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My limited understanding of the ruling: The ruling states that the President is immune from prosecution while exercising official duties of the office of Presi

My limited understanding of the ruling: The ruling states that the President is immune from prosecution while exercising official duties of the office of President but can be investigated by a special counsel that is appointed by an act of Congress, and if successfully impeached and convicted can then be charged with said crimes. “Unofficial” acts are not protected by this immunity but a special counsel is still required to be appointed by an act of Congress to investigate and then bring forward charges. Out of context this is quite reasonable and level headed. In context of the hyper partisan landscape US politics are today, doesn’t seem likely without a supermajority opposition to be able to bring charges against a president, for official or unofficial acts that are crimes.

awb 2y ago
On paper it makes sense. The people elect a congress charged with checking the powers of the President. States can also pass constitutional amendments to further limit or define the powers of the President. In reality, power can be consolidated to the point where these checks and balances no longer work properly.
- lupire 2y ago
  And that's point where the SC is irrelevant. You can't paperwork your way out of civil war when the people want one.
- dudinax 2y ago
  No it doesn't. There's nothing in the constitution that grants immunity to a president and no reason why Donald Trump had to commit the crimes he's charged with.
  - ac29 2y ago
    If every past, present, and future legal scenario was explicitly and unambiguously addressed by the constitution, we wouldnt need the Supreme Court. In reality it is an imperfect document that can never possibly be complete.
    - dudinax 2y ago
      You're suggesting presidential immunity is a new idea, and criminal charges against ex-presidents are a new threat to the executive branch, both of which were wrong. 230 years ago people had already through through this. Immunity isn't in the constitution because they didn't want it in there. The president already has all the constitutional protection he needs from prosecution: a prosecutor can't remove him from office.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
comex 2y ago
You're mixing together a few different things. - Trump's lawyers argued in this case that an ex-president can only be charged with a crime if he was impeached and convicted for that same act. But all of the justices rejected this view today. The newly granted immunity is orthogonal to whether or not the president is impeached. - Though, the president does have to leave office somehow before he can be prosecuted. He can't be prosecuted while still sitting. This wasn't technically decided in this case, but the parties mostly agreed as much beforehand, and the majority opinion has a footnote approvingly citing an Office of Legal Counsel memo to that effect. - Separately, Trump's lawyers argued that the special counsel that prosecuted him was not properly appointed by an act of Congress. But the Supreme Court did not grant certiorari on that issue and the majority opinion today did not address it. Justice Thomas's solo concurring opinion, however, did address it and agreed with Trump (but a concurring opinion has no legal effect). In any case, this is a different question from whether prosecutions of ex-presidents must go through a special counsel. As far as I know, there is no formal rule that would require it, but it's highly desirable as a way to avoid political bias. That question didn't come up in this case, though.
- brianaker 2y ago
  Trump's attorneys did not say "the special counsel that prosecuted him was not properly appointed by an act of Congress", Justice Thomas brought this up in oral arguments. Trump's attorneys admitted in oral arguments that they had not brought this up during the appeal, so as an argument it was not saved. Further more, historically there is no basis for the argument. Special prosecutors, which are different from the "independent counsel" that came about after Nixon; the laws around "independent counsel" expired a while ago. "Special counsel", and all of the other similarly named, have been around since Marbury. By happenstance, some have been X-members of Congress, Cabinet members, etc... but far from all. There is a reason why none of the other Justices brought this up, it is absurdist.
adriand 2y ago
This ruling seems to open the door to a president being immune from, say, commanding SEAL Team 6 to assassinate a political rival. “In its ruling, the Supreme Court decided there was no question that Mr. Trump enjoyed immunity from being prosecuted for one of those methods: his efforts to strong-arm the Justice Department into validating his false claims that the election had been marred by widespread fraud. That was because the justices determined that Mr. Trump’s interactions with top officials in the department were clearly part of his official duties as president.” [1] One of the president’s official duties is to direct the military to take actions that protect the country. Biden can reasonably claim Trump is a threat to democracy, and can officially request him to be killed. Right? If not why not? 1: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/01/us/politics/supreme-court-immunity-trump-jan-6.html https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/01/us/politics/supreme-court...
- unyttigfjelltol 2y ago
