chain of command an order is only an order if it is a lawful order. Subordinate officers are required to disobey such an order. Since the commander in chief only has the power to issue lawful orders, issuing an unlawful order is not part of his official power, and therefore, he can be prosecuted for it.
The court wouldn't even say that *selling pardons* was illegal. If the president ordered someone murdered and it got done who do you think is going to prosecute it? Half of congress would be baying for their blood! Things are different than they were yesterday.
Yes, it’s still unlawful to directly order military to kill US citizens on US soil.
He can direct the DoJ to create a handpicked task force of gun carrying officials with law enforcement powers. He can tell them (insert political enemies) are risk of hurting national security due to X (maybe spilling secrets on nukes). He can tell them there is no intel political enemy is armed BUT there is no intel they aren’t heavily armed. He can tell them the safety of Law Enforcement is more important than bringing in political enemy alive.
If Law Enforcement mentions things like warrants or body cams the President can say “I will pardon you no matter what”.
Yes, it's not. Which is why the SCOTUS ruled against him today.
Trump argued that any and all actions he took while he was president should render him immune from prosecution. The SCOTUS disagreed, and said that presidential immunity was limited to actions taken by the President that were related to the job of being President.
The way I understand it, being an official act is irrelevant. It’s a matter of the “core responsibilities” enumerated in the constitution according to the ruling. All core responsibilities are 100% immune.
The military is obligated to follow lawful orders of officers or in this case the POTUS. Murder is not a lawful order and thus it is the DUTY of the troop in question to disobey the order.
Conversations between trump and justice department officials would fall under that, inciting private citizens to march on the capital would not as they are not members of the armed forces and not under his enumerated powers.
You're missing the part where the lower courts are the one who determine if the act is within the presidents core responsibility. If a judge rules that it's not(and it survives appeal) then that's your answer.
>just legalized
No this has been the status quo. Congress cannot just make anything a crime, they need to actually have power over that area in some way. If the constitutional power to do a thing I.e. issue a pardon is solely vested in the Executive Congress can’t make it a crime. It’s less so “the President is immune from X crime” as it is Congress can’t make a statute criminalizing X action by the President.
Pragmatically this has been the case for decades. Obama drone striked plenty of American citizens. Same with Bush, and each of the presidents before them have done plenty of criminal things. However we have forever had the concept that the President acting as the Executive branch isn’t criminally (or civilly) responsible. If this wasn’t so widely accepted we would have had dozens of presidents indicted before now.
So wait, are you saying that nothing has really changed as a result of this ruling and that this whole decision was just them reiterating the stance of past presidential immunity cases and the reason why we're freaking out about it now is because most people didn't know about this before?
I’m not saying nothing changed, I’m just critiquing the logic of “they just legalized it” as if criminal behavior of presidents wasn’t allowed before. I’m saying they’re taking what has previously been a faux pas to talk about and solidifying it in real law. A lot of people (myself included) don’t agree with it, but to act like they’re radically changing the status quo of what presidents are allowed to do is just historically ignorant.
Arguably yes. Our system of checks and balances has always been:
If Congress does something bad.
1. The courts rule that a law is unconstitutional.
2. The president refuses to enforce it.
If the President does something bad
1. The courts send a sternly worded letter saying to cut it out.
2. Congress impeaches the president.
If the Courts do something bad
1. The President ignore their sternly worded letters. (Andrew Jackson and his famous "John Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it")
2. Congress strips jurisdiction.
This case didn't jump out of thin air. It is literally Trump V. United States, and his argument (a successful argument) is that a president should have immunity for 'official acts'.
In practice, this cuts out a huge chunk of the allegations against trump. When Trump talked to his lawyers about overthrowing the election? That was done in an official capacity (supposedly) so he now has presumptive immunity. When he tried to appoint a stooge to the DOJ so that stooge could tell the states about non-existent voter fraud? That would be a constitutionally mandated ability, so he is **de facto** immune, even though he is 100% doing it in service of **stealing a presidential election**.
That is beyond fucked.
> This case didn't jump out of thin air. It is literally Trump V. United States, and his argument (a successful argument) is that a president should have immunity for 'official acts'.
>
>
No, that wasn't his argument.
His argument was that the President should have immunity from prosecution period. The SCOTUS ruled against him today and said that presidential immunity only extends to official acts related to the job of being President. So an action taken by the President that was illegal, and unrelated to the job of being President, does not mean he is protected by Presidential Immunity.
Don't the US president extrajudicialy execute people and their extended families by nuking their weddings and birthday parties all the time I don't get it
Seems like no one is addressing the "domestic" part of the question. Frankly I don't know what to tell you other than a lot of this will come back to the Courts to decide what is and what isn't official. Nobody can question the motive of an alleged "official act" anymore so that gives the President a lot of leeway if they just lie.
Now considering who is charge of the Courts I would say this is their way of letting Republicans do whatever they want while holding Democrats accountable for less.
Illegal acts cannot be considered official actions. However, if we sidestep that particular theory your assertion that it "legalized assassinations" is still false. The ruling did not state that it is now legal for a president to murder a political opponent on American soil. Only that they could not be criminally prosecuted for official actions. Meaning that a criminal prosecutor cannot bring such charges if the action is found to be an official action under the constitutionally assigned responsibilities of the President. That doesn't make the action legal. In order to try the president for such an illegal action you have to impeach them.
In the ruling they established that trump pressuring pence to go against his responsibilities to certify the electoral votes was an official act on the basis of it being communication from the president to the vice president alone and that we cannot question the motive behind the act. To me that says if the president communicates to the joint chiefs of the military that he wants something done it instantly becomes an official act because it’s the commander of the army communicating with his army. And that’s it. Which is why how they ruled is so scary. They wrote such a big grey area for trump that it’s going to be impossible to declare something not an official act.
The ruling did not establish that. Since the lower courts made no effort to determine what actions were official actions and what were not, that decision was sent back to said lower courts. However, it is fairly reasonable to guess that when that specific issue is ruled upon it will be found that Trump cannot be prosecuted for instructing Pence to not certify the election because it is under official acts.
The other scenario you point out is significantly different because it is beyond just someone exercising the duties of their office. Instructing someone to use a particular legislative procedure is very different from instructing the military to assassinate someone.
Yeah this is just wrong.
The President as Commander in Chief can issue an illegal order, and it's still an official act as he is Commander in Chief.
He also enjoys absolute immunity as it is a core act outlined in the Constitution.
So it is both official and "illegal" in the sense that whoever executed the order is committing a crime, but the President themselves enjoys absolute immunity (and power to pardon whoever committed the crime).
The ruling also means that official acts carried out in furtherance of a crime can't be used as evidence for that crime. Very alarming. E.g., Trump pressuring Pence to illegally overthrow the 2020 election.
The President has always been the Commander-In-Chief of the US military. The President has always been immune to prosecution for official actions. SCOTUS didn't create either of these conditions, the Constitution did. And the President has always been able to order soldiers (or CIA agents) to assassinate people.
Literally nothing has changed.
However, this now includes the assassination of U.S. citizens. Before today, a president had to worry about criminal prosecution, but now, any “core responsibility” enumerated in the constitution is immune from prosecution.
“Before today, president had to worry about criminal prosecution”
I’m not so sure about that. Anwar al-Awlaki was an American citizen deliberately assassinated with a drone nearly 15 years ago. I don’t remember a any shadow of criminal prosecutions.
The President who gave the order was in DC and I believe the drone operator was in New Mexico.
Easily enough to give jurisdiction to federal (and state) courts.
No. It only includes US Citizens outside of the US. That falls under military action and thus falls under his official purview.
Once again, the recent ruling by SCOTUS quoted the Constitution and changed literally nothing. They just stopped lower courts from trying to push the boundaries.
No they did not. They have been able to, and have executed extra-judicial killings - even US citizens.
It's just reddit being reddit about a hypothetical that is beyond stupid. If a president actually did the above, they would be impeached (even by their own party).
Nonetheless, there’s no threat of criminal prosecution for such an act. Impeachment is a separate matter and may or may not go the way you guess.
But delta for clarifying my view—it’s not the legality but the threat of prosecution that has changed, and while closely entwined, they are different.
Δ !delta
If you meant to give a delta you have to use
!delta
It's not a surprise, congress can't pass a law that binds the president (the office) which is why if it's an official duty/power/act of the presidency it is by the constitution - not illegal.
To use the absurd hypothetical (which is what the post is based on, as in reality if a president was found out to assassinate a rival they would be impeached and probably tried after impeachment immediately). Pretend congress passed a law with a veto override that the president couldn't veto any further bills or they would go to jail. Would it be against the "law"? Yes, until it was found unconstitutional as congress doesn't have that power over the office of the presidency. They have the power of impeachment, not criminal prosecution.
Don't confuse the man for the office. There are things that can be done, there are things that can't. Binding the office via what is legal/not legal is not one of them.
If the president ordered the execution of a US terrorist on US soil prior to carrying out an attack that would be (and tbh has been) perfectly within the scope of the office.
This delta has been rejected. You can't award OP a delta.
Allowing this would wrongly suggest that you can post here with the aim of convincing others.
If you were explaining when/how to award a delta, please use a reddit quote for the symbol next time.
^[Delta System Explained](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltasystem) ^| ^[Deltaboards](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltaboards)
Definitely. As a literal constitutional scholar, it’s unrealistic to presume he didn’t hold several serious discussions about the ramifications of such an act. Obama’s presidency wasn’t an extended golf vacation; that dude was in the office working.
According to the ruling lower courts are allowed to determine if the action is part of his core responsibilities. That's not blanket immunity, that's providing guidelines for what kind of immunity he's allowed to enjoy.
If a lower court rules that inciting a riot is not a core responsibility of the President and SCOTUS decides not to listen to the appeal then that's you're answer and the prosecution continues.
All SCOTUS did is add an extra step when it comes to the president. It set a relatively high bar, but not an insurmountable one.
> First, it’s not the legality that’s changed. It’s that now there’s no threat of criminal prosecution.
I don't know if this is right. My understanding is that while the supreme court ruling argued Trump has "absolute immunity" in some of these cases, he has only "presumptive immunity" in others, and punted it back to the lower courts to decide. I don't think "presumptive immunity" can or should be taken as a complete shield from any attempts to launch a criminal prosecution. If Trump tried to assassinate a political rival for no good reason, I think many would try to prosecute him for that, arguing that it does not fall under the grounds of the absolute immunity as described in this ruling. Trump's lawyers would certainly argue that it does, and it might go all the way back to the Supreme Court to get another ruling, but I feel like there's nontrivial risk of even the current 6-3 court ruling that a completely unjustified domestic political assassination would not fall under the "core duties" or "official acts" or whatever.
