Supreme Court Watch

[ti-amie]

Nonilex
@Nonilex@masto.ai
#SCOTUS’ #immunity ruling will also reverberate in #FultonCounty, #Georgia where #Trump & 14 of his allies have been criminally charged in a sprawling #racketeering [#RICO] indictment. In Jan, Trump’s GA lawyers filed a motion arguing that the case should be dismissed on immunity grounds. But prosecutors have been waiting on the #SupremeCourt, & have said they will file a response to Trump within 2 weeks of the issuance of the immunity ruling.

[ponchi101]

The president is immune now. But the current president is Biden.
How about if he orders the release of all of Trump's tax records? He is immune of prosecution if he claims he did it in the name of national security.
Elect Tiny in 2024, and he will only leave the POTUS when he dies. Which, surely, can be soon, but don't count on it.

[ti-amie]

The president is immune now. But the current president is Biden.
How about if he orders the release of all of Trump's tax records? He is immune of prosecution if he claims he did it in the name of national security.
Elect Tiny in 2024, and he will only leave the POTUS when he dies. Which, surely, can be soon, but don't count on it.

Biden is an institutional man. I've wondered if now, given leave to do whatever the hell he wants, he will issue an executive order to expand the court to 13 with all four appointed by him? I wonder if he will issue an order saying convicted felons can never serve as POTUS?

I'm sure wonks in the Democratic party have been thinking about and talking about this situation and presenting Biden with different scenarios now that the Presidency is akin to being a king, something the framers of the Constitution didn't want.

[Owendonovan]

I suppose Biden should consider assassinating tfg if that's what is allowed now by a President.

[ti-amie]

Katie Phang
@KatiePhang
Justice Jackson's dissent: "...the Court today transfers from the political branches to itself the power to decide when the President can be held accountable."

"...while Congress (the branch of our Government most accountable to the People) is the entity our Constitution tasks with deciding, as a general matter, what conduct is on or off limits, the Court has now arrogated that power until itself when that question pertains to the President."

[ti-amie]

Lisa Rubin
@lawofruby
There are two absences in today’s SCOTUS ruling on presidential immunity that you should note. First, while making clear there is no immunity for unofficial acts, the majority doesn’t carve out any alleged conduct in the indictment that is definitively NOT immune. 1/

And that’s not because they are allergic to categorical determinations. Today’s decision makes clear that all alleged conduct stemming from Trump’s interactions with and/or direction of DOJ is absolutely immune. Why? 2/

Because, as Roberts writes, “nvestigative and prosecutorial decisionmaking is ‘the special province of the Executive Branch,’ and the Constitution vests the entirety of the executive power of the President.” 3/

Put another way, they drew a bright line on one side of this indictment—but refused to do so even as to three different sets of allegations, including the planning and execution of the fake elector scheme, that Trump’s lawyer, admitted at argument were private. 4/

But it’s the second absence that is even more glaring. While we got a concurring opinion from Thomas, Roberts seems to have kept Gorsuch and Alito quiet. How? 5/

One guess is that the majority opinion contains various language important to and potentially even drafted by each of them. (The nastiness of the section refuting the dissents feels particularly unlike Roberts.) Why wouldn’t Roberts want them to write separately? 6/

Because their concurrences could have been — untethered to the other justices in the majority — even more sweeping in its conception of what immunity Trump deserves. FIN.

[ti-amie]

Kyle Griffin
@kylegriffin1

READ: Justice Sotomayor's warning in her dissent:

"When [the president] 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. Let the President violate the law, let him exploit the trappings of his office for personal gain, let him use his official power for evil ends. Because if he knew that he may one day face liability for breaking the law, he might not be as bold and fearless as we would like him to be. That is the majority's message today. Even if these nightmare scenarios never play out, and I pray they never do, the damage has been done. The relationship between the President and the people he serves has shifted irrevocably. In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law."

[ti-amie]

Kyle Griffin
@kylegriffin1
The conservative Supreme Court just ruled that plaintiffs can challenge the actions of federal agencies long after those actions have been finalized.

This was the goal of several conservative groups — including the Koch network and the Chamber of Commerce — to further upend the administrative state.

Justice Jackson in her dissent: "At the end of a momentous Term, this much is clear: The tsunami of lawsuits against agencies that the Court's holdings in this case and Loper Bright have authorized has the potential to devastate the functioning of the Federal Government."

[ti-amie]

Kyle Griffin
@kylegriffin1
Flag: In a footnote, the conservative Supreme Court appears to say the federal cases against Trump cannot continue if he returns to the White House.

John Roberts: "In the criminal context … the Justice Department 'has long recognized' that 'the separation of powers precludes the criminal prosecution of a sitting President.'"

[ponchi101]

It all started with Robert Bork's nomination (Reagan's), a man that was clearly not up to the standards of the supreme court. Reagan was unable to get him seated, but he set the frame: judges could be nominated as an accessory to a party.
The SCOTUS has to be reviewed completely. When you consistently see votes split along the same lines, you can see that the decisions are not being made along the lines of logic and justice, but along agendas.

[Owendonovan]

Intelligent people with the means will leave this country, creating a brain drain.

[ponchi101]

No, they won't. Brain drain happens when the country offers no opportunities to the young. Regardless of who gets elected, the USA will still be friendly to free enterprise, and that means the smart gets opportunities.
What can happen will be that smart people will not come into the USA. The brain magnet that it was to people in India, China or South America may shrink a little. But, for example. For the people in Venezuela, the USA remains a far better place, even if Trump gets elected and we are despised by INS and ICE.

[Suliso]

Exactly. Where the hell would they go to anyway? A few here and there yes, but not in any significant numbers.

[ponchi101]

Not to mention. Americans are famous for NOT speaking other languages. So the places of choice are few.

[ti-amie]

back off Warchild!
@easyj0307

As bad as this opinion was, it really is consistent with a lot of the made up (expletive) that Roberts has been doing for a while now. In most if not all of his landmark rulings, he doesn’t really even make a legal argument. Just opines how he thinks things should be with fluffy text.