  SCOTUS said there was an extra procedural step, namely impeachment and conviction by the Senate. Ultimately the Senate would decide factually, whether that hypothetical action was an appropriate basis for further criminal prosecution. Prosecuting a president fundamentally is a political act, and why would we think a random DC bureaucrat better qualified to make a consequential political act than the Senate itself?
  - dashundchen 2y ago
    Why does the president deserve some fundamental immunity with a very high political bar to clear, compared to average citizen or politician? Carving out some special protection strikes at the heart of the idea that everyone is equal in the eyes of the law.
    - rayiner 2y ago
      Because the government kills people all the time and destroys their lives and businesses. And because nobody is combing through the criminal law books trying to convict the average person for something. I mean, the former governor of New York just said the New York prosecution against Trump wouldn’t have been brought against anyone else.
Ancapistani 2y ago
> Out of context this is quite reasonable and level headed. That's why I'm opposed to making changes to the way the Court is selected and empaneled. The fact that it's inconvenient for one party right now is irrelevant. It'll be inconvenient for the other party soon enough. > In context of the hyper partisan landscape US politics are today, doesn’t seem likely without a supermajority opposition to be able to bring charges against a president, for official or unofficial acts that are crimes. Good. If it were easy to bring charges against a President, then Presidents wouldn't be able to do anything they were elected to do. The failure of that protection at the end of the term is one of the major reasons for the end of the Roman Republic. If you repeatedly make powerful political figures choose between prosecution and violence, it won't take long for one of them to choose violence. The fact that we've peacefully transitioned between presidents ~45 times is honestly rather amazing.
- tines 2y ago
  > Good. If it were easy to bring charges against a President, then Presidents wouldn't be able to do anything they were elected to do. Leaving aside the difference between "bringing charges" and "successfully bringing charges," there's a big gap between "easy" and "impossible." Nobody wants presidents to be criminally liable for the things they do in good faith. But this ruling makes good faith irrelevant; it doesn't matter why they do an official act, it's immune. The fact is that a former president exerted pressure on government officials in a way that would halt a lawful election and coordinated to subvert its true results by presenting fake results. In determining whether that was an official act, we cannot reference his motivations according to the SC's ruling. Allow the motivation for official acts to be taken into consideration for prosecution, and a lot of the problems go away.
  - QuizzicalCarbon 2y ago
    I honestly can’t tell if you’re talking about Hunter Biden’s laptop, which many leaders of the intelligence community claimed was fake Russian disinfo, only to be recently admitted into court evidence as being real and factual. Who exerted pressure on those officials to lie to the public before the last presidential election?
DEADMINCE 2y ago
> Out of context this is quite reasonable and level headed. In context of the hyper partisan landscape US politics are today, doesn’t seem likely without a supermajority opposition to be able to bring charges against a president, In context though, it's quite terrifying given how much the US has fallen into tribalism. Half the population wouldn't convict a certain candidate no matter what they did.
- mandmandam 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - sanderjd 2y ago
    Actually it's not true of both sides. Hunter Biden was tried and convicted and nobody is up in arms about it, because he did the crimes and should do his time. If his father has done any crimes he should do the time as well. Most people still think this. The only people who don't are those in thrall to one particular cult of personality.
    - rayiner 2y ago
      What about using the New York election interference law to prosecute people who suppressed the Hunter Biden laptop story?
      - vaidhy 2y ago
        That action did not happen in New York.
        rayiner 2y ago
        It involved suppression of an article published by a New York newspaper, by social media companies with a large presence in New York. You could indict the social media companies as part of a conspiracy charge under New York law, even if other relevant events happened elsewhere. Also, do other jurisdictions have obscure election interference laws they never use? Does Delaware? I bet they do.
rayiner 2y ago
It also reflects common practice: https://oxcon.ouplaw.com/display/10.1093/law-mpeccol/law-mpeccol-e305 https://oxcon.ouplaw.com/display/10.1093/law-mpeccol/law-mpe... (“ 3 Functional immunity applies to both sitting and former heads of state; however, this immunity is available to such individuals solely with respect to acts performed in their official capacity (Fox 667).”) France, for example, has prosecuted former presidents for things like bribery. But I don’t think you can prosecute a former president of France for something he told the Ministry of Justice to do. I suspect this distinction between official and unofficial acts is also what most people assumed the law was, until Trump forced the Supreme Court to confront it under a particularly unsympathetic set of facts.
7e 2y ago
I’m an FBI agent and I kill my wife. Am I immune from prosecution unless Congress appoints a special counsel, simply because I work in the executive branch?