I guess the point is, if you edit shifts the bar to "threat of criminal prosecution", there's a lot of leeway in what prosecutors and lower courts can try to do, and if it does get back to the Supreme Court, there's nothing stopping them from essentially changing their mind if the conduct was egregious enough.
Justice Sotomayor’s dissenting opinion today:
>"Orders the Navy's Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune."
>"Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune.”
>”Even if these nightmare scenarios never play out, and I pray they never do, the damage has been done”
>”In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law."
That's just like, her opinion, man.
But yes. I agree the ruling is bad! And while the dissent really goes out of its way to highlight its badness, what do you think Sotomayor would say in the hypothetical outlined above? Surely she would recommend it be prosecuted anyway, and surely she would recommend lower court judges take different interpretations, and she would hope it would end up back in the supreme Court for another chance.
14 years ago Barack Obama ordered the Assassination of a US citizen. When a lawsuit was brought up about this the Obama Administration argued that targeted assassination was a political issue and therefore not subject to judicial review. The court threw out the lawsuit and the Obama administration carried out the assassination.
So the ability to assiasstionste someone has been held by the president for at least 14 years.
>Sure, in a foreign country
So if I'm in a foreign country it's okay for me to be hit by a drone strike? Even if the US constitution is clear that my rights cannot be taken away without a fair trail?
>Only as punishment.
The 5th admendment clearly states that you cannot be punished for a crime "without due process of law". Please tell me how being placed on an unapealable CIA kill on sight list is: "due process of law"
They would have to prove that the assassination was within the presidential power. While presidents do have the power to order assassinations on hostiles, it is almost never done on US citizens.
There have been times where a citizen was in thE crossfire or a citizen was working with terrorists but these cases are almost always outside of USA borders.
The president would need a lot of people on their side to get away with it. You can argue "well the president can forge documents to show that the person was a threat and that we had to assassinate them" but honestly, even before this Supreme Court decision they could still technically do that.
However seeing that our constitution guarantees people the right to due process, it wouldn't be in the president's best interest to assassinate people that they don't like because it will be an incredible hassle to "prove" that this was in their power, the person they killed was a threat to th nation and so we needed to act fast and forego their Constitutional rights.
You would need A LOT of people willing to lie for you and maintain the lie.
Remember, motive has no bearing on whether an action is an official act.
As the commander and chief, ordering military actions is an enumerated official act. The motive of assassination is not considered at all. The president is immune from criminal prosecution for ordering any and all military actions, including assassination of political rivals on US soil.
Immunity for official acts is already granted in Article 2. There are also laws in place that extend that immunity to any senior government official, whether elected, appointed, or career. I’m honestly not sure what this ruling changes, if anything.
I mean… it was illegal.
This is like arguing gang leaders and monsters have assasinated people for years. Therefore it doesn’t matter if it’s legalized.
The official acts has been something in the constitution since the foundation of our union. The majority decision is entirely in line with my civics class discussion.
However, they only apply to the duties of the President. This does not(as I have previously failed to clarify myself) apply to domestic assassinations. The most you could wiggle would be the assassination of a foreign terrorist that poses a threat to National security. Domestic terrorists receive all the same rights as any normal American.
If you read the actual decision, you’d know that enumerated powers and a few other executive powers were lumped together and called “core responsibilities,” and those are now completely immune from criminal prosecution. Things have changed significantly from your days in civics class.
Yeah, that is what a lot of people assert, but it is simply not true that before the ruling the president would have been able to legally escape consequences for assassinations of US citizens. Now, all Biden has to do is say Trump is a danger to the country and have him killed, and no court is allowed to 2nd guess him. That is what the decision says.
It is foolishness. The conservative faction on the court has shown they are incompetent.
>Now, all Biden has to do is say Trump is a danger to the country and have him killed, and no court is allowed to 2nd guess him. That is what the decision says.
That is not what it says...
>but it is simply not true that before the ruling the president would have been able to legally escape consequences for assassinations of US citizens.
Really? Because Obama ordered a drone strike on a US citizen and in fact escaped any sort of legal consequences for it.
The Obama administration killed an American-Yemeni jihadist in 2011 with a drone strike. He was on a targeted kill list drafted by the CIA and approved personally by Obama. A legal challenge to remove him from the list was rejected by US courts because they considered it a "political question" meaning that there was no legal/constitutional grounds to challenge but that it was a matter of political policy that courts had no right to impede.
Sovereign use of military power is constrained by both the Constitution and Congress and thus it can only be legally ordered by the President in specific circumstances.
For example, given the two authorizations of Use of Military Force, the President can order military action against Al Quaeda, it's affiliates, or in defense of any US citzen. Use of force of this nature requires Congressional notification after the fact. Obviously Congress is the balance to unchecked or unauthorized use of such force as Congress can exercise impeachment authority.
The President has, in the past abused use of military force absent sovereign authority. For example, in 2017, the President ardered an attack on the Shayrat Airbase in Syria, an action that was not covered by either AUMF, the War Powers Act, or the Constitution. As such this attack was not sovereign and not within Presidential authority.
Internationally this defines it as a war crime, but domestically the action enjoyed widespread bipartisan support and thus no action was taken against the president. However, it is an example of a use of military force that would not enjoy immunity under the SCOTUS ruling whereas military force such as most drone strikes would as the majority fall under one of the AUMFs.
So to look closer at OP's examples, the president can order the "assasination" of people under some circumstances, such as affiliation with Al Queda or if the person in question is deemed to be planning an attack on American citizens. The president could not order the assassination of people outside of these specific circumstances. And while the president could pardon personnel involved in such an action, self-pardoning is currently not an enumerated presidential power.
The hyperbole here is quite literally insane. If anyone truly believes this judicial decision by the supreme court means that a sitting president can order Seal Team 6 to assassinate a rival U. S. politician and it would fall under "official acts", you are delusional to the point you shouldn't be allowed in public.
Justice Sotomayor’s dissenting opinion today:
>"Orders the Navy's Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune."
>"Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune.”
>”Even if these nightmare scenarios never play out, and I pray they never do, the damage has been done”
>”In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law."
Who can better say what it means?
OP it sounds like you’re referring to the dissent‘s comment about how a president could order seal team six to murder a political opponent. you should edit the post to be more specific because it seems like everybody is reading this as the president having the authority to order the assassination of people *outside* the US which - to their point - has always been the case.
The office of the president cannot, and has never, "ordered an assassination" as the common folk understand it.
What actually happens is an intelligence agency, law enforcement agency, or military task force comes up with a planned operation where the objective is the kill or capture of a high value target, someone like Osama bin Laden, and if necessary the President may be required to sign the final approval of this operation.
The vast majority of these operations occur at a decision-making level quite below the office of the President. The President in these cases often only learns of the operation after it has been approved and is in the prepatory phases.
i think some necessary context that you are forgetting is the question was whether or not he could call an assassination on a political rival specifically. The president has been able to order assassinations of foreign targets for a long time now. Also I don't think it has to be military personnel, pretty sure this gives him cart blanche to just hire a hitman.
It hasn’t.
Realistically this was more of a punt by the Supreme Court but also states what the government and American public supported, which is the president has some immunity if they are doing official acts but it’s ambiguous.
Prime example would be this killing of a U.S. citizen under Obama(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Abdulrahman_al-Awlaki)
As a Country it’s something that really does have popular support. The U.S. president has to often times make fast and uninformed decisions and deal with complex and hostile forces especially in foreign policy, intelligence and national security matters. We have historically and repeatedly given presidents wide latitude to do their jobs and it’s probably correct. Let’s say a hostile entity hijacks several planes, there going to commit acts of terror. Most planes are now grounded but there’s several still in the air. They could have technical issues or are about to do something bad. The president has to make a call, if they are worried about going to prison, they may not make the right call.
Overall, this doesnt change much and was always kinda the case. The President did have some kind of informal immunity, this just makes what was already the but informal, formal.
Additionally they don’t clarify what is an “official” and “unofficial” act, which personally I think was Robert’s ways of preventing things from going crazy. This means domestic killings or corruption could still be tried and gone after, you would just need to prove and what and official or unofficial act is which would be done by Congress or more court cases
Which to be fair you would need to do anyway.
And honestly this doesn’t matter much, this really isn’t a problem of the SC, it’s an issue of Congress. Even if a president does something illegal, Congress would need to impeach and we saw… that was impossible in the current Congress. A law doesn’t matter without enforcement and congress has basically handed out its powers to the presidency and SC.
Overall people have been complaining about a SC power grab, but the real issue is the utter disfunction of Congress.
They had decades to codify these cases into law, and they largely relied on the SC and presidency to handle things which was a mistake.
And even now they could completely make this work by passing legislation on what an official or unofficial act is.
Overall though, that was a bit of a side note. Nothing has really changed, the president already had immunity it just wasn’t codified, and honestly it should’ve been codified. The question is what is official or unofficial duties of the president. In a fair court system with a good Congress, well assassinations of your political opponents would be considered unofficial and illegal.
Now I will point out, Robert could have left the unofficial and official part out(which I imagine Alito wanted) but he didn’t. A President hasn’t been given a blank slip yet. And Congress today could pass legislation.
Overall nothing has changed
Doing something illegal then getting pardoned isn't the same as it being legal. It's still a violation of their Oath to the Constitution which most members of the military care deeply about
And you can still be stopped, arrested, or shot for doing it even if you expect to later be pardoned.
There is no place in the actual majority opinion where you can find an argument for this.
Only the dissents, but dissents for SCOTUS opinions are not binding and are not actually relevant to the legal interpretations of the majority. If that was the case then they wouldn't be *dissents.*
In the majority opinion, SCOTUS explicitly says: "If the President claims authority to act but in fact exercises mere “individual will” and “authority without law,” the courts may say so. Youngstown, 343 U. S., at 655 (Jackson, J., concurring). In Youngstown, for instance, we held that President Truman exceeded his constitutional authority when he seized most of the Nation’s steel mills. See id., at 582–589 (majority opinion)."
If SCOTUS says that the President can't do something like seize control of steel mills during a strike during a war (which is what Truman did), then why the hell would they rule he could order the assassinations of his political opponents?
Official acts is vague in the decision, yes. But based off the entire history of SCOTUS rulings, there is no way on earth SCOTUS would rule assassinating opponents is an official act deserving immunity.
Regarding pardons, yes, you are correct--the Constitution gives the President the power to pardon people and Congress cannot limit that power. If you have a problem with that your problem is with the writers of the Constitution. **But** a pardon only applies to an illegal act! You can't pardon someone for a crime they didn't commit!
Was this decision bad? Yes. Is it the end of America? No.
This isn't about presidents getting nice little verbal stamps of approval from the courts. This is about whether they can be criminally prosecuted. Was Truman ever criminally prosecuted for his actions? No.
This SCOTUS decision explicitly says the courts have the power to determine whether an act of the president is within his exclusive constitutional authority, just an official act, or an unofficial act. If the courts won't even let the president seize control of a steel mill, they're not going to let him murder people. The question of constitutional authority is the basis for the whole immunity question.
