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SCOTUS: sponsored by Harlan Crow

From bluesky:

i have so much boundless contempt for these pathetic white men, who were blessed enough to be born in one of the few attempts at multiracial democracy in the world, and who panic at being no more valued than anyone else to the extent that they'd blow it all up and go back to divine right of kings

less than a single person's life has passed since we started making anything approaching a serious attempt at this and these mewling mediocrities will be quite content to end it all rather than simply come to grips with being no more or less valuable than any other citizen
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From SCOTUSBlog:
Justice Barrett also has a concurring opinion. She agrees with the majority on the "core constitutional powers" immunity but would take a different approach to other official acts. She would look at whether the criminal statute under which the president is being charged applies to his conduct and whether that application to the particular facts of the case is constitutional.
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She comes so close to getting it. So close. "If the president does something illegal, he should be charged"

Instead we have Roberts wiping his ass with the american flag.
 
I mean, this was what every expert predicted the ruling would be, and it does not end the trials in any way. All it means is that an action as President that is an official action of the Executive Branch would be subject. Actions of a candidate /= the actions of the President even if that candidate is the President.

Any immunity is ridiculous, but the only effect this will have on Trump is there will now have to be a hearing by Judge Chutkin to see what counts as official acts and what does not. (which will of course be appealed) None of what he is charged with in DC is a Presidential Act. Chutkin is not Cannon she actually knows how this works. Plus, the hearing will be in open court meaning every aspect of the crime in the indictment and all of the evidence theoretically will be be available to the public.

I am not sure what you all were expecting, this was the ruling pretty much everyone said was coming and while annoying it honestly changes very little outside of not being able to prosecute a President if he does something illegal that is an official action. (and Impeachment is still a way to hold a President accountable which was part of why they said Presidents dont have broad immunity) I think some of you are overreacting a little bit.

I will say, every justice that voted for this piece of crap can never again even pretend to be Originalists. While some Founders wanted immunity...they were far outnumbered which is why it was never greatly considered.
 
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This ruling also blocks "official acts" from being used as evidence in the prosecution of the "unofficial acts". Which is also a big deal since proving motive is now virtually impossible if you have anything approaching a skeptical judge.
 
Handyman said:
I mean, this was what every expert predicted the ruling would be, and it does not end the trials in any way. All it means is that an action as President that is an official action of the Executive Branch would be subject. Actions of a candidate /= the actions of the President even if that candidate is the President.

Any immunity is ridiculous, but the only effect this will have on Trump is there will now have to be a hearing by Judge Chutkin to see what counts as official acts and what does not. (which will of course be appealed) None of what he is charged with in DC is a Presidential Act. Chutkin is not Cannon she actually knows how this works. Plus, the hearing will be in open court meaning every aspect of the crime in the indictment and all of the evidence theoretically will be be available to the public.

I am not sure what you all were expecting, this was the ruling pretty much everyone said was coming and while annoying it honestly changes very little outside of not being able to prosecute a President if he does something illegal that is an official action. (and Impeachment is still a way to hold a President accountable which was part of why they said Presidents dont have broad immunity) I think some of you are overreacting a little bit.

I will say, every justice that voted for this piece of crap can never again even pretend to be Originalists. While some Founders wanted immunity...they were far outnumbered which is why it was never greatly considered.
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It may not end the trials but you know he's going to try to claim that every act he did was official and all it's going to be used for is a delay tactic to push everything out past the election and see just how much he can get away with. And with the court continuing to rule in his favor it's an extreme slippery slope we're running down here.
 
First Time said:
It may not end the trials but you know he's going to try to claim that every act he did was official and all it's going to be used for is a delay tactic to push everything out past the election and see just how much he can get away with. And with the court continuing to rule in his favor it's an extreme slippery slope we're running down here.
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Even if they found no immunity at all the trial wasn't happening before the election. It would take at least 2 months (I believe Chutkin sa to get started and no judge is going to want to start a trial in September with an election in November. That is why SCOTUS did it this way they delayed the ruling long enough to guarantee that the trial could not happen until after the election in the hopes Trump wins and wipes it away.

He can argue that sure, but that just leads to evidentiary hearings and he needs to be able to prove that. He hasn't had a lot of good experiences doing that even with judges he put in place.

I am not worried about him, I am worried about how this will be abused by others if we survive him though. It isn't hard to come up with ways to make it seem like unofficial acts are official if you do a little planning.
 
Well, luckily, stealing documents is not an official act and refusing to return them a year after you left office is not something done with president.
 
Handyman said:
Even if they found no immunity at all the trial wasn't happening before the election. It would take at least 2 months (I believe Chutkin sa to get started and no judge is going to want to start a trial in September with an election in November. That is why SCOTUS did it this way they delayed the ruling long enough to guarantee that the trial could not happen until after the election in the hopes Trump wins and wipes it away.

He can argue that sure, but that just leads to evidentiary hearings and he needs to be able to prove that. He hasn't had a lot of good experiences doing that even with judges he put in place.

I am not worried about him, I am worried about how this will be abused by others if we survive him though. It isn't hard to come up with ways to make it seem like unofficial acts are official if you do a little planning.
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I wish I had your faith cuz at this point I absolutely don't.
If you're saying it's not hard to come up with ways to make it seem like inofficial acts are official there's nothing stopping him from doing it with what's already on trial. This country is no longer a country of laws after today
 
Swansong said:
This ruling also blocks "official acts" from being used as evidence in the prosecution of the "unofficial acts". Which is also a big deal since proving motive is now virtually impossible if you have anything approaching a skeptical judge.
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You have to be able to prove an act is official. And it would take more than a skeptical judge...you dont err on the side of immunity in most cases if you are skeptical.