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- thatoneguy 2y ago
  No, because you're not _in charge of_ the executive branch.
  - 7e 2y ago
    Is that a meaningful distinction? If so, why?
    - saurik 2y ago
      FWIW, I think it might be, because the prosecutors work for the executive branch.
- paulddraper 2y ago
  No. An FBI agent and president are two different things.
  - 7e 2y ago
    Wow, really? Thanks! The point is that both wield executive power, yet one person in the executive can be prosecuted only by Congress and the rest not. Illogical.
    - 15155 2y ago
      One is where all executive power is vested and originates, the other is a hired employee.
dudinax 2y ago
There's no provision in the constitution for immunity. They made it up there's nothing reasonable about it. Under this decision the president can commit a crime or order someone else to commit a crime, and as long as the crime is committed using a power of the office, it can't be charged. For example, if in an official communication the president orders an officer to solicit a bribe for doing their duty, the president can't be charged. It's ridiculous, horrible, and destructive to the constitution.
- Den_VR 2y ago
  [dead]
- ttyprintk 2y ago
  Those wouldn’t be crimes. They cannot produce evidence. As of this ruling, it looks like: - Biden issues a prepardon essentially deputizing anyone who detains Eric Trump or Eric’s laptop. - We might endure some debate whether it is an official act. That debate actually only matters to Congress or future historians. - Since the extrajudicial apprehension of Eric and his evidence is defined as not-criminal, there is no need to preserve details. Seal Team 6 and those involved enjoy a prepardon and some assurance that their names are scrubbed. - This is constitutional if Congress has granted the President (Biden at this point) war powers and is satisfied that some elements of the military identified Eric Trump with the enemy. We’ll debate whether the President is a member of the military, just as we had to debate whether he was an officer of the USA under Amendment 14, section 3.
kristjansson 2y ago
> and if successfully impeached and convicted can then be charged with said crimes The opinion explicitly rejects this line of reasoning. > Transforming that political process [impeachment] into a necessary step in the enforcement of criminal law finds little support in the text of the Constitution or the structure of our Government
atoav 2y ago
As someone living in Geemany my bar for auch high level laws is: would Adolf Hitler have been able to use it to abolish democracy? If so it is bad. IMO the US president was already too powerful since the cold war, but this is crazy.
- pyuser583 2y ago
  American has an extremely weak state. The government is incapable of accomplishing basic tasks. Men like Trump want to weaken the state further. Look at Trumps actions during COVID. Did he use the crisis to grab power? Declare a state of emergency? Declare martial law? Suspend habeas corpus? No he told the states to handle it. The real fear Americans have isn't a Hitler situation, but a Hindenburg situation.
  - atoav 2y ago
    You have any polls on that or is that just a guess?
  - throwaway7ahgb 2y ago
    Yes, and the states did handle it. People left NY and CA in droves to FL and TX and still are doing so.
aredox 2y ago
The ruling also doesn't clearly define what is official, and that one must presume everything is "official" unless proven otherwise, and that anything "official" cannot be included as evidence. Clarence Thomas even wrote openly that the concept of a special counsel is illegal.
anon373839 2y ago
I found some time to read the main opinion and Justice Sotomayor’s dissent. I approached them both with a genuinely open mind because I figured that the public discourse lacked nuance. Well, the opinion is just as awful as everyone has said. For one thing, it is dishonest. The court spends a lot of time distinguishing the different presidential powers and levels of immunity, as if its holding had limitations. It doesn’t. The practical effect of Trump v. U.S. is that it is all but impossible to prosecute even the most heinous abuses of presidential power. For another thing, the court really couldn’t manage even a semblance of textual or historical support for its decision. Given the court’s recent emphasis on fidelity to those sources, it really is astonishing! (And I say this as someone who is somewhat sympathetic to textualism in principle.) I think it’s really worthwhile to read at least the syllabus and Sotomayor’s dissent.
HumblyTossed 2y ago
The subtlety in this is it makes the Supreme Court King makers. They, ultimately, get to decide what is official.
EasyMark 2y ago
I think the point is that because there are no limits initially, it makes it extremely easy for the President to murder half the government who disagree with him as an official act. As long as he uses marines instead of his own 9mm hand pistol on the street it would be an official act because the SCOTUS decision assumes everything he does as a precursor is fine. It provides cover for him to act in that manner, and by then there is no one to impeach and convict and then hold him criminally liable. If you have read Project 2025, then you know their first act will be to fire everyone in the executive branch and military and install only loyalists. I think people are seriously underestimating what Trump and his followers are up to.
thewileyone 2y ago
Nope, this has opened the door to all kinds of malfeasance. It's not wide open and welcoming, but ajar nonetheless.
dllthomas 2y ago
The ruling does not seem to say that impeachment removes the immunity.

