For reference: Article 48 Wikipedia I’m trying to understand how anyone with any knowledge of the history of dictators could possibly justify granting a president unchecked “official” power so if anyone has any actual theories I am ALL ears.
For reference: Article 48 Wikipedia I’m trying to understand how anyone with any knowledge of the history of dictators could possibly justify granting a president unchecked “official” power so if anyone has any actual theories I am ALL ears.
In the sense that the Constitution is above the law, yes.
The president is not obligated with protecting elections so that should not fall within absolute immunity. At best, the president appoints election-related officials and may pressure them to do something about an election, But acting unilaterally is not something a president is supposed to do. (In my opinion)
Edit: Having now read the syllabus and opinions a couple times, Roberts has stated what I have. It’s up to judicial review to determine if what he’s done is within his core duties or peripheral duties.
I’m super confident this guy will be found guilty of election interference. When is a much bigger unknown.
The US Constitution gives the Executive official responsibility for the enforcement of all federal law.
This is from snippets of Justice Sotomayer’s disent I found here.
Right here is where she’s losing me. It’s The Constitution. It is very much The Law above all laws. By definition, these acts, as defined in Article II, are immune from prosecution.
Roberts was very clear that the charges against Trump need to be reviewed to determine if they’re “core” official acts or “perimeter” official acts. As I interpreted what Roberts said, there’s no way Trump is getting away with everything.
My understanding is that a President from founding until now has been afforded immunity from civil lawsuits for official duties, but it was never intended to shield a President against criminal prosecution. That is why Nixon stepped down, because he had crossed that line and was going to be criminally charged/prosecuted.
The court has now taken and re-written the law for Trump, knowing that Biden (or any Dem) President will not abuse this new King power that the Court put themselves in charge of determining what applies and what doesn’t. They have opened Pandora’s box thinking they can control this new power, but if a dictator wants to be a dictator, they will find a way around the Court. This is going to have long term major repercussions for generations.
To me (as a non-US citizen and outside observer) this seems to be the real problem. Seems to present a catch-22 to me. What am I missing?
You aren’t missing anything. Our Supreme Court is supposed to look at each case and make sure that the law was applied correctly according to the constitution and case law, but has now become an extension of Trump’s legal counsel doing backflips to bend (and inow seems also rewrite) the law to his benefit.