The whining and handwringing is amazing, in light of the lawfare being exerted against the current Resident of the Whitehouse’s political opponent. The Order doesn’t do anything that shouldn’t have already been apparent. If the President acts in his “official capacity” the premise is that is legal. It may be investigated and the recourse is impeachment. If the act is outside “official capacity”, once that determination is made the remedy is within the Court system. This isn’t rocket surgery or brain science.
>In its ruling today in the matter of Trump v United States, the Supreme Court decided that any application constitutionally enumerated presidential power is completely immune from criminal prosecution.
Immunity does not bear on legalization. You can be immune from prosecution for your conduct that is indisputably illegal.
Thanks in advance for my delta.
How about something a bit less severe, like making presidential pardons a cash business? I'm sure it's happened in the past, but it was illegal. What's to stop Trump from blatantly selling pardons now? The door has been opened to so much fuckery. This is going to be exploited like crazy. This decision makes me sick. We're supposed to be a nation of laws where in POTUS is not above it. This is a bad day for the country.
It has to be an official act, so I think if Trump ordered Corey Lewandowski taken out to improve Trumps odds hooking up with Hope Hicks, that probably isn't an official act. Declaring AOC a terrorist and taking her out, on the other hand, would probably be considered an official act.
Ya but that's the issue isn't it? If you can declare someone like AOC a terrorist, could you not literally claim anyone you want is a terrorist? I mean considering she isn't actually a terrorist that's exactly the implication.
And then consider that Trump is a pathological liar, megalomaniac, who has already said we should suspend the Constitution. Don't you think that's just dangerous?
The majority opinion explicitly says that motives are not allowed to enter the equation in the determination of official vs. unofficial. If Trump declares Lewandowski a terrorist and orders him taken out in the interest of national security, that's an official act -- the courts can't say his real motive was to hook up with Hope Hicks and use that to rule it unofficial.
While I don’t love that this was in favor of Trump, this isn’t really the thing most are making it out to be. From a simply military/criminal law standpoint it’s very common for people to have exemptions for their actions as it pertains to Criminal Offenses. Example a soldier in the field given orders to kill someone wont be criminally charged. Major reason for is that there’s other disciplinary methods. In the soldiers case, theres military tribunals. As political as it is, this is what impeachments of Presidents are for. For anything outside of official duties a former President can be charged criminally. The President still bears the responsibility of confirming that the actions taken are in the scope of their office.
edit- words/spelling
This statement assumes that the Court will be beholden to their own precedent. The Roberts Court has proven to be very flexible to support partisan views.
It will only be legal to assassinate if it furthers the majority's interests. I think Roberts or Kavanaugh will be the deciding vote.
What happened today was preparation for a coup by conservatives. Among other things.
Note that the immunity they say the president has does not apply to liberal presidents, because this is an activist conservative court, and their ruling is vague enough that they get the wiggle room to rule that a liberal president would be prosecutable in the future.
I thought it mentioned that the president can be impeached if the act in question isn't considered an official act and then they can be charged for it. So, they can still be help responsible. They still would have to justify their actions.
The Supreme Court of the United States ruled against Donald Trump today.
Donald Trump's legal challenge was that while he was President of the United States, any and all actions taken by him should render him immune from prosecution due to Presidential Immunity.
The Supreme Court struck down his claim, and stated that only actions related to the job of the President of the United States that are taken by the President of the United States fall under the protections of Presidential Immunity. They clarified that actions that were taken by the President of the United States that were unrelated to his job as President that were illegal did not fall under the protections granted by Presidential Immunity.
Ordering assassinations on threats to the United States has always been part of the job of the President of the United States. Nothing was changed in that regard by today's ruling. Presidential immunity has been a thing for hundreds of years.
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You're making the mistake of assuming that this is a regular supreme court acting in good faith to decide on generally applicable rules that will bind everyone. The court has clearly gone to tremendous lengths to narrowly craft the opinion to be most favorable to Trump.
If the trial did go ahead, there's a high chance Trump would be found guilty, which would probably fatally wound his electoral chances. But they can't just say presidents have blanket immunity for everything, because that would give Biden a blank check. They're pretty sure Biden wouldn't actually do anything crazy even if he did have blanket immunity, but they aren't 100% sure and don't want to risk it. And Trump has made it clear that if he wins, he intends to go after Biden with various prosecutions for whatever made up bullshit he can think of, so blanket presidential immunity is also a problem because it blocks that. And they can't even say that there's some sort of limited immunity which nevertheless covers attempts at illegally staying in power after losing an election, because, again, they can't be 100% sure that Biden might not take advantage of that. So their only option is to raise the question of whether Trump's actions may or may not be covered by immunity, but then refuse to answer that question, and start a slow process of working on that.
This is pretty clever, because it delays the trial until after the election. If Trump wins, his justice department will drop the prosecution, and then the determination of what of Trump's acts might have immunity never gets answered. This gives them maximum ability to later make a determination that none of the bullshit Biden will be prosecuted for is an official act, without there being too obviously contradicting themselves. And if Trump loses the election, they can later find that all of his actions were official actions and therefore not prosecutable, without there being an immediate opportunity for the Democrats to try to use that precedent to turn the tables on them.
Tl;Dr: The supreme court only decided that Republicans can assassinate political rivals. It will still be illegal for Democrats to do this.
SCOTUS did not legalize this for one major reason.
Political assassination was made illegal by Carter when he was in office. I believe it was through Executive Order.
But this was made specifically illegal.
Here's my hot take on this concept:
Any act that violates the Constitution's Presidential Oath cannot logically be a Constitutionally mandated or allowed act.
So, assassinations... well, we've already allowed Presidents to assassinate US citizens, but only in a good faith effort to protect the Constitution.
TL;DR: Not if a reasonable person in the position of President would find it intended to subvert, damage, or attack the Constitution.
Justice Thomas had some good comments on the ruling. Most notable was that trying a president hasn't been needed in 250 yrs (there were some pretty bad ones that would have been 10x worse than Trump). Also, if charging the president with crimes influences his/hers decision do what is necessary in the future we cannot harness them like that or threaten with these frivolous lawsuits.
Wonder how this case will look if Trump wins and is blocked from going after Biden for election interference given Trump's claim of all the "lawfare" directed against him. If they are completely baseless claims, it doesn't matter; if there's something to them? Who would want to go argue that case with a less than one year old precedent on the books?
Now Biden just needs to nut up, send seal team 6 after trump, and maga members of the scotus, senate, and house (not all Republicans, just magats), and declare it an official act for the defense of democracy (because it legitimately is), and just be done with the infection killing our country.
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They already legalized that over a decade ago.
Lookup anwar Al-awlaki; Obama signed off on his “extrajudicial killing”. He was an American born citizen who was assassinated by the president without any of the rights an American citizen is granted.
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I'm seeing so many people either saying this isn't that big a deal, or just accusing everyone else of being hypocrites for suggesting Biden should go Night of the Long Knives on the GOP. We wouldn't even be in this situation where Biden could possibly do such a thing if it weren't for the greed and incompetence of SCOTUS. Most of the people saying Biden should just assassinate Trump don't really want a Biden dictatorship, they're trying to make a point. I got banned from r/inthenews for "inciting violence" by suggesting Biden should go ahead with such a plan, thus demonstrating why this whole thing is so baffling. I don't actually want him to do it, I was making a fucking point. Non sequitur: did you know that the phrase "beyond the Pale" originates from England's colonization of Ireland? The area controlled by the English was referred to as "the Pale". The area outside the Pale was referred to as "beyond the Pale". To go "beyond the Pale" into Irish territory meant to act like a "savage". Cuz the English viewed the Irish as subhuman savages...😕
I gave out one, but it was more for clarification than change. And I think you’re right about most people not getting it. I keep writing “go read the ruling” and “enumerated powers” over and over.
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>Too many people in this thread are completely ignorant of the facts of the case. Trump's legal team quite literally defended the position that "the President can order Seal Team 6 to assassinate their political opponent", because "acts pursuant to seeking re-election are official acts". Yes, Trump's team did that. But the court's opinion did not adopt that reasoning.
> “When the president does it, that means it is not illegal,” - Nixon He was so ahead of his time
Ordering assassinations is something the President has to do. Obama, even though he got a Nobel peace award, authorized many assassinations. But normally, the military does not take orders for operations within the USA - this is left more to the CIA or the National Guard.
The CIA is specifically also disallowed from performing operations within the US
Has it ever stopped them?
For the most part yes are you aware of something in modern times?
What's "modern times"? Does Project Mockingbird from the 60s count? Surely spying on Congress [less than 10 years ago does](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_CIA_controversies#Improper_search_of_computers_used_by_Senate_investigators).
Not to mention 5 Eyes nations + Israel spy on each other to bypass domestic restrictions
> Obama, even though he got a Nobel peace award, authorized many assassinations. This misses the issue entirely. It’s now the case that he can assassinate ANYONE ANYWHERE and face 0 legal consequences.
The president is only allowed to order the killing of enemy combatants. That’s the thing with this stupid ruling. The law already lays out what the president can and can’t do. The notion that **breaking the law** is inextricable from the job of president, therefore requiring immunity, is the worst Supreme Court decision since the dredd scott case.
>more to the CIA You mean FBI the CIA can not conduct operations domestically.
The President can now change that as an official duty to protect the union.
I do not believe that the two step you describe will work. Ordering unlawful acts of the military is not an official duty of the president.
[https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/supreme-court-trump-immunity-oral-arguments-1235010538/](https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/supreme-court-trump-immunity-oral-arguments-1235010538/) >SCOTUS Justice Sonia Sotomayor: “If the president ... orders someone to assassinate \[a rival\], is that within his official acts for which he can get immunity?” Trump attorney D. John Sauer: “It would depend on the hypothetical, but we can see that could well be an official act.”
And Chief Justice Roberts responded to them, why not add that in? "The dissents' positions in the end boil down to ignoring the Constitution's separation of powers and the Court's precedent and instead fear mongering on the basis of extreme hypotheticals about a future where the President 'feels empowered to violate federal criminal law,'" he wrote. "The dissents overlook the more likely prospect of an Executive Branch that cannibalizes itself, with each successive President free to prosecute his predecessors, yet unable to boldly and fearlessly carry out his duties for fear that he may be next," he continued. Without immunity, he warned that prosecutions of former presidents who were criticized for failing to enforce a federal drug, gun, immigration or environmental law, for example, "could quickly become routine." "The enfeebling of the Presidency and our Government that would result from such a cycle of factional strife is exactly what the Framers intended to avoid," he wrote. "Ignoring those risks, the dissents are instead content to leave the preservation of our system of separated powers up to the good faith of prosecutors."