awb 2y ago

On paper it makes sense. The people elect a congress charged with checking the powers of the President. States can also pass constitutional amendments to further limit or define the powers of the President. In reality, power can be consolidated to the point where these checks and balances no longer work properly.

lupire 2y ago
And that's point where the SC is irrelevant. You can't paperwork your way out of civil war when the people want one.
dudinax 2y ago
No it doesn't. There's nothing in the constitution that grants immunity to a president and no reason why Donald Trump had to commit the crimes he's charged with.
- ac29 2y ago
  If every past, present, and future legal scenario was explicitly and unambiguously addressed by the constitution, we wouldnt need the Supreme Court. In reality it is an imperfect document that can never possibly be complete.
  - dudinax 2y ago
    You're suggesting presidential immunity is a new idea, and criminal charges against ex-presidents are a new threat to the executive branch, both of which were wrong. 230 years ago people had already through through this. Immunity isn't in the constitution because they didn't want it in there. The president already has all the constitutional protection he needs from prosecution: a prosecutor can't remove him from office.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

comex 2y ago

You're mixing together a few different things. - Trump's lawyers argued in this case that an ex-president can only be charged with a crime if he was impeached and convicted for that same act. But all of the justices rejected this view today. The newly granted immunity is orthogonal to whether or not the president is impeached. - Though, the president does have to leave office somehow before he can be prosecuted. He can't be prosecuted while still sitting. This wasn't technically decided in this case, but the parties mostly agreed as much beforehand, and the majority opinion has a footnote approvingly citing an Office of Legal Counsel memo to that effect. - Separately, Trump's lawyers argued that the special counsel that prosecuted him was not properly appointed by an act of Congress. But the Supreme Court did not grant certiorari on that issue and the majority opinion today did not address it. Justice Thomas's solo concurring opinion, however, did address it and agreed with Trump (but a concurring opinion has no legal effect). In any case, this is a different question from whether prosecutions of ex-presidents must go through a special counsel. As far as I know, there is no formal rule that would require it, but it's highly desirable as a way to avoid political bias. That question didn't come up in this case, though.

brianaker 2y ago
Trump's attorneys did not say "the special counsel that prosecuted him was not properly appointed by an act of Congress", Justice Thomas brought this up in oral arguments. Trump's attorneys admitted in oral arguments that they had not brought this up during the appeal, so as an argument it was not saved. Further more, historically there is no basis for the argument. Special prosecutors, which are different from the "independent counsel" that came about after Nixon; the laws around "independent counsel" expired a while ago. "Special counsel", and all of the other similarly named, have been around since Marbury. By happenstance, some have been X-members of Congress, Cabinet members, etc... but far from all. There is a reason why none of the other Justices brought this up, it is absurdist.

adriand 2y ago

This ruling seems to open the door to a president being immune from, say, commanding SEAL Team 6 to assassinate a political rival. “In its ruling, the Supreme Court decided there was no question that Mr. Trump enjoyed immunity from being prosecuted for one of those methods: his efforts to strong-arm the Justice Department into validating his false claims that the election had been marred by widespread fraud. That was because the justices determined that Mr. Trump’s interactions with top officials in the department were clearly part of his official duties as president.” [1] One of the president’s official duties is to direct the military to take actions that protect the country. Biden can reasonably claim Trump is a threat to democracy, and can officially request him to be killed. Right? If not why not? 1: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/01/us/politics/supreme-court-immunity-trump-jan-6.html https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/01/us/politics/supreme-court...

unyttigfjelltol 2y ago
SCOTUS said there was an extra procedural step, namely impeachment and conviction by the Senate. Ultimately the Senate would decide factually, whether that hypothetical action was an appropriate basis for further criminal prosecution. Prosecuting a president fundamentally is a political act, and why would we think a random DC bureaucrat better qualified to make a consequential political act than the Senate itself?
- dashundchen 2y ago
  Why does the president deserve some fundamental immunity with a very high political bar to clear, compared to average citizen or politician? Carving out some special protection strikes at the heart of the idea that everyone is equal in the eyes of the law.
  - rayiner 2y ago
    Because the government kills people all the time and destroys their lives and businesses. And because nobody is combing through the criminal law books trying to convict the average person for something. I mean, the former governor of New York just said the New York prosecution against Trump wouldn’t have been brought against anyone else.

