Democrats: You got what you asked for when the Supreme Court ruled presidents have absolute immunity for official actions
As always, the Democrats have once again demonstrated their utter inability to reflect even slightly on the consequences of their actions.
On July 1, 2024 the Supreme Court, faced with an appeal from Donald Trump that claimed he as president should have immunity from prosecution when his political opponents gain power, ruled that yes, Trump is right, that presidents do have absolute immunity for their “official” actions while in office.
The majority opinion finds that presidents have absolute immunity for core constitutional powers and presumptive immunity for other official acts. This immunity does “not extend to conduct in areas where his authority is shared with Congress,” and unofficial acts taken while in office receive no immunity at all.
The court ruled that President Trump’s conversations with the acting attorney general were core conduct subject to absolute immunity. It also ruled that his conversations with the vice president about the counting of the votes were part of his official duties, thus subject to presumptive, but not absolute, immunity—finding that Judge Chutkan should now assess whether prosecution of these actions intrudes on the authority and functions of the executive branch, and prosecutors will have to rebut the presumption of immunity if so.
Since then Democrat politicians and pundits have been gnashing their teeth in horror, claiming that this ruling now allows presidents to do almost anything once in office, from assassinating their opponents to using the military to arrest and eliminate judges he or she does not like.
The irony here of course escapes the Democrats. First, hasn’t Biden and his Department of Justice and the FBI been doing a milder form of the same abuse of power in their lawfare against Trump and those who worked for him?
Second, this case would never have gotten to the Supreme Court in the first place if the Democrats had not started that lawfare campaign. By prosecuting Trump on numerous weak and sometimes utterly bogus charges, it forced the issue to the courts, which was then forced to rule.
The biggest irony of this whole issue is that the Democrats are right. This ruling is terrible for our country in numerous ways. It sets a terrible precedent, legalizing illegal action by elected officials. It allows for future abuses of power that cannot at this time be even imagined.
Up until the last decade, all politicians of both parties understood this. They did not prosecute their opponents when they had the chance, because the last thing they wanted was to force the courts to make exactly this kind of decision. Better to act like civilized and rational human beings in a pluralistic democratic society, allowing their political opponents the right to exist freely without the fear or threat of arrest.
The Constitution: Too much bother. Time
to throw it in the ash heap
The Democratic Party under Joe Biden finally abandoned that civilized and rational approach, and thus, it has gotten something it really did not want. Right now the odds of Trump winning in November are rising exponentially, for many reasons. Should he win, this Supreme Court decision gives him a much wider latitude for action. And because of the vindicative nature of the actions by the Democrats against him, he will have much less desire to restrain himself.
Trump is not the kind of man to do that, but what of five or ten years hence?
As I said, the Democrats have once again demonstrated their utter inability to reflect even slightly on the consequences of their actions. They abandoned the filibuster, and ended up allowing Trump while he was president from 2016 to 2020 to appoint a slew of much more conservative judges then previously would have been possible. They used the legal system to persecute and imprison Trump appointees, and now face the same consequences for themselves. And they used that same legal system to trump up absurd charges against Trump.
What is to stop a later Republican president from now doing the same to them?
Increasingly the Constitution is becoming a forgotten document, the law either twisted into a pretzel to get around its plain meaning, or ignored entirely when it interferes with the power lust of those in power.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
As always, the Democrats have once again demonstrated their utter inability to reflect even slightly on the consequences of their actions.
On July 1, 2024 the Supreme Court, faced with an appeal from Donald Trump that claimed he as president should have immunity from prosecution when his political opponents gain power, ruled that yes, Trump is right, that presidents do have absolute immunity for their “official” actions while in office.
The majority opinion finds that presidents have absolute immunity for core constitutional powers and presumptive immunity for other official acts. This immunity does “not extend to conduct in areas where his authority is shared with Congress,” and unofficial acts taken while in office receive no immunity at all.
The court ruled that President Trump’s conversations with the acting attorney general were core conduct subject to absolute immunity. It also ruled that his conversations with the vice president about the counting of the votes were part of his official duties, thus subject to presumptive, but not absolute, immunity—finding that Judge Chutkan should now assess whether prosecution of these actions intrudes on the authority and functions of the executive branch, and prosecutors will have to rebut the presumption of immunity if so.
Since then Democrat politicians and pundits have been gnashing their teeth in horror, claiming that this ruling now allows presidents to do almost anything once in office, from assassinating their opponents to using the military to arrest and eliminate judges he or she does not like.