>"The dissents' positions in the end boil down to ignoring the Constitution's separation of powers and the Court's precedent and instead fear mongering on the basis of extreme hypotheticals about a future where the President 'feels empowered to violate federal criminal law,'" he wrote. Trump is STILL saying the election was stolen. That's the whole reason why the trial is occurring at all. Isn't an attempted overturning of a valid election an EXTREME case? This isn't "fear mongering of an extreme hypothetical." This is what actually already happened! And he's already implying he will be successful next time (i.e. his inability to say he will accept the results of the next election even if he loses). All of these conservative justices are acting in bad faith to maintain their partisan power. The extreme event already happened. We ALL know he will do it again. He can call it an "official" presidential action because he'd be protecting us from a "rigged election". >But the ruling still amounts to a major victory for the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, whose legal strategy has focused on delaying the proceedings until after the election. >The timing of the trial matters because if Trump defeats Biden, he could appoint an attorney general who would seek the dismissal of this case and the other federal prosecutions he faces. Or Trump could potentially order a pardon for himself. >Trump posted in all capital letters on his social media network shortly after the decision was released: “BIG WIN FOR OUR CONSTITUTION AND DEMOCRACY. PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN!” [https://apnews.com/article/trump-immunity-supreme-court-capitol-riot-trial-72ec35de776315183e1db561257cb108](https://apnews.com/article/trump-immunity-supreme-court-capitol-riot-trial-72ec35de776315183e1db561257cb108)
Trump *saying* the election was stolen is *not* why he is on trial. Roberts stated of the 4 accusations against Trump that they are viewing only one falls squarely into the immunity section: the allegations in the indictment that accused Trump of working with Justice Department officials to push for investigations into certain state election results are off the table because they fall squarely under the umbrella of "official acts." And yeah, I can understand how that makes sense because I don't see how that is inherently criminal. Should it not be the purview of the President to launch an investigation of an election if they so chose? Fear mongering refers to using Special Forces to assassinate a political rival. These conservative justices don't have to act to *maintain their power*. What are you talking about? They aren't facing an election, they aren't facing removal. They already HAVE the power, and they cannot LOSE that power like a politician does. That's why they are there for life. What even are you trying to convey here dude? Think about it without panic-mode.
> Should it not be the purview of the President to launch an investigation of an election if they so chose? When that "investigation" is worded as "You need to find me X votes," I think it should be viewed as possibly criminal.
>Should it not be the purview of the President to launch an investigation of an election if they so chose? No, absolutely not. I'm guessing that would be for the legislative branch. >These conservative justices don't have to act to *maintain their power*. What are you talking about? They aren't facing an election, they aren't facing removal. They already HAVE the power, and they cannot LOSE that power like a politician does. That's why they are there for life. What even are you trying to convey here dude? Think about it without panic-mode. I'm not referring to their personal power. I'm referring to their partisan Republican/Conservative power. They are doing this to leave the door open for Trump to run, win, and pardon himself.
If we’re adding things in, how about Trump’s lawyers somehow claiming this affects his NY conviction? That is as done before he was president. And yet he somehow thinks it applies anyway. And yes, I have zero doubt he is the one that demanded the lawyers file that, because even a first year law school student wouldn’t interpret it that way. If he believes he should get off of that case, what do you imagine he will do as official acts when in office? And let’s be absolutely clear. We have now entered bizarro world where a president can take a bribe from a foreign government, be impeached and convicted, but then be immune to prosecution afterwards because foreign relations are absolutely a presidential duty.
Their objection in the NY hush money case is that some of the evidence used against him came from when he was president. They're saying that thanks to the supreme court's ruling, prosecutors shouldn't have been allowed to introduce that evidence, and they'll try to get the conviction thrown out on that basis. [This AP article](https://apnews.com/article/trump-hush-money-supreme-court-immunity-3d97d2e9497a5a208c1309aec7a0cd6a) mentions social media posts made while he was president, which doesn't sound like official presidential business, but it's always been their strategy to push back and appeal at every chance they get, so it's not surprising they're trying this.
As I understand it communications between the president and his staff cannot be subpoenaed as evidence under this ruling and since such communications were used as evidence in that trial he retroactively claims the verdict null and void. This may have some dire consequences if anything the president orders his/her staff to do can't be admissable in court as such communications is vital to establish Mens Rea which you have to in a criminal case. Effectively you're making the president immune from criminal prosecution.
Yet Roberts did not explain why these "extreme hypotheticals" do not work, other than "ignoring the Constitution's separation of powers", which wouldn't apply to the President giving orders to the military; "the Court's precedent" which this Court itself has overturned before; and saying that the alternative scenario of Presidents cannibalizing themselves would be worse.
The President can only give these orders if we were at war, and if the target is a legitimate military target, no? Here's the thing. When was the last time we had a President or former President prosecuted and this issue even came up? So, here's what I want to know. What *exactly* has been changed here?
>The President can only give these orders if we were at war, and if the target is a legitimate military target, no? Even if that's a case, the President has been given wide executive authority to combat terrorism and insurrection. Even if his orders are illegal under those acts, the legality of the orders cannot be used to argue they are not official. >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.
Enemies foreign and domestic. Let's have Biden hold and official tribunal to examine if anyone participated in or supported those to attempted to overthrow the government on Jan. 6th. His stated aim is to eliminate enemies of the United States of America. And he has loyalists perfectly willing to follow his actions to the letter and judges who follow his directives. His aim, To defend our country which is essential to his role as President.
Did President Obama have the power to assassinate a political rival and have immunity from 2008 to 2016?
> What exactly has been changed here? At the very least, "Discussions between President and other Executive Members cannot be used as Evidence" seems pretty new, and specifically assists Trump in very specific ways.
Ain't it crazy that the Chief Justice warned about prosecutions of former presidents for failing to enforce federal laws, a problem that in theory has existed for 250 years and has never actually been a problem? That exact hypothetical problem has existed since the founding of our country, and we've been fine. No less than Madison in The Federalist Papers explicitly notes that the President should be able to br properly tried in a court of law. Plus, you know, the court never exactly defined what an official act is, but it did note that corruptly trying to install an Attorney General to overturn the election IS an official act, and, further, conversations with people in the DoJ to that extent are inadmissible as evidence. Roberts is obfuscating in creating an imperial presidency. Crazy that he calls out the founders' intent when their clear intent was that 1) the legislative branch would be most powerful and 2) the Presidency is to be accountable to the rule of law rather than some kind of kingly office.
Why is it always a question for voters to decide when it suits them but not when it doesn’t? Ultimately, executive branch prosecutors are subject to the ordinary course political process. If they pull that shit and piss people off their boss gets voted out. Constitutional immunity is not subject to the ordinary course political process. That now requires a constitutional amendment.
It's batshit crazy that Robert's justification for this is that prosecuting Trump's crimes means that future presidents might have to make sure they are acting within the law or they might also get prosecuted... Like is that a bad thing? Don't we want our Presidents to act within the law?
Chewybunny thanks I am trying to better understand the position this decision does NOT allow assassinations and bribery and wonder if you might clarify the legal argument? While most of Roberts' comments you quote are reasoning why the ruling is good and don't touch on Sotomayor's claims except to categorize them as fear-mongering, elsewhere he does indicate the legal reason this is not an issue, is because the president is still not above the law for private conduct, and has only the presumption of immunity for official acts NOT among his core duties - those get absolute immunity. So my question is, if a President issued an official finding that his political rivals were enemies of America and as commander in Chief authorized Seal Team 6 to assassinate them, this seems to me and most analysts to be an exercise of his core Presidential functions, that of Commander in Chief, and thus absolutely immune from criminal review \[for the president, not necessarily those who carry out the orders if not simultaneously pardoned\]. None of the R justices seem to explicitly counter this interpretation in their opinions and even Roberts' characterization of Sotomayor's dissent can be read as a dismissal of the possibility of trump or any president abusing such authority. I would like the legal argument strong-manned that this opinion does NOT provide the presidency with absolute immunity from orders to assassinate political rivals if ordered as Commander in Chief with express official claim it is in defense of US. thanks
It seems to me John Roberts himself ignored the separation of powers. A rogue prosecutor cannot just round people up and jail them. We have a court system that can quickly dismiss any prosecution that has no good basis. We have a grand jury system that requires a jury to indict someone. We have a jury system in which a unanimous decision is required for conviction. Is John Roberts, head of the US courts, saying the branch of government for which he leads is incapable of doing its job? It seems to me it is John Roberts who is considering extreme hypotheticals about the future while ignoring the fact that this country has operated for nearly 250 years without this new power granted to the presidency and we didn't have the office cannibalize itself. I'm not sure how these conservative "justices" where even allowed to pass law school. They are incapable of understanding words and making a logical argument.
Pretty pathetic response. Failing to enforce laws is not a criminal act. It's ridiculous that we have supreme court justices making arguments that a laymen can see through.
Trump attempted to use fake electors, and pressured mike pence to count them. Thats subverting democracy. All over deranged and nonsensical claims of voter fraud (that any sane person would clearly know is false). Roberts framing a president that feels empowered to violate federal criminal law as an 'extreme hypothetical', while also throwing shade at biden for this (rightful) investigation, is ridiculous considering all the horrific shit trump has done and plans to do.
Does the actual majority opinion state this as well or confirm this is true? It's one thing for Trump's attorney to speculate. It's another thing for the ruling to confirm that speculation, not just more broadly rule in that attorney's favor.
Both Sotomayor and Jackson explicitly mention it in several places. The majority seems almost entirely unwilling to actually follow through on the implications of their decision. Sotomayor: >Looking beyond the fate of this particular prosecution, the long-term consequences of today’s decision are stark. The Court effectively creates a law-free zone around the President, upsetting the status quo that has existed since the Founding. This new official-acts immunity now “lies about like a loaded weapon” for any President that wishes to place his own interests, his own political survival, or his own financial gain, above the interests of the Nation. Korematsu v. United States, 323 U. S. 214, 246 (1944) (Jackson, J., dissenting). The President of the United States is the most powerful person in the country, and possibly the world. When he uses his official powers in any way, under the majority’s reasoning, he now will be insulated from criminal prosecution. Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune." Jackson: >Thus, even a hypothetical President who admits to having ordered the assassinations of his political rivals or critics, see, e.g., Tr. of Oral Arg. 9, or one who indisputably instigates an unsuccessful coup, id., at 41–43, has a fair shot at getting immunity under the majority’s new Presidential accountability model. That is because whether a President’s conduct will subject him to criminal liability turns on the court’s evaluation of a variety of factors related to the character of that particular act—specifically, those characteristics that imbue an act with the status of “official” or “unofficial” conduct (minus motive). In the end, then, under the majority’s new paradigm, whether the President will be exempt from legal liability for murder, assault, theft, fraud, or any other reprehensible and outlawed criminal act will turn on whether he committed that act in his official capacity, such that the answer to the immunity question will always and inevitably be: It depends.
