“Unlikely Trump will ever be tried for the crimes he committed,” says ex-Judge J. Michael Luttig
It’s not a hard question, or at least it hasn’t been before: Does the United States have a king – one empowered to do as they please without even the pretext of being governed by a law higher than their own word – or does it have a president? Since Donald Trump began claiming he enjoys absolute immunity from prosecution for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, two courts have issued rulings striking down this purported right, recognizing that one can have a democracy or a dictatorship, but not both.
“We cannot accept former President Trump’s claim that a President has unbounded authority to commit crimes that would neutralize the most fundamental check on executive power – the recognition and implementation of election results,” states the unanimous opinion of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, issued this past February, upholding a lower court’s take on the question. “Nor can we sanction his apparent contention that the Executive has carte blanche to violate the rights of individual citizens to vote and have their votes cast.”
You can’t well keep a republic if it’s effectively legal to overthrow it. But at oral arguments last week, conservative justices on the Supreme Court – which took up the case rather than cosign the February ruling – appeared desperate to make the simple appear complex. Justice Samuel Alito, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, argued that accountability was what would actually lead to lawlessness.
Illegitimate court, almost half were appointed by the accused and should not even be hearing this case. We are teetering on a dictatorship and this court is pulling the steering wheel even more that direction. I, for one, do not recognize any ruling from these corrupt judges.
Three were appointed, which is 1/3rd of the nine justices. However, to me the most relevant figure is that five of the nine were appointed by GOP presidents that got into office losing the popular vote (Roberts & Alito by GWB, and Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and ACB by Trump).
These justices, the majority of the court, do not and have never represented the US either by vote or ideology (even secondarily via the presidential/nominating vote), yet they are lifetime-appointed positions with unparalleled power over our lives and the continued existence of American democracy. They can choose to allow Trump to crown himself king, but they are already an effective monarchy.
Roberts has been concerned about the Court’s legitimacy the last decade. He should be - it isn’t legitimate.
Roberts doesn’t give a flying fuck about his Court’s legitimacy. He cares about the appearance of his Court’s legitimacy.
Yes, sorry, that’s the better way to put it.
To him, it’s the same thing, because if the Supreme Court loses the appearance of legitimacy, they themselves have no practical means to enforce their decisions.
Unless they have a dictator-president and ineffective congress.
It feels a lot like they’re getting for that possible outcome—so they have a sympathetic king when the time comes.
The Supreme Court is illegitimate because of what you said. By association, the presidency is also illegitimate. And since the Senate is undemocratic and Congress should have a couple thousand folks in it rather than 435, both of those are illegitimate.
Thankfully, they still have the monopoly of violence.
Congress should have a couple thousand folks in it rather than 435
This is exactly it. This is what hamstrings the will of the majority and lends relevance to these lunatics we’re having to endure.
Many revere our founders, and I’m quite sure if they could comment on this mess they’d say something like “There are how many millions of citizens? And you stopped adding representatives at 435? That’s the problem. Why?”
We outnumber them, by a bunch. And they know that. Well, the smart ones allowing “democracy” to prevail knew it, I don’t know about these crazies going for the power grab right now.
We lack organization, ability to plan as one. The conspiracy theorist in me says they know that as well, hence why they are attacking ways of obtaining information and organization.
It’s an absolute clown show not based on law but on bribes, influence, and political alignment.
Tale as old as time.
SCOTUS should not have taken the case. Full stop.
Take it, laugh at the arguments and vote 9-0, maybe. Just get it settled.
I knew this SCOTUS was a joke, but this is unbelievable even for them. I cannot fathom that I’ve lived to see the day that a former president’s lawyer argues that the sitting president ought to be able to perform political assassination and any number of justices, let alone a near, majority say “well that makes sense to me lol”.
This is just the natural development of unchecked conservatism, a plague long overdue for a cure.
If they rule in favour I guess Biden can save your democracy with an undemocratic act. SCOTUS should agree then, right?
He could, but he wouldn’t. We’d just sigh and cross our fingers and hope decorum will prevail (spoiler alert)
Sadly I believe you are correct
republicans would be happy with the appearance of democracy - just like russia. Theres multiple names on the box, but you know the votes aren’t counted. trump would conveniently win every time. Strangely just like putin does.