The irony here of course escapes the Democrats. First, hasn’t Biden and his Department of Justice and the FBI been doing a milder form of the same abuse of power in their lawfare against Trump and those who worked for him?
Second, this case would never have gotten to the Supreme Court in the first place if the Democrats had not started that lawfare campaign. By prosecuting Trump on numerous weak and sometimes utterly bogus charges, it forced the issue to the courts, which was then forced to rule.
The biggest irony of this whole issue is that the Democrats are right. This ruling is terrible for our country in numerous ways. It sets a terrible precedent, legalizing illegal action by elected officials. It allows for future abuses of power that cannot at this time be even imagined.
Up until the last decade, all politicians of both parties understood this. They did not prosecute their opponents when they had the chance, because the last thing they wanted was to force the courts to make exactly this kind of decision. Better to act like civilized and rational human beings in a pluralistic democratic society, allowing their political opponents the right to exist freely without the fear or threat of arrest.
The Constitution: Too much bother. Time
to throw it in the ash heap
The Democratic Party under Joe Biden finally abandoned that civilized and rational approach, and thus, it has gotten something it really did not want. Right now the odds of Trump winning in November are rising exponentially, for many reasons. Should he win, this Supreme Court decision gives him a much wider latitude for action. And because of the vindicative nature of the actions by the Democrats against him, he will have much less desire to restrain himself.
Trump is not the kind of man to do that, but what of five or ten years hence?
As I said, the Democrats have once again demonstrated their utter inability to reflect even slightly on the consequences of their actions. They abandoned the filibuster, and ended up allowing Trump while he was president from 2016 to 2020 to appoint a slew of much more conservative judges then previously would have been possible. They used the legal system to persecute and imprison Trump appointees, and now face the same consequences for themselves. And they used that same legal system to trump up absurd charges against Trump.
What is to stop a later Republican president from now doing the same to them?
Increasingly the Constitution is becoming a forgotten document, the law either twisted into a pretzel to get around its plain meaning, or ignored entirely when it interferes with the power lust of those in power.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Just ask the next logical question:
How would those who oppose and are sooo outraged by the Supreme Court ruling, based in Constitutional common sense, what would the alternate ruling be that would seem a more appropriate ruling?
PRESIDENTS MUST HAVE IMMUNITY
https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/presidents-must-have-immunity
DEMOCRAT POLITICS CREATED TRUMP
https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/democrats-created-trump
Why?
Because Hunter is the smartest man that the president knows.
Everyone knowns that.
And the president of course loves his son.
WH Asked: Why Is Hunter Biden In Meetings With President Biden And Senior Advisors Post-Debate?
https://youtu.be/Csb42jTGRWg?si=iDKpOz_K_a-xPE_o
I think what we need to emphasize is that all the posturing in the mainstream media about the shock of Biden’s incapacity is a pure lie. They ALL KNEW! With the exception of Fox News, they ALL HID that knowledge! For the last year or more, Biden has avoided contact with the media in any unstructured way that requires his to think on his feet. Thus the media is complicit in hiding the incapacity of the President from the American people!
All this posturing about “We had no idea!” reminds me of how the most senior Nazis reacted when they found to their horror that the plot to kill Hitler with a bomb had failed. They immediately began executing their subordinates who also know of the plot, so they could protect the secret of their own involvement! Bastards!
I want to prosecute Democrats who start foreign wars.
They are not protecting the US from direct invasion.
“I think what we need to emphasize is that all the posturing in the mainstream media about the shock of Biden’s incapacity is a pure lie. They ALL KNEW! With the exception of Fox News, they ALL HID that knowledge! For the last year or more,” all very true, but the big question is, who has been has been making policy in the White House for the last year or more.
“Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
John Adams, 1798
The real point, however, is that the radical Democrats are perfectly content, in this particular case as in so many others, to utterly destroy everything that the Founders of this country were trying to achieve in creating a durable form of self government. And the sooner the better.
As Mr. Adams so astutely observed, a government like ours was not designed for people devoid of any commitment to truth, virtue, or morality, and we are reaping the consequences of living under the rule of such individuals*. Again, these people ruin everything that they touch under the guise of “defending our democracy” (i.e., building socialism and destroying all of America’s traditional institutions), and why would they worry about consequences? One more time, boys and girls, for *these* people, CHAOS AND DESTRUCTION aren’t a bug, they’re a feature.