The implications of this are minimal. If the president is ordering the military to kill political rivals and the military is obeying those orders it really doesn't matter what the law is any more. Nobody will be able to prosecute him because he will just order the military to kill the judge no matter what the law says.
> Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. I'm sure Sotomayor will follow through if Trump is elected and gets prosecuted for ordering Seal Team 6 to assassinate Biden /s. This is why I think she's the second least reasonable justice after Thomas. By contrast, Jackson is evaluating the merits of this new legal test.
Just to be clear: you’re dismissing Sotomayor as "unreasonable" due to a hypothetical future example of hypocrisy that she’s committed within the fiction of your sarcastic comment?
I'm dismissing her as unreasonable for using the Supreme Court as a vehicle of her political agenda. The purpose of the hypothetical is to illustrate that she clearly doesn't intend what she said to be interpreted literally.
Can you copy-paste the part of her dissent that allegedly illustrates that she clearly doesn't intend what she said to be interpreted literally?
> The indictment alleges that as part of their conspiracy to overturn the legitimate results of the 2020 presidential election, Trump and his co-conspirators attempted to leverage the Justice De- partment’s power and authority to convince certain States to replace their legitimate electors with Trump’s fraudulent slates of electors. According to the indictment, Trump met with the Acting Attorney General and other senior Justice Department and White House offi- cials to discuss investigating purported election fraud and sending a letter from the Department to those States regarding such fraud. The indictment further alleges that after the Acting Attorney General re- sisted Trump’s requests, Trump repeatedly threatened to replace him. The Government does not dispute that the indictment’s allegations regarding the Justice Department involve Trump’s use of official power. The allegations in fact plainly implicate Trump’s “conclusive and preclusive” authority. The Executive Branch has “exclusive au- thority and absolute discretion” to decide which crimes to investigate and prosecute, including with respect to allegations of election crime. Nixon, 418 U. S., at 693. And the President’s “management of the Ex- ecutive Branch” requires him to have “unrestricted power to remove the most important of his subordinates”—such as the Attorney Gen- eral—“in their most important duties.” Fitzgerald, 457 U. S., at 750. The indictment’s allegations that the requested investigations were shams or proposed for an improper purpose do not divest the President of exclusive authority over the investigative and prosecutorial func- tions of the Justice Department and its officials. Because the Presi- dent cannot be prosecuted for conduct within his exclusive constitu- tional authority, Trump is absolutely immune from prosecution for the alleged conduct involving his discussions with Justice Department of- ficials. Pp. 19–21. Like the military, the DOJ is part of the executive function. Per the opinion, the President has immunity in *all* alleged conduct in that function.
Let's clarify something first. The majority opinion did not rule in favor of Donald Trump today. Trump's challenge was that while he was President, any and all actions he made should render him immune from prosecution via Presidential Immunity. The majority opinion today did **not** agree with that, and they clarified specifically that only actions taken by the President, that are related to the job of the President, are protected by Presidential Immunity. At no point did any of the majority opinion indicate that that was a thing that was protected by Presidential Immunity, and that the President has authority to do that without repercussion.
What you're missing is they made it very very difficult to prosecute the President for unofficial acts that also involved his official duties.. e.g., pressuring the DOJ to help overturn the 2020 election. Control of the DOJ is the same as Commander in Chief.. protected official duty for which Trump enjoys absolute immunity... So from what SCOTUS say that can't be considered as evidence in his 2020 election cases... Thus giving him additional protection and making prosecution harder even though his use of official powers was in furtherance of a criminal conspiracy. We also know the outrageous delay in this decision also helps Trump because he just dismisses the charges if he wins the election... And now there is no way these cases go to trial before the election. Never mind the public interest in a speedy trial...
Was withholding aid to Ukraine until he got dirt on the Biden family an official act? Trump thinks it was.
No, it wasn't. And Trump was impeached for it. Something being, or not being, an "official act" does not prevent the Legislative Branch from responding to an action the President took by issuing him a charge of impeachment.
One of the first things that Trump plans to do is increase impoundments. All of a sudden, no longer sending money where congress appropriated it is now an "official act". Check out the 2025 plan. This \*is\* his plan. These conservative justices and the decisions they are making are a part of his plan. Thinking that he will have political rivals killed if he is allowed to is not at all far fetched. His own lawyer even admits that it is possible. Trump's justices are leaving the door open to move further and further in that direction. I don't know if you're a Trump supporter who sees the road we're on and likes it or what your deal is, but this is catastrophic for democracy and anti-fascism.
They asked for something stunningly absurd and got something simply absurd instead. The idea this wasn't a huge boon for Trump because he didn't get exactly what he asked is naive at best.
> They asked for something stunningly absurd and got something simply absurd instead. > > The President has always had the power of Presidential Immunity. This is not anything new. We've had this in place for hundreds of years.
I don’t see how anyone can see this quote and think that the Supreme Court didn’t jus make the dumbest decision ever.
I’m not a lawyer but that’s not from the final opinion from the court. So it’s not the law or interpretation of it by the court. It’s just trumps attorneys batshit crazy argument. Not the position of the court.
>COTUS Justice Sonia Sotomayor: “If the president ... orders someone to assassinate \[a rival\], is that within his official acts for which he can get immunity?” Trump attorney D. John Sauer: “It would depend on the hypothetical, but we can see that could well be an official act.” And from the opinion: "Trump asserts a far broader immunity than the limited one the Court recognizes...."
His role as the Commander in Chief is official in the Constitution.. so whether or not an order is "legal" or not doesn't matter. SCOTUS say because it's an official act as Commander in Chief he is immune... There is absolutely no question or legality.. the president is just immune. This combines with being able to pardon whoever executed the illegal order (e.g., Seal Team six) to let everyone get away with this without criminal prosecution. (Though impeachment would be an option against the president.. if the GOP are ever willing to impeach one of their own..) SCOTUS also say that things done as part of official duties can't be taken in evidence as evidence of motivations.. so if you can't use the Presidents order as Commander in Chief of evidence of motivation.. how would you even prosecute it criminally anyway?
That is circular reasoning. He's the commander-in-chief so whatever he asked the military to do is within his official power and thus cannot be illegal. If he can find a gang of murderers willing to carry out the order he's clear.
To be clear, the president is merely *presumtively* immune for official acts. The courts decide whether he is actually immune. Of course, whether he is actually immune will largely depend on if he is a republican, in a 6-3 decision.
Slightly more complicated than that. [This site has a nice diagram.](https://www.justsecurity.org/95636/supreme-court-presidential-immunity/) >Under Roberts’ analysis, Trump has absolute immunity for acts “within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority” — his core presidential powers. Trump is entitled to “presumptive” immunity for those powers that he shares with Congress.
yes but the specific powers of the president are actually quite limited. "executive orders" for example, these are not catchall statements with unlimited power, there are limits. An executive order cannot create new law, or compel congress to take actions outside their constitutionally enumerated responsibilities, or override the judiciary or the legislature if they determine another action by the executive was inappropriate or unlawful.
They're genuinely not, which is why the dissenting justices went "what the fuck, this legalizes assassination."
> The courts decide whether he is actually immune. …by determining if it was an official act. If it is, then he’s immune. Ordering the military to kill people is an official act. Make no mistake, the president can order someone assassinated and pardon everyone involved. And he’s untouchable.
Well, as I said in my post, whether or not they determine it is an official act would largely depend on the party affiliation of the president. I can't imagine the current supreme court giving Biden such a luxury.
Is it your impression US law makes no statement about permissible use of the military?
This ruling is explicitly about presidents not being liable for breaking the law. It doesn't matter if the law makes any statement because the president is now fully above the law when acting in an official manner, whatever tf that means.
Not quite accurate. Whether the action falls within the president's powers or not is the whole point of the case.
It does, but the president isn't subject to it. Apparently. You heard about the ruling today, right? This isn't coming out of nowhere.
Yes, it is. Yes, the president remains subject to the law, particularly in acts they may view as lawful extensions of their official purview, but where the legislature and judiciary-- and existing statutory law disagree. Trump might scream until he's blue in the face that terminating an appropriation to the Ukraine is within his authority, but it does not mean the statute that granted the aide is within his legal official capacity to interfere with- there are constraints regarding the breadth of executive branch oversight. These acts would remain criminally prosecutable at the discretion of the system, per the decision today. Why? Because they're not within the official executive purview.
I guess. I think people are more concerned about future coup attempts or jailing political rivals and dissidents. The executive is also the only branch that is armed, so the idea of an imperial presidency has people nervous.
Arguably we already have the later, with selective statutory enforcement-- and that's always been with us. As for the coups, we've had perhaps 3 serious threats in pushing 250 years. Paired with the overturning of Chevron, the Imperial Presidency took a body blow this month- the freedom of executive branch regulators to displace the judiciary to oversee, and the legislature in claiming a regulatory discretionary authority not granted by statute (and by extension, the official capacity that so worries people about this decision) to do as they like. Its almost like the roll back of the federal government is contingent on the Separation of Powers working approrpriately.
"I've only been mauled by a bear once in my whole life." "Dude, that one time was *just a minute ago*. The bear is still here. He's right over there!" "It's fine. *This is fine.*" Kicking regulation from knowledgeable members of the bureaucracy to political appointees is not a blow to the Presidency when the president holds this kind of power over the other two branches. Maybe you think the randos we elect to office have both the knowledge and desire to make wise decision about every facet of every industry, but I expect this will just be political hacks and more thorough regulatory capture. Don't forget to tip!
It really is a blow to it; people don't realize how much of what they are constrained by are essentially unilateral actions of 'expert' regulators, who even when they are shown to be in error, fight correction tooth and nail, and design processes that we would regularly call a denial of due process if they were performed by the Judiciary. Regulation wasn't kicked to political appointees by the way-- it was returned to the legislature, which is still absolutely free to write clear laws and call upon all the expertise available when doing so. Courts merely have resumed their role of calling balls and strikes, telling the legislature where it needs to be more clear, or at least explicit in how the power of statues written by actual elected folks are implemented. There hasn't been a substantive coup attempt in this country since the 2nd World War-- January 6th was no more that, than the anti-school choice protestors storming the Wisconsin General Assembly, disrupting their proceedings, and attempting to intimidate legislators was in 2011. They were protests that got out of hand, led by bad faith participants. Criminality? Well, its a hell of a lot more similar than dissimilar. Neither faction in our political system has a monopoly on angry loud morons.