Ancapistani 2y ago

> Out of context this is quite reasonable and level headed. That's why I'm opposed to making changes to the way the Court is selected and empaneled. The fact that it's inconvenient for one party right now is irrelevant. It'll be inconvenient for the other party soon enough. > In context of the hyper partisan landscape US politics are today, doesn’t seem likely without a supermajority opposition to be able to bring charges against a president, for official or unofficial acts that are crimes. Good. If it were easy to bring charges against a President, then Presidents wouldn't be able to do anything they were elected to do. The failure of that protection at the end of the term is one of the major reasons for the end of the Roman Republic. If you repeatedly make powerful political figures choose between prosecution and violence, it won't take long for one of them to choose violence. The fact that we've peacefully transitioned between presidents ~45 times is honestly rather amazing.

tines 2y ago
> Good. If it were easy to bring charges against a President, then Presidents wouldn't be able to do anything they were elected to do. Leaving aside the difference between "bringing charges" and "successfully bringing charges," there's a big gap between "easy" and "impossible." Nobody wants presidents to be criminally liable for the things they do in good faith. But this ruling makes good faith irrelevant; it doesn't matter why they do an official act, it's immune. The fact is that a former president exerted pressure on government officials in a way that would halt a lawful election and coordinated to subvert its true results by presenting fake results. In determining whether that was an official act, we cannot reference his motivations according to the SC's ruling. Allow the motivation for official acts to be taken into consideration for prosecution, and a lot of the problems go away.
- QuizzicalCarbon 2y ago
  I honestly can’t tell if you’re talking about Hunter Biden’s laptop, which many leaders of the intelligence community claimed was fake Russian disinfo, only to be recently admitted into court evidence as being real and factual. Who exerted pressure on those officials to lie to the public before the last presidential election?

DEADMINCE 2y ago

> Out of context this is quite reasonable and level headed. In context of the hyper partisan landscape US politics are today, doesn’t seem likely without a supermajority opposition to be able to bring charges against a president, In context though, it's quite terrifying given how much the US has fallen into tribalism. Half the population wouldn't convict a certain candidate no matter what they did.

mandmandam 2y ago
[flagged]
- sanderjd 2y ago
  Actually it's not true of both sides. Hunter Biden was tried and convicted and nobody is up in arms about it, because he did the crimes and should do his time. If his father has done any crimes he should do the time as well. Most people still think this. The only people who don't are those in thrall to one particular cult of personality.
  - rayiner 2y ago
    What about using the New York election interference law to prosecute people who suppressed the Hunter Biden laptop story?
    - vaidhy 2y ago
      That action did not happen in New York.
      - rayiner 2y ago
        It involved suppression of an article published by a New York newspaper, by social media companies with a large presence in New York. You could indict the social media companies as part of a conspiracy charge under New York law, even if other relevant events happened elsewhere. Also, do other jurisdictions have obscure election interference laws they never use? Does Delaware? I bet they do.

rayiner 2y ago

It also reflects common practice: https://oxcon.ouplaw.com/display/10.1093/law-mpeccol/law-mpeccol-e305 https://oxcon.ouplaw.com/display/10.1093/law-mpeccol/law-mpe... (“ 3 Functional immunity applies to both sitting and former heads of state; however, this immunity is available to such individuals solely with respect to acts performed in their official capacity (Fox 667).”) France, for example, has prosecuted former presidents for things like bribery. But I don’t think you can prosecute a former president of France for something he told the Ministry of Justice to do. I suspect this distinction between official and unofficial acts is also what most people assumed the law was, until Trump forced the Supreme Court to confront it under a particularly unsympathetic set of facts.

7e 2y ago

I’m an FBI agent and I kill my wife. Am I immune from prosecution unless Congress appoints a special counsel, simply because I work in the executive branch?