*As Cotour points out, including Hunter Biden, who appears to be helping to make critical decisions in the White House…
Minor edit in second paragraph: “that presidents do have absolute immunity”
TAKING CARE OF BUSINESS: TRUMP v BIDEN
“If you harm a hair on a single head, I will kill you!” Tell him! As Trump handed a satellite picture of the head of the Taliban’s home to him. Then he walked out of the room. That seems to have gotten the Taliban leaders attention because no American to my understanding under the Trump administration was harmed in Afghanistan. And then what happened?
https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/taking-care-of-business-trump-v-biden
Andi: Fixed. Thank you.
I would be hard pressed to cite anything that better confirms Robert’s observation about the Democrats’ “utter inability to reflect even slightly on the consequences of their actions.”
From today’s New York Times:
“A top adviser to Mr. Biden, who also spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the situation, said the president was ‘well aware of the political challenge he faces.’ That person added on Wednesday that Mr. Biden was aware that the outcome of his campaign could be a different ending than the one his is fighting for, but that the president believes he is an effective leader who is mentally sharp and ‘doesn’t get how others don’t accept that.’ Mr. Biden still adamantly views his debate showing as a bad performance and not a revelatory event.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/03/us/politics/biden-withdraw-election-debate.html?nl=from-the-times®i_id=33059852&segment_id=171223
“An effective leader who is mentally sharp”? Dear God in Heaven. While former President Trump is often enough chided for his own self absorption and narcissism, could there be any better indicator of the degree to which Joe Biden and the people around him are so completely lacking in insight, self awareness, and intellectual honesty that such questions as “what might be best for the Democratic Party and the country” never occur to them? Nor is their any indication in this piece that their decision making process is in any way informed by what might be called objective reality. Instead, it’s all about what’s best for Joe and his friends, and that is the only “reality” that matters.
Very, very sad.
> Up until the last decade, all politicians of both parties understood this. They did not prosecute their opponents when they had the chance, because the last thing they wanted was to force the courts to make exactly this kind of decision. Better to act like civilized and rational human beings in a pluralistic democratic society, allowing their political opponents the right to exist freely without the fear or threat of arrest.
Ummm….no. This is not true at all.
If Richard Nixon had not resigned, he would have been impeached by the House and convicted by the Senate. He resigned because he knew he didn’t have the votes in the Senate to avoid conviction. Nixon would have been prosecuted and likely convicted by the courts and joined other Watergate convicts in jail had Gerald Ford had not granted him a pardon for all crimes he committed related to the scandal. Accepting the pardon was a legal admission of guilt. Under the court’s ruling this week, he might have been able to claim his committed official acts and not resigned. “When the president does it, that means it is not illegal.”
Another example, Nixon’s first VP, Spiro “nattering nabobs” Agnew resigned in disgrace and accepted a plea bargain over bribes he took during his tenure as Maryland governor. It’s how Ford ended up as vice president.
In February 1807, Vice President Aaron Burr on a charge of treason. This was during the tenure of founding father Thomas Jefferson. The founders didn’t have any sense of absolute immunity at that level. In fact, in Federalist No. 69 Hamilton wrote:
“The President of the United States would be liable to be impeached, tried, and, upon conviction of treason, bribery, or other high crimes or misdemeanors, removed from office; and would afterwards be liable to prosecution and punishment in the ordinary course of law. The person of the king of Great Britain is sacred and inviolable; there is no constitutional tribunal to which he is amenable; no punishment to which he can be subjected without involving the crisis of a national revolution. In this delicate and important circumstance of personal responsibility, the President of Confederated America would stand upon no better ground than a governor of New York, and upon worse ground than the governors of Maryland and Delaware.”
Trump was impeached twice. The second time Mitch McConnell justified the decision not to convict him after Jan. 6 by saying Trump would still be liable for prosecution for actions involving the attack. A conviction would have ended Trump’s political career. But, Mitch passed the buck. Trump, of course, asked for immunity — something not in the Constitution — and the court granted it. And it is as terrible of a decision as you said.
In addition to these examples, there have been many cases of senators and Congressmen being indicted and even convicted of criminal acts. For example, Bob Menendez is under indictment on bribery and corruption charges. In fact, a number of elected officials in Congress from both parties have been indicted in recent years. https://thehill.com/homenews/4230828-indicted-while-in-office-menendez-among-7-members-of-congress-charged-in-recent-years/
D. Messier,
You wrote: “This is not true at all. If Richard Nixon had not resigned, he would have been impeached by the House and convicted by the Senate.”