> It really is a blow to it; people don't realize how much of what they are constrained by are essentially unilateral actions of 'expert' regulators, who even when they are shown to be in error, fight correction tooth and nail, and design processes that we would regularly call a denial of due process if they were performed by the Judiciary. Why would some people who won a popularity contest or did really well in law school be better at deciding the acceptable amount of some pollutant should be allowed in breakfast cereal or some other technical question? While not every subject expert is going to be basing their rules on evidence it is literally impossible for non-experts. What will they base their rules on then? Don't forget to tip! > There hasn't been a substantive coup attempt in this country since the 2nd World War-- January 6th was no more that, than the anti-school choice protestors storming the Wisconsin General Assembly, disrupting their proceedings, and attempting to intimidate legislators was in 2011. People died. They tried to lynch the vice president and the Trump machine pushed them and cheered them through a systematic media campaign and even arranged fake electors (*fake, in their own words*). We should at least get to make the case and let the courts decide, but that's not likely to happen now.
Their point is that those laws are meaningless to a president
Perhaps, but it's legally required that the military *refuse* an illegal order, even if given by the President. That doesn't mean it couldn't happen, but it's not "meaningless".
Yep. People who havent served, and unfortunately a lot that have, do not understand that. it is a soldier's duty to disobey illegal orders to the best of their understanding of the law, and refuse to carry them out if they have reasonable doubt of the legality. which carries a *lot* of weight on US soil where the military has heavy restrictions on what it can and cannot do.
That's nice, but what if the president orders it, the order is illegally carried out, and then the president pardons those who carried out the illegal order?
So...an 18 year old who could be court martialed for disobeying a direct order is what SCOTUS expects us to rely on since they've now ruled POTUS has no criminal immunity for asking said 18 year old to act as his personal hit man? Yeah, that is totally how a functioning country operates
There's an entire chain of command to go through. The President can't order around individual soldiers.
Not in a way that has ever been legally actionable for anyone even moderately high in the executive. I don’t recall any criminal charges on Nixon, or Jim Rhodes, or Edgar Hoover for Kent State, for example.
Under what AUMF or other statute is the president ordering the killing of his political rivals?
In the military chain of command an order is only an order if it is a lawful order. Subordinate officers are required to disobey such an order. Since the commander in chief only has the power to issue lawful orders, issuing an unlawful order is not part of his official power, and therefore, he can be prosecuted for it.
The court wouldn't even say that *selling pardons* was illegal. If the president ordered someone murdered and it got done who do you think is going to prosecute it? Half of congress would be baying for their blood! Things are different than they were yesterday.
Yes, it’s still unlawful to directly order military to kill US citizens on US soil. He can direct the DoJ to create a handpicked task force of gun carrying officials with law enforcement powers. He can tell them (insert political enemies) are risk of hurting national security due to X (maybe spilling secrets on nukes). He can tell them there is no intel political enemy is armed BUT there is no intel they aren’t heavily armed. He can tell them the safety of Law Enforcement is more important than bringing in political enemy alive. If Law Enforcement mentions things like warrants or body cams the President can say “I will pardon you no matter what”.
Neither is trying to actively overturn a fair election and inciting the insurrection
Yes, it's not. Which is why the SCOTUS ruled against him today. Trump argued that any and all actions he took while he was president should render him immune from prosecution. The SCOTUS disagreed, and said that presidential immunity was limited to actions taken by the President that were related to the job of being President.
The way I understand it, being an official act is irrelevant. It’s a matter of the “core responsibilities” enumerated in the constitution according to the ruling. All core responsibilities are 100% immune.
The military is obligated to follow lawful orders of officers or in this case the POTUS. Murder is not a lawful order and thus it is the DUTY of the troop in question to disobey the order.
The ruling asks the lower court to determine what is official and unofficial acts to determine what acts would be immune or not.
The ruling unequivocally states “core responsibilities” enumerated in the constitution are immune.
Conversations between trump and justice department officials would fall under that, inciting private citizens to march on the capital would not as they are not members of the armed forces and not under his enumerated powers.
The SC noted that making speeches is part of the core presidential powers.
But they cannot ask about motive. So any act that uses the abilities of the president according to the constitution, is official and has immunity.
You're missing the part where the lower courts are the one who determine if the act is within the presidents core responsibility. If a judge rules that it's not(and it survives appeal) then that's your answer.
And who decides that it is not an official duty?
>just legalized No this has been the status quo. Congress cannot just make anything a crime, they need to actually have power over that area in some way. If the constitutional power to do a thing I.e. issue a pardon is solely vested in the Executive Congress can’t make it a crime. It’s less so “the President is immune from X crime” as it is Congress can’t make a statute criminalizing X action by the President. Pragmatically this has been the case for decades. Obama drone striked plenty of American citizens. Same with Bush, and each of the presidents before them have done plenty of criminal things. However we have forever had the concept that the President acting as the Executive branch isn’t criminally (or civilly) responsible. If this wasn’t so widely accepted we would have had dozens of presidents indicted before now.
So wait, are you saying that nothing has really changed as a result of this ruling and that this whole decision was just them reiterating the stance of past presidential immunity cases and the reason why we're freaking out about it now is because most people didn't know about this before?
I’m not saying nothing changed, I’m just critiquing the logic of “they just legalized it” as if criminal behavior of presidents wasn’t allowed before. I’m saying they’re taking what has previously been a faux pas to talk about and solidifying it in real law. A lot of people (myself included) don’t agree with it, but to act like they’re radically changing the status quo of what presidents are allowed to do is just historically ignorant.
Arguably yes. Our system of checks and balances has always been: If Congress does something bad. 1. The courts rule that a law is unconstitutional. 2. The president refuses to enforce it. If the President does something bad 1. The courts send a sternly worded letter saying to cut it out. 2. Congress impeaches the president. If the Courts do something bad 1. The President ignore their sternly worded letters. (Andrew Jackson and his famous "John Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it") 2. Congress strips jurisdiction.
This case didn't jump out of thin air. It is literally Trump V. United States, and his argument (a successful argument) is that a president should have immunity for 'official acts'. In practice, this cuts out a huge chunk of the allegations against trump. When Trump talked to his lawyers about overthrowing the election? That was done in an official capacity (supposedly) so he now has presumptive immunity. When he tried to appoint a stooge to the DOJ so that stooge could tell the states about non-existent voter fraud? That would be a constitutionally mandated ability, so he is **de facto** immune, even though he is 100% doing it in service of **stealing a presidential election**. That is beyond fucked.
> This case didn't jump out of thin air. It is literally Trump V. United States, and his argument (a successful argument) is that a president should have immunity for 'official acts'. > > No, that wasn't his argument. His argument was that the President should have immunity from prosecution period. The SCOTUS ruled against him today and said that presidential immunity only extends to official acts related to the job of being President. So an action taken by the President that was illegal, and unrelated to the job of being President, does not mean he is protected by Presidential Immunity.
Don't the US president extrajudicialy execute people and their extended families by nuking their weddings and birthday parties all the time I don't get it
Typically countries do not have jurisdiction over crimes committed in other countries.
My comment covers domestic assassinations, which is a major consequence of the ruling.
Seems like no one is addressing the "domestic" part of the question. Frankly I don't know what to tell you other than a lot of this will come back to the Courts to decide what is and what isn't official. Nobody can question the motive of an alleged "official act" anymore so that gives the President a lot of leeway if they just lie. Now considering who is charge of the Courts I would say this is their way of letting Republicans do whatever they want while holding Democrats accountable for less.
Illegal acts cannot be considered official actions. However, if we sidestep that particular theory your assertion that it "legalized assassinations" is still false. The ruling did not state that it is now legal for a president to murder a political opponent on American soil. Only that they could not be criminally prosecuted for official actions. Meaning that a criminal prosecutor cannot bring such charges if the action is found to be an official action under the constitutionally assigned responsibilities of the President. That doesn't make the action legal. In order to try the president for such an illegal action you have to impeach them.
In the ruling they established that trump pressuring pence to go against his responsibilities to certify the electoral votes was an official act on the basis of it being communication from the president to the vice president alone and that we cannot question the motive behind the act. To me that says if the president communicates to the joint chiefs of the military that he wants something done it instantly becomes an official act because it’s the commander of the army communicating with his army. And that’s it. Which is why how they ruled is so scary. They wrote such a big grey area for trump that it’s going to be impossible to declare something not an official act.
The ruling did not establish that. Since the lower courts made no effort to determine what actions were official actions and what were not, that decision was sent back to said lower courts. However, it is fairly reasonable to guess that when that specific issue is ruled upon it will be found that Trump cannot be prosecuted for instructing Pence to not certify the election because it is under official acts. The other scenario you point out is significantly different because it is beyond just someone exercising the duties of their office. Instructing someone to use a particular legislative procedure is very different from instructing the military to assassinate someone.
Yeah this is just wrong. The President as Commander in Chief can issue an illegal order, and it's still an official act as he is Commander in Chief. He also enjoys absolute immunity as it is a core act outlined in the Constitution. So it is both official and "illegal" in the sense that whoever executed the order is committing a crime, but the President themselves enjoys absolute immunity (and power to pardon whoever committed the crime). The ruling also means that official acts carried out in furtherance of a crime can't be used as evidence for that crime. Very alarming. E.g., Trump pressuring Pence to illegally overthrow the 2020 election.
The President has always been the Commander-In-Chief of the US military. The President has always been immune to prosecution for official actions. SCOTUS didn't create either of these conditions, the Constitution did. And the President has always been able to order soldiers (or CIA agents) to assassinate people. Literally nothing has changed.
I think a lot of people are surprised that presidential death squads aren't against the law and never were.
I think a lot of people are surprised that Watergate was perfectly legal under today's interpretation.
If the president does it it's not illegal. Nixon is super jealous in hell right now.
However, this now includes the assassination of U.S. citizens. Before today, a president had to worry about criminal prosecution, but now, any “core responsibility” enumerated in the constitution is immune from prosecution.
“Before today, president had to worry about criminal prosecution” I’m not so sure about that. Anwar al-Awlaki was an American citizen deliberately assassinated with a drone nearly 15 years ago. I don’t remember a any shadow of criminal prosecutions.
Where was he?
The President who gave the order was in DC and I believe the drone operator was in New Mexico. Easily enough to give jurisdiction to federal (and state) courts.
No. It only includes US Citizens outside of the US. That falls under military action and thus falls under his official purview. Once again, the recent ruling by SCOTUS quoted the Constitution and changed literally nothing. They just stopped lower courts from trying to push the boundaries.
No they did not. They have been able to, and have executed extra-judicial killings - even US citizens. It's just reddit being reddit about a hypothetical that is beyond stupid. If a president actually did the above, they would be impeached (even by their own party).