It’s not a new observation that the GOP and Russia are on the same page about a lot of things; what isn’t settled is what will be done about it
If the Court decides that the President has unbound authority then why shouldn’t Joe Biden shoot Donald Trump with a gun? It’s not illegal when the President does it!
Biden could also argue that trump was a threat to America and its democracy.
He wouldn’t be wrong.
Or maybe Biden could just have Seal Team 6 take out several Supreme Court Justices?
Came here to say this. I wonder how Trollito would answer that very direct question?
For extra impact, have Seal Team 6 second the president’s lawyers/entourage whatever it’s called and deliver the question. In full gear.
Even if it’s not illegal, and even if Joe Biden was okay with it ethically, politically he’d be turning Trump into a martyr and giving the right a lot of propaganda with which to incite civil war.
My guess, based on messaging to their base, they’ve already planned for this.
Stop saying this. They’d forget about him in 6 months
If he loses the election, sure. If he ends up in prison, sure. If Biden kills him?
Nah, they’ll forget about him when Fox News and the rest of the oligarchs decide using him as a martyr is no longer useful for stirring up civil unrest and solidifying their own power.
Nah, they’ll forget about him when Fox News and the rest of the oligarchs decide using him as a martyr is no longer useful
I mean, if the Supreme Court ruled in Trump’s favor, Biden could have assassinated (or heavily implied he was considering assassinating) those oligarchs too. Just assign a seal team to follow Rupert Murdoch around. If Trump has already been assassinated, Murdoch will get the message real quick.
Unfortunately Murdoch isn’t alone in pushing it, not by far
You don’t understand the depth of need to worship something. Neither do I but I’m starting to understand.
What signaling, and who is “they,” and what is “this?”
They is the GOP. This is the context of the comment I was replying too, “What’s to stop Biden from shooting Trump?”
The signaling/messaging is the inciting of a civil war, calling Trump’s indictments a witch hunt, the doubt the SC is casting on Trump’s crimes, the 2020 election being ‘stolen’ etc. etc. etc.
Trump isn’t the end game. He’s the pawn of men who have been plotting this for decades. And the SC are just more pieces in the game.
The money behind the strategy isn’t attached to Trump. If Biden has him killed, they already have a contingency in place. Or they wouldn’t risk letting the SC open the door in the first place.
The last thing we need is people in power having their running mates murdered.
Tell that to conservatives. They insist upon it.
Just wait until the penny finally drops for him. Or was it a Pence?
At that point Biden should sent every Republican to Gitmo. Appoint new SCOTUS judges that go and make that previous ruling null. Then he can’t be charged because it wasn’t a crime when he did it. Maybe that’ll humble Republicans…hah yeah probably not.
The main issue isn’t necessarily the ethics of this.
It’s that the Republicans and the Democrats have different bases.
Biden doing this would likely alienate moderate democrats, with many in the house/senate voting to support any impeachment inquiry. The same is not true for any Republican today.
Their base has literally been “At least it’s not a democrat.”
Biden’s base is “at least he’s not Trump” so I’m not sure.
Me, a layman: GEE I WONDER IF SWEARING TO UPHOLD THE CONSTITUTION MEANS HE SHOULDN’T BE ABLE TO DESTROY IT.
In all caps.
Preserve, protect, defend. Didn’t say anything about upholding or abiding by so everything’s fine, what’s the big deal? 😵💫
Cowabunga it is then. I believe this is that part about the tree of liberty needing the blood of patriots or something.
Removed by mod
Well that was a horrifying read first thing in the morning.
Reminds me of when that loser was president. Every morning there was some new horrifying thing to read about.
Now some want to see that shit show return.
Seriously, they should have argued that by the defense’s own argument, Biden could jail, torture, and/or kill SCOTUS judges, political rivals such as tRump, and effectively commit any crime, so long as he was president when it happened and watch how fast these fascists turn tail.
I don’t understand this country and really wish the boomers would find another hobby besides redoing all the shit the generation before them tried to stop and making everyone’s life worse to do it.
You guys don’t get it yet? They all talk, they coordinated not to pass it then decided who can vote what to piss off the least amount of their constituents. That’s it, it’s all politics.
The fact that your supreme court is even willing to deal with the question of whether a president should have absolute immunity pretty much says it all.