Except that he would have been impeached for an actual abuse of power, like the Teapot Dome scandal. Impeaching Nixon would not have been the abuse of power that Robert Zimmerman was talking about. The same goes for your Agnew example.
I fear that you have missed the point of Robert’s post.
Then you go on to confuse treason and high crimes with the non-crimes for which the Democrats abused their power to impeach Trump, making impeachment a complete joke — or worse — a badge of honor, when the Democrats do the impeachment.
“In addition to these examples, there have been many cases of senators and Congressmen being indicted and even convicted of criminal acts.”
Were these indictments abuses of power or merely the regular prosecutions of actual criminal acts?
What we have seen from the Biden administration and the Obama administration holdovers are selected accusation and persecution of non-crimes, from General Micheal Flynn to the recent Trump trials. This is abuse of power, and it is not protected by the recent Supreme Court ruling.
Asking to verify the electors is not an act of treason. He can ask as many times as he wants. It is in fact his duty.
The Jan6 people who were prosecuted were prosecuted under the wrong statute. They were prosecuted under the Enron rules which stated that they had to interfere with evidence, paperwork or government duties. The same as Trump in fact.
The sad fact is not a single one of them touched any paperwork or slowed down the process. As for the trespass charges those too will be tossed out because the government did not allow any defense to show the officers holding the doors open.
In fact it is now known that at least one of the prosecutors stated that they charged them all so heavy in order to stop any further MAGA activity. And he is quite proud that it worked.
For these failures against MAGA and Trump the left wants to impeach the SC. But even that threat is stupid because they broke no law.
An addendum to my last comment. How most people in Washington see and experience the world:
https://www.gocomics.com/pearlsbeforeswine/2024/07/04
To make a radical proposal — borrowed from Robert Heinlein — perhaps passing some kind of test for / showing evidence of insight, empathy, and self sacrifice should be required of anyone wanting to hold public office, with prior military (or first responder) service strongly encouraged.
Yeah, good luck with that in a world where even screening for basic cognitive function isn’t required to hold office. Indeed, if you are a Democrat, all you have to do is to *feel* deeply about something and believe that the ends justify the means.
Milt: As Wayne would say: Good stuff!
Oh FFS, Edward.
You’re trying to split hairs on a bald head. If the Senate can’t convict Trump for what he did on Jan. 6, then what is the point of impeachment? If Democrat Al Gore had done anything like this after the SC ruled for Bush in 2000, Republicans would have been screaming to toss him out of office and prosecute him. They tried to throw Clinton out of office for lying under oath about a consensual affair. Ken Starr came close to filing charges over Whitewater.
Don’t give me any of that Jan. 6 was peaceful or Trump wasn’t to blame. It wasn’t, and Trump knew exactly what he was doing sending that mob to the Capitol. He wanted that to happen. Even Mitch said so. As for the violence, here ya go:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXnHIJkZZAs
I can post clips of the violence on Jan. 6 all day. Don’t try to deny it.
Bob’s post is typical. Instead of blaming the Supreme Court for pulling absolute immunity out of thin air (it exists not in the Constitution or Federalist Papers), he blames Democrats based on some idea that these types of prosecutions didn’t happen in the past. They did. Going all the way to Aaron Burr. There’s also some belief that someone nothing Trump has done deserves legal action. That’s a delusion. If a Democrat had done the things Trump did, you’d all be howling for prosecution.
The SC effed the country with this ruling, it should trouble everyone that any president — Democrat, Republican, whatever — has been granted such broad absolute immunity. Put the blame where it belongs. The six justices on the Supreme Court.
I can post clips like this all day. Any claim this wasn’t a violent attack denies reality.
“If the Senate can’t convict Trump for what he did on Jan. 6, then what is the point of impeachment? ”
The act of impeachment by the Congress is its own penalty.
If the Senate refuses to remove that does not take away the stain. And that is the point.
Given the Supreme Court’s ruling on presidential immunity, please provide the “correct” ruling in your opinion.
I will wait.
A president must have immunity in executing their sworn fiduciary responsibilities. Period.
Sorry, but that is the way things must be. And without the president being immune from legal consequences in the execution of his sworn fiduciary responsibilities then no president would ever accomplish anything of consequence and the country would become impotent.
What is wrong with you?