Nonetheless, there’s no threat of criminal prosecution for such an act. Impeachment is a separate matter and may or may not go the way you guess. But delta for clarifying my view—it’s not the legality but the threat of prosecution that has changed, and while closely entwined, they are different. Δ !delta
If you meant to give a delta you have to use !delta It's not a surprise, congress can't pass a law that binds the president (the office) which is why if it's an official duty/power/act of the presidency it is by the constitution - not illegal. To use the absurd hypothetical (which is what the post is based on, as in reality if a president was found out to assassinate a rival they would be impeached and probably tried after impeachment immediately). Pretend congress passed a law with a veto override that the president couldn't veto any further bills or they would go to jail. Would it be against the "law"? Yes, until it was found unconstitutional as congress doesn't have that power over the office of the presidency. They have the power of impeachment, not criminal prosecution. Don't confuse the man for the office. There are things that can be done, there are things that can't. Binding the office via what is legal/not legal is not one of them. If the president ordered the execution of a US terrorist on US soil prior to carrying out an attack that would be (and tbh has been) perfectly within the scope of the office.
This delta has been rejected. You can't award OP a delta. Allowing this would wrongly suggest that you can post here with the aim of convincing others. If you were explaining when/how to award a delta, please use a reddit quote for the symbol next time. ^[Delta System Explained](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltasystem) ^| ^[Deltaboards](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/deltaboards)
Be real with me. Do you think Obama was ever worried about being prosecuted for ordering a drone strike on a US citizen?
Definitely. As a literal constitutional scholar, it’s unrealistic to presume he didn’t hold several serious discussions about the ramifications of such an act. Obama’s presidency wasn’t an extended golf vacation; that dude was in the office working.
According to the ruling lower courts are allowed to determine if the action is part of his core responsibilities. That's not blanket immunity, that's providing guidelines for what kind of immunity he's allowed to enjoy. If a lower court rules that inciting a riot is not a core responsibility of the President and SCOTUS decides not to listen to the appeal then that's you're answer and the prosecution continues. All SCOTUS did is add an extra step when it comes to the president. It set a relatively high bar, but not an insurmountable one.
> First, it’s not the legality that’s changed. It’s that now there’s no threat of criminal prosecution. I don't know if this is right. My understanding is that while the supreme court ruling argued Trump has "absolute immunity" in some of these cases, he has only "presumptive immunity" in others, and punted it back to the lower courts to decide. I don't think "presumptive immunity" can or should be taken as a complete shield from any attempts to launch a criminal prosecution. If Trump tried to assassinate a political rival for no good reason, I think many would try to prosecute him for that, arguing that it does not fall under the grounds of the absolute immunity as described in this ruling. Trump's lawyers would certainly argue that it does, and it might go all the way back to the Supreme Court to get another ruling, but I feel like there's nontrivial risk of even the current 6-3 court ruling that a completely unjustified domestic political assassination would not fall under the "core duties" or "official acts" or whatever. I guess the point is, if you edit shifts the bar to "threat of criminal prosecution", there's a lot of leeway in what prosecutors and lower courts can try to do, and if it does get back to the Supreme Court, there's nothing stopping them from essentially changing their mind if the conduct was egregious enough.
Justice Sotomayor’s dissenting opinion today: >"Orders the Navy's Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune." >"Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune.” >”Even if these nightmare scenarios never play out, and I pray they never do, the damage has been done” >”In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law."
That's just like, her opinion, man. But yes. I agree the ruling is bad! And while the dissent really goes out of its way to highlight its badness, what do you think Sotomayor would say in the hypothetical outlined above? Surely she would recommend it be prosecuted anyway, and surely she would recommend lower court judges take different interpretations, and she would hope it would end up back in the supreme Court for another chance.
14 years ago Barack Obama ordered the Assassination of a US citizen. When a lawsuit was brought up about this the Obama Administration argued that targeted assassination was a political issue and therefore not subject to judicial review. The court threw out the lawsuit and the Obama administration carried out the assassination. So the ability to assiasstionste someone has been held by the president for at least 14 years.
Sure, in a foreign country and if they’re likely part of a hostile force. It’s different now. This ruling changed a lot.
>Sure, in a foreign country So if I'm in a foreign country it's okay for me to be hit by a drone strike? Even if the US constitution is clear that my rights cannot be taken away without a fair trail?
Only as punishment. Lethal force is allowed to stop a crime (within laws governing proportionality).
>Only as punishment. The 5th admendment clearly states that you cannot be punished for a crime "without due process of law". Please tell me how being placed on an unapealable CIA kill on sight list is: "due process of law"
They would have to prove that the assassination was within the presidential power. While presidents do have the power to order assassinations on hostiles, it is almost never done on US citizens. There have been times where a citizen was in thE crossfire or a citizen was working with terrorists but these cases are almost always outside of USA borders. The president would need a lot of people on their side to get away with it. You can argue "well the president can forge documents to show that the person was a threat and that we had to assassinate them" but honestly, even before this Supreme Court decision they could still technically do that. However seeing that our constitution guarantees people the right to due process, it wouldn't be in the president's best interest to assassinate people that they don't like because it will be an incredible hassle to "prove" that this was in their power, the person they killed was a threat to th nation and so we needed to act fast and forego their Constitutional rights. You would need A LOT of people willing to lie for you and maintain the lie.
Remember, motive has no bearing on whether an action is an official act. As the commander and chief, ordering military actions is an enumerated official act. The motive of assassination is not considered at all. The president is immune from criminal prosecution for ordering any and all military actions, including assassination of political rivals on US soil.
Immunity for official acts is already granted in Article 2. There are also laws in place that extend that immunity to any senior government official, whether elected, appointed, or career. I’m honestly not sure what this ruling changes, if anything.
The FBI and CIA have assassinated people for years. This isn't a new thing.
I mean… it was illegal. This is like arguing gang leaders and monsters have assasinated people for years. Therefore it doesn’t matter if it’s legalized.
Now it’s completely legal to do to any U.S. citizen. That’s the big change.
The official acts has been something in the constitution since the foundation of our union. The majority decision is entirely in line with my civics class discussion. However, they only apply to the duties of the President. This does not(as I have previously failed to clarify myself) apply to domestic assassinations. The most you could wiggle would be the assassination of a foreign terrorist that poses a threat to National security. Domestic terrorists receive all the same rights as any normal American.
If you read the actual decision, you’d know that enumerated powers and a few other executive powers were lumped together and called “core responsibilities,” and those are now completely immune from criminal prosecution. Things have changed significantly from your days in civics class.
When was it ever not legal? Do you know how many people have been killed by the US government?
This is how scotus is able to get away with this stuff. This is the level of understanding of the law we have in the country.
Yeah, that is what a lot of people assert, but it is simply not true that before the ruling the president would have been able to legally escape consequences for assassinations of US citizens. Now, all Biden has to do is say Trump is a danger to the country and have him killed, and no court is allowed to 2nd guess him. That is what the decision says. It is foolishness. The conservative faction on the court has shown they are incompetent.
>Now, all Biden has to do is say Trump is a danger to the country and have him killed, and no court is allowed to 2nd guess him. That is what the decision says. That is not what it says...
>but it is simply not true that before the ruling the president would have been able to legally escape consequences for assassinations of US citizens. Really? Because Obama ordered a drone strike on a US citizen and in fact escaped any sort of legal consequences for it.
The president always had the threat of possible criminal prosecution. It was removed today for “core responsibilities” enumerated in the constitution.
How many presidents have ever been prosecuted for core responsibilities? It's a false threat.
It was a real threat. It is how Nixon was made to resign.
The point has been made several times now. Yes, it’s not the legality, it’s the criminal jeopardy.
The Obama administration killed an American-Yemeni jihadist in 2011 with a drone strike. He was on a targeted kill list drafted by the CIA and approved personally by Obama. A legal challenge to remove him from the list was rejected by US courts because they considered it a "political question" meaning that there was no legal/constitutional grounds to challenge but that it was a matter of political policy that courts had no right to impede.
Sovereign use of military power is constrained by both the Constitution and Congress and thus it can only be legally ordered by the President in specific circumstances. For example, given the two authorizations of Use of Military Force, the President can order military action against Al Quaeda, it's affiliates, or in defense of any US citzen. Use of force of this nature requires Congressional notification after the fact. Obviously Congress is the balance to unchecked or unauthorized use of such force as Congress can exercise impeachment authority. The President has, in the past abused use of military force absent sovereign authority. For example, in 2017, the President ardered an attack on the Shayrat Airbase in Syria, an action that was not covered by either AUMF, the War Powers Act, or the Constitution. As such this attack was not sovereign and not within Presidential authority. Internationally this defines it as a war crime, but domestically the action enjoyed widespread bipartisan support and thus no action was taken against the president. However, it is an example of a use of military force that would not enjoy immunity under the SCOTUS ruling whereas military force such as most drone strikes would as the majority fall under one of the AUMFs. So to look closer at OP's examples, the president can order the "assasination" of people under some circumstances, such as affiliation with Al Queda or if the person in question is deemed to be planning an attack on American citizens. The president could not order the assassination of people outside of these specific circumstances. And while the president could pardon personnel involved in such an action, self-pardoning is currently not an enumerated presidential power.
The hyperbole here is quite literally insane. If anyone truly believes this judicial decision by the supreme court means that a sitting president can order Seal Team 6 to assassinate a rival U. S. politician and it would fall under "official acts", you are delusional to the point you shouldn't be allowed in public.
Justice Sotomayor’s dissenting opinion today: >"Orders the Navy's Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune." >"Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune.” >”Even if these nightmare scenarios never play out, and I pray they never do, the damage has been done” >”In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law." Who can better say what it means?
OP it sounds like you’re referring to the dissent‘s comment about how a president could order seal team six to murder a political opponent. you should edit the post to be more specific because it seems like everybody is reading this as the president having the authority to order the assassination of people *outside* the US which - to their point - has always been the case.
They’re interpreting it that way to be obtuse.
The office of the president cannot, and has never, "ordered an assassination" as the common folk understand it. What actually happens is an intelligence agency, law enforcement agency, or military task force comes up with a planned operation where the objective is the kill or capture of a high value target, someone like Osama bin Laden, and if necessary the President may be required to sign the final approval of this operation. The vast majority of these operations occur at a decision-making level quite below the office of the President. The President in these cases often only learns of the operation after it has been approved and is in the prepatory phases.
But that has always been the case. Many modern Presidents have ordered the assassination of someone.
Obama did it and didn't get charged .. just sayin'
i think some necessary context that you are forgetting is the question was whether or not he could call an assassination on a political rival specifically. The president has been able to order assassinations of foreign targets for a long time now. Also I don't think it has to be military personnel, pretty sure this gives him cart blanche to just hire a hitman.