True, but not hearing it would piss off the retarded half of the country. So they hear it, everyone panders to whoever they need, and here we are. This country is completely broken, both sides are garbage, it’s all a show so they can get away with whatever they want and feed us just enough to keep us from rising up in any productive way. We are just the herd, we don’t matter, we are a byproduct and we cultivate their money and lifestyle. They just can’t tell us that openly. Even “voting”, they will keep gerrymandering to keep it close. The dems will allow them to because dispite being widely more popular in the popular vote, they need the Villan of the Republicans to keep pushing things to the right to keep their game going. If they fought it, then someone would come along further to the left and the jig is up. Look what they did to Bernie, the only genuine candidate in my lifetime.
I don’t think very many people realize just how broken we are, and it is beyond any diplomatic way of fixing. We either ride the ship while it sinks or take the helm at this point. Capitalism+Citizens United+legal lobbiests/bribes+Insider trading allowed by congess members= you’re gonna have a bad time. And the only people that can change it is congress themselves, so they as a whole need to decide to cost themselves millions and millions of dollars. Never gonna happen peacefully. Nothing surprises me with the Supreme Court. Or any other politician. They are actually human garbage scum of the earth willing to lie, cheat, and steal. Willing to back a country that is blowing up children and hospitals so they can make some money from arms dealers. Fuck them all. They are a stain on the history of humanity.
/rant
I’m from Germany, but I see myself more as a European, because I don’t think much of national concepts, if only because of our past. Having said that, against the background of the past decades, it seems almost desirable to me that the situation in America now makes it obvious to everyone that the US system does not serve the American people. You have long been a role model for us: a successful democracy that promises its citizens prosperity and freedom. Many of my fellow citizens are only now realizing that this has never been the case, as the massive flaws in your system make it obvious that this is not a system for the people, but a system for the powerful. I sincerely hope that this realization can somewhat help humanity overcome greed and hubris to find a better way. But I have little hope, if only because even here in Germany I can see that fascism is on the rise again - although the Germans should know better; unfortunately, not even my people seem to have learned anything from our terrible past. It’s enough to make you cry. So long story short: I can understand your frustration very well.
You have long been a role model for us
Not gonna lie, this stings, because like most American kids I grew up believing the bullshit as well. The truth hurts.
Be better than us.
Reagan. Reagan and his trickle down economics was the start of the absurd funneling of the money to the top. It has been a snowball rolling downhill ever since.
This is why they feel they’ve already won. They can say shit it court like the president has the authority to kill political opponents. It’s a hail mary for them, but it doesn’t matter at this point. The highest court in the US is now listening and thinking about that question.
Just saying, if 45’s acts are deemed political activity protected from prescription, 46 is still in office and is handed carte blanche to engage in all manner of unseemly counterfuckery. At the extreme, I believe Seal Team Six was mentioned, but I’m sure Biden could find lots of fun and creative ways to abuse unfettered executive power.
The lawyers literally said that if the assassination is done for personal gain, but “as an official act”, then it should fall under immunity.
If we ever get to the point where he gets placed above the law as our president, there’s only one thing to do. I’ll say no more.
Hear hear
Canada and Mexico are not at all far away. Easy to move to better accommodations.
This illegitimate “supreme” court needs to be dismantled and rebuilt with normal justices. There is no place in a modern culture for conservatism or any other hate-based, oppressive ideology.
Conservatives should not be permitted to participate in government at any level. They seek only to control others and destroy progress. We should be speaking openly about the deadly dangers of conservatism and should exclude such toxic lifestyles from polite society.
Court expansion is the only straightforward way. Put the corrupt ones in minority.
This is truly the only possible way. But, damn it would be nice to not have conservative pieces of shit anywhere near a position of authority over the normal people.
Nope, shame them.
Legit Biden needs to challenge it directly and have Trump’s daughter and her husband arrested and jailed on charges he must fully admit are false and politically motivated. Say the Saudi money was to pay for classified information or something, they would either have to rethink their choice or the precedent is set with a Democrat in office which would allow literal and complete political control of the government.
ACAB; All Conservatives Are Bad
stack the court. If the court is going to undermine any sort of accountability for criminals then the best thing to do is stack the court
You will never see that because liberal democrats like Joe Biden hold civility and precedent with more primacy than halting a fascist uprising. This is why leftists claim that liberals always fall in line with fascism.
Has anyone asked Trump that he believes if Biden want to execute him and his allies RIGHT NOW, it would be totally ok and Biden should get full immunity as well?