For example take the Fake Elector Scheme part of the trial...what official act covers that?

If I was a betting man (and I am) the next appeal after Chutkin has her hearing will narrow it further and basically make any actions as a candidate not under the umbrella. Only actions having nothing to do with the election can be considered "official acts" because you are acting as a candidate not as an Executive.

I have a feeling this is going to backfire on the GOP almost as badly as ending Roe did.
 
dxmnkd316 said:
From SCOTUSBlog:


She comes so close to getting it. So close. "If the president does something illegal, he should be charged"

Instead we have Roberts wiping his *** with the american flag.
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I hope roberts walks into oncoming traffic. Not hard to do when your head is all the way up your ass
 
First Time said:
I wish I had your faith cuz at this point I absolutely don't.
If you're saying it's not hard to come up with ways to make it seem like inofficial acts are official there's nothing stopping him from doing it with what's already on trial. This country is no longer a country of laws after today
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No it is hard, because he didn't know he could do it. You need to finesse that stuff. You don't just call the Ukraine and say "find me dirt or I will hold up your aid" you make sure there is a lot of back and forth, much more nuance to the call so that it is so filled with things that could be deemed "official" that you muddied the waters to the point it is hard to parse out what is and is not part of the duties of the President.

I don't have much faith left, that isn't what this is. We are just lucky that the first time around they acted like idiots and bullies who thought they could get away with everything in plain sight. If he wins again...then yeah his people will be able to better do all of that.

The problem he has in his current trials is he was very explicit about what he was doing and what the purpose of it was. He has to be able to find a way to argue that, say, defrauding the Electoral College can be deemed an official act, find a judge to agree and then survive the appeals. That does not seem likely unless Cannon hears all his cases.

Swan,

Going back to your comment, it actually does not block those acts (if they are deemed to be official acts) from being used in total if they are part of the public record. To quote NBC:

Today’s decision sets out a lot of rules about what evidence can or cannot be used in Trump’s election interference trial, assuming we ever get there.

As part of today’s ruling, the Court held if a certain allegation in the indictment is determined to be an “official act,” prosecutors cannot introduce “testimony or private records of the President probing the official act itself."

However, the Court has left a narrow path for prosecutors to show jurors evidence of official acts if, and only if, that evidence can be found in the public record.

“But of course the prosecutor may point to the public record to show the fact that the President performed the official act,” Roberts writes. “And the prosecutor may admit evidence of what the President allegedly demanded, received, accepted, or agreed to receive or accept in return for being influenced in the performance of the act.”

So if there is a video of Trump speaking to the media or otherwise discussing any of the acts in the indictment — such as the call pressuring Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to overturn Biden's win — those statements could be introduced as evidence.

What prosecutors would not be able to do is put someone like Mark Meadows or another presidential advisor on the witness stand and have them tell jurors about their discussions with Trump.
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Don't get me wrong, I hate all of this and the Court is friggin corrupt as hell. But I mean, we can definitely means test it. I believe the President took and oath to protect the Constitution, and Trump has said he wants to throw out Democracy...so if Biden ordered a hit on him in his capacity as Commander-in-Chief and as the preserver of democracy how do we think that would play out in the Courts? We could end all of this tomorrow, and the coming Constitutional Crisis would probably fix the broken system! Biden might go down as the Greatest President since Lincoln! :p​​​​​​​
 
I guess handy for me where it lies is that he will push it and push every single ruling to scotus and then scotus will declare that his acts are official...that is where I think all of this is headed.
This ruling to me says that with the court the way it is now he can push anything he wants to scotus and his judges will rule in his favor as an official act
 
First Time said:
I guess handy for me where it lies is that he will push it and push every single ruling to scotus and then scotus will declare that his acts are official...that is where I think all of this is headed.
This ruling to me says that with the court the way it is now he can push anything he wants to scotus and his judges will rule in his favor as an official act
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And I agree with this. Everything he insists as official will be deemed so. This is the most activist and corrupt SCOTUS we've ever seen. Outcome first, reasoning after.
 
My two cents.

First, we were never going to see a decision that I'm sure many of you here, and others around the country, wanted to see -- that Trump has zero immunity associated with being POTUS. A POTUS is certainly entitled to some immunity, for certain things associated with serving as President.

Once we accept that as a basic premise, which we must, then this case just becomes like all of the other immunity cases out there. The courts must examine how far the immunity extends, and the fact finders have to decide whether the facts fit within that protection.

We probably have two hundred years of case law involving both civil and criminal immunity for state government officials and federal government officials. It just so happens that until now we don't really have any case law involving immunity associated with the POTUS because, fortunately, we haven't seen cases where it's even necessary to consider prosecuting the President for something.

But I'm sure there is a body of case law out there, perhaps fairly small, involving the prosecution of federal judges or other elected federal officials, and a larger body of case law involving the prosecution of state elected officials or judges.

The courts will sort it out, starting at the trial court level, and working its way up to the Circuits.

Trying to figure out what constitutes the course and scope of your duties, and then whether the facts demonstrate you were in that course and scope, is not a magic trick. It's done every day in this country.
 
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