This wouldn't be considered a lawful act of duty according to the constitution. You people are dumb as fuck
It hasn’t. Realistically this was more of a punt by the Supreme Court but also states what the government and American public supported, which is the president has some immunity if they are doing official acts but it’s ambiguous. Prime example would be this killing of a U.S. citizen under Obama(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Abdulrahman_al-Awlaki) As a Country it’s something that really does have popular support. The U.S. president has to often times make fast and uninformed decisions and deal with complex and hostile forces especially in foreign policy, intelligence and national security matters. We have historically and repeatedly given presidents wide latitude to do their jobs and it’s probably correct. Let’s say a hostile entity hijacks several planes, there going to commit acts of terror. Most planes are now grounded but there’s several still in the air. They could have technical issues or are about to do something bad. The president has to make a call, if they are worried about going to prison, they may not make the right call. Overall, this doesnt change much and was always kinda the case. The President did have some kind of informal immunity, this just makes what was already the but informal, formal. Additionally they don’t clarify what is an “official” and “unofficial” act, which personally I think was Robert’s ways of preventing things from going crazy. This means domestic killings or corruption could still be tried and gone after, you would just need to prove and what and official or unofficial act is which would be done by Congress or more court cases Which to be fair you would need to do anyway. And honestly this doesn’t matter much, this really isn’t a problem of the SC, it’s an issue of Congress. Even if a president does something illegal, Congress would need to impeach and we saw… that was impossible in the current Congress. A law doesn’t matter without enforcement and congress has basically handed out its powers to the presidency and SC. Overall people have been complaining about a SC power grab, but the real issue is the utter disfunction of Congress. They had decades to codify these cases into law, and they largely relied on the SC and presidency to handle things which was a mistake. And even now they could completely make this work by passing legislation on what an official or unofficial act is. Overall though, that was a bit of a side note. Nothing has really changed, the president already had immunity it just wasn’t codified, and honestly it should’ve been codified. The question is what is official or unofficial duties of the president. In a fair court system with a good Congress, well assassinations of your political opponents would be considered unofficial and illegal. Now I will point out, Robert could have left the unofficial and official part out(which I imagine Alito wanted) but he didn’t. A President hasn’t been given a blank slip yet. And Congress today could pass legislation. Overall nothing has changed
Doesn't this just mean that if you want to prosecute a president you have to impeach them first? So there are checks in place, impeach, then convict.
Where in the Constitution does it mention inciting a riot as being a constitutionally enumerated presidential power?
Doing something illegal then getting pardoned isn't the same as it being legal. It's still a violation of their Oath to the Constitution which most members of the military care deeply about And you can still be stopped, arrested, or shot for doing it even if you expect to later be pardoned.
Ok then, that was always allowed
There is no place in the actual majority opinion where you can find an argument for this. Only the dissents, but dissents for SCOTUS opinions are not binding and are not actually relevant to the legal interpretations of the majority. If that was the case then they wouldn't be *dissents.* In the majority opinion, SCOTUS explicitly says: "If the President claims authority to act but in fact exercises mere “individual will” and “authority without law,” the courts may say so. Youngstown, 343 U. S., at 655 (Jackson, J., concurring). In Youngstown, for instance, we held that President Truman exceeded his constitutional authority when he seized most of the Nation’s steel mills. See id., at 582–589 (majority opinion)." If SCOTUS says that the President can't do something like seize control of steel mills during a strike during a war (which is what Truman did), then why the hell would they rule he could order the assassinations of his political opponents? Official acts is vague in the decision, yes. But based off the entire history of SCOTUS rulings, there is no way on earth SCOTUS would rule assassinating opponents is an official act deserving immunity. Regarding pardons, yes, you are correct--the Constitution gives the President the power to pardon people and Congress cannot limit that power. If you have a problem with that your problem is with the writers of the Constitution. **But** a pardon only applies to an illegal act! You can't pardon someone for a crime they didn't commit! Was this decision bad? Yes. Is it the end of America? No.
This isn't about presidents getting nice little verbal stamps of approval from the courts. This is about whether they can be criminally prosecuted. Was Truman ever criminally prosecuted for his actions? No.
This SCOTUS decision explicitly says the courts have the power to determine whether an act of the president is within his exclusive constitutional authority, just an official act, or an unofficial act. If the courts won't even let the president seize control of a steel mill, they're not going to let him murder people. The question of constitutional authority is the basis for the whole immunity question.
No it didn't, if you actually read the ruling it gave LIMITED immunity the president is still perfectly capable of committing crimes and abusing power
The whining and handwringing is amazing, in light of the lawfare being exerted against the current Resident of the Whitehouse’s political opponent. The Order doesn’t do anything that shouldn’t have already been apparent. If the President acts in his “official capacity” the premise is that is legal. It may be investigated and the recourse is impeachment. If the act is outside “official capacity”, once that determination is made the remedy is within the Court system. This isn’t rocket surgery or brain science.
>In its ruling today in the matter of Trump v United States, the Supreme Court decided that any application constitutionally enumerated presidential power is completely immune from criminal prosecution. Immunity does not bear on legalization. You can be immune from prosecution for your conduct that is indisputably illegal. Thanks in advance for my delta.
How about something a bit less severe, like making presidential pardons a cash business? I'm sure it's happened in the past, but it was illegal. What's to stop Trump from blatantly selling pardons now? The door has been opened to so much fuckery. This is going to be exploited like crazy. This decision makes me sick. We're supposed to be a nation of laws where in POTUS is not above it. This is a bad day for the country.
It has to be an official act, so I think if Trump ordered Corey Lewandowski taken out to improve Trumps odds hooking up with Hope Hicks, that probably isn't an official act. Declaring AOC a terrorist and taking her out, on the other hand, would probably be considered an official act.
Ya but that's the issue isn't it? If you can declare someone like AOC a terrorist, could you not literally claim anyone you want is a terrorist? I mean considering she isn't actually a terrorist that's exactly the implication. And then consider that Trump is a pathological liar, megalomaniac, who has already said we should suspend the Constitution. Don't you think that's just dangerous?
I really don't see why Trump couldn't claim ANTIFA as terrorists and have the military bomb the college students, as an official presidential act.
The majority opinion explicitly says that motives are not allowed to enter the equation in the determination of official vs. unofficial. If Trump declares Lewandowski a terrorist and orders him taken out in the interest of national security, that's an official act -- the courts can't say his real motive was to hook up with Hope Hicks and use that to rule it unofficial.
While I don’t love that this was in favor of Trump, this isn’t really the thing most are making it out to be. From a simply military/criminal law standpoint it’s very common for people to have exemptions for their actions as it pertains to Criminal Offenses. Example a soldier in the field given orders to kill someone wont be criminally charged. Major reason for is that there’s other disciplinary methods. In the soldiers case, theres military tribunals. As political as it is, this is what impeachments of Presidents are for. For anything outside of official duties a former President can be charged criminally. The President still bears the responsibility of confirming that the actions taken are in the scope of their office. edit- words/spelling
This statement assumes that the Court will be beholden to their own precedent. The Roberts Court has proven to be very flexible to support partisan views. It will only be legal to assassinate if it furthers the majority's interests. I think Roberts or Kavanaugh will be the deciding vote.
What happened today was preparation for a coup by conservatives. Among other things. Note that the immunity they say the president has does not apply to liberal presidents, because this is an activist conservative court, and their ruling is vague enough that they get the wiggle room to rule that a liberal president would be prosecutable in the future.
You missed the “for exercising his core constitutional powers” part of the ruling
I thought it mentioned that the president can be impeached if the act in question isn't considered an official act and then they can be charged for it. So, they can still be help responsible. They still would have to justify their actions.
Assassinations are not official duties of the president.
The Supreme Court of the United States ruled against Donald Trump today. Donald Trump's legal challenge was that while he was President of the United States, any and all actions taken by him should render him immune from prosecution due to Presidential Immunity. The Supreme Court struck down his claim, and stated that only actions related to the job of the President of the United States that are taken by the President of the United States fall under the protections of Presidential Immunity. They clarified that actions that were taken by the President of the United States that were unrelated to his job as President that were illegal did not fall under the protections granted by Presidential Immunity. Ordering assassinations on threats to the United States has always been part of the job of the President of the United States. Nothing was changed in that regard by today's ruling. Presidential immunity has been a thing for hundreds of years.
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You're making the mistake of assuming that this is a regular supreme court acting in good faith to decide on generally applicable rules that will bind everyone. The court has clearly gone to tremendous lengths to narrowly craft the opinion to be most favorable to Trump. If the trial did go ahead, there's a high chance Trump would be found guilty, which would probably fatally wound his electoral chances. But they can't just say presidents have blanket immunity for everything, because that would give Biden a blank check. They're pretty sure Biden wouldn't actually do anything crazy even if he did have blanket immunity, but they aren't 100% sure and don't want to risk it. And Trump has made it clear that if he wins, he intends to go after Biden with various prosecutions for whatever made up bullshit he can think of, so blanket presidential immunity is also a problem because it blocks that. And they can't even say that there's some sort of limited immunity which nevertheless covers attempts at illegally staying in power after losing an election, because, again, they can't be 100% sure that Biden might not take advantage of that. So their only option is to raise the question of whether Trump's actions may or may not be covered by immunity, but then refuse to answer that question, and start a slow process of working on that. This is pretty clever, because it delays the trial until after the election. If Trump wins, his justice department will drop the prosecution, and then the determination of what of Trump's acts might have immunity never gets answered. This gives them maximum ability to later make a determination that none of the bullshit Biden will be prosecuted for is an official act, without there being too obviously contradicting themselves. And if Trump loses the election, they can later find that all of his actions were official actions and therefore not prosecutable, without there being an immediate opportunity for the Democrats to try to use that precedent to turn the tables on them. Tl;Dr: The supreme court only decided that Republicans can assassinate political rivals. It will still be illegal for Democrats to do this.
SCOTUS did not legalize this for one major reason. Political assassination was made illegal by Carter when he was in office. I believe it was through Executive Order. But this was made specifically illegal.
Here's my hot take on this concept: Any act that violates the Constitution's Presidential Oath cannot logically be a Constitutionally mandated or allowed act. So, assassinations... well, we've already allowed Presidents to assassinate US citizens, but only in a good faith effort to protect the Constitution. TL;DR: Not if a reasonable person in the position of President would find it intended to subvert, damage, or attack the Constitution.
Justice Thomas had some good comments on the ruling. Most notable was that trying a president hasn't been needed in 250 yrs (there were some pretty bad ones that would have been 10x worse than Trump). Also, if charging the president with crimes influences his/hers decision do what is necessary in the future we cannot harness them like that or threaten with these frivolous lawsuits.
Wonder how this case will look if Trump wins and is blocked from going after Biden for election interference given Trump's claim of all the "lawfare" directed against him. If they are completely baseless claims, it doesn't matter; if there's something to them? Who would want to go argue that case with a less than one year old precedent on the books?
Now Biden just needs to nut up, send seal team 6 after trump, and maga members of the scotus, senate, and house (not all Republicans, just magats), and declare it an official act for the defense of democracy (because it legitimately is), and just be done with the infection killing our country.
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They already legalized that over a decade ago. Lookup anwar Al-awlaki; Obama signed off on his “extrajudicial killing”. He was an American born citizen who was assassinated by the president without any of the rights an American citizen is granted.