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
thatoneguy 2y ago
No, because you're not _in charge of_ the executive branch.
- 7e 2y ago
  Is that a meaningful distinction? If so, why?
  - saurik 2y ago
    FWIW, I think it might be, because the prosecutors work for the executive branch.
paulddraper 2y ago
No. An FBI agent and president are two different things.
- 7e 2y ago
  Wow, really? Thanks! The point is that both wield executive power, yet one person in the executive can be prosecuted only by Congress and the rest not. Illogical.
  - 15155 2y ago
    One is where all executive power is vested and originates, the other is a hired employee.

dudinax 2y ago

There's no provision in the constitution for immunity. They made it up there's nothing reasonable about it. Under this decision the president can commit a crime or order someone else to commit a crime, and as long as the crime is committed using a power of the office, it can't be charged. For example, if in an official communication the president orders an officer to solicit a bribe for doing their duty, the president can't be charged. It's ridiculous, horrible, and destructive to the constitution.

Den_VR 2y ago
[dead]
ttyprintk 2y ago
Those wouldn’t be crimes. They cannot produce evidence. As of this ruling, it looks like: - Biden issues a prepardon essentially deputizing anyone who detains Eric Trump or Eric’s laptop. - We might endure some debate whether it is an official act. That debate actually only matters to Congress or future historians. - Since the extrajudicial apprehension of Eric and his evidence is defined as not-criminal, there is no need to preserve details. Seal Team 6 and those involved enjoy a prepardon and some assurance that their names are scrubbed. - This is constitutional if Congress has granted the President (Biden at this point) war powers and is satisfied that some elements of the military identified Eric Trump with the enemy. We’ll debate whether the President is a member of the military, just as we had to debate whether he was an officer of the USA under Amendment 14, section 3.

kristjansson 2y ago

> and if successfully impeached and convicted can then be charged with said crimes The opinion explicitly rejects this line of reasoning. > Transforming that political process [impeachment] into a necessary step in the enforcement of criminal law finds little support in the text of the Constitution or the structure of our Government

atoav 2y ago

As someone living in Geemany my bar for auch high level laws is: would Adolf Hitler have been able to use it to abolish democracy? If so it is bad. IMO the US president was already too powerful since the cold war, but this is crazy.

pyuser583 2y ago
American has an extremely weak state. The government is incapable of accomplishing basic tasks. Men like Trump want to weaken the state further. Look at Trumps actions during COVID. Did he use the crisis to grab power? Declare a state of emergency? Declare martial law? Suspend habeas corpus? No he told the states to handle it. The real fear Americans have isn't a Hitler situation, but a Hindenburg situation.
- atoav 2y ago
  You have any polls on that or is that just a guess?
- throwaway7ahgb 2y ago
  Yes, and the states did handle it. People left NY and CA in droves to FL and TX and still are doing so.

aredox 2y ago

The ruling also doesn't clearly define what is official, and that one must presume everything is "official" unless proven otherwise, and that anything "official" cannot be included as evidence. Clarence Thomas even wrote openly that the concept of a special counsel is illegal.

anon373839 2y ago

I found some time to read the main opinion and Justice Sotomayor’s dissent. I approached them both with a genuinely open mind because I figured that the public discourse lacked nuance. Well, the opinion is just as awful as everyone has said. For one thing, it is dishonest. The court spends a lot of time distinguishing the different presidential powers and levels of immunity, as if its holding had limitations. It doesn’t. The practical effect of Trump v. U.S. is that it is all but impossible to prosecute even the most heinous abuses of presidential power. For another thing, the court really couldn’t manage even a semblance of textual or historical support for its decision. Given the court’s recent emphasis on fidelity to those sources, it really is astonishing! (And I say this as someone who is somewhat sympathetic to textualism in principle.) I think it’s really worthwhile to read at least the syllabus and Sotomayor’s dissent.

HumblyTossed 2y ago

The subtlety in this is it makes the Supreme Court King makers. They, ultimately, get to decide what is official.

EasyMark 2y ago

I think the point is that because there are no limits initially, it makes it extremely easy for the President to murder half the government who disagree with him as an official act. As long as he uses marines instead of his own 9mm hand pistol on the street it would be an official act because the SCOTUS decision assumes everything he does as a precursor is fine. It provides cover for him to act in that manner, and by then there is no one to impeach and convict and then hold him criminally liable. If you have read Project 2025, then you know their first act will be to fire everyone in the executive branch and military and install only loyalists. I think people are seriously underestimating what Trump and his followers are up to.

thewileyone 2y ago

Nope, this has opened the door to all kinds of malfeasance. It's not wide open and welcoming, but ajar nonetheless.

dllthomas 2y ago

The ruling does not seem to say that impeachment removes the immunity.