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Obama ordering a drone strike on an American citizen fighting with the Taliban in Afghan is an official act.
Nixon’s Plumbers trying to kill Daniel Ellsworth is a private act.
Not really. Because the pardon can only be used while they are still president. If you charge someone after their term is up the pardon doesn’t really help them
The ruling today is actually more restrictive than the power the President already has to pardon.
For example, under this ruling Barack Obama could be convicted with any crime that occurred before January 2009 or after January 2017. He could also be convicted of crimes that were “unofficial” acts between 2009-2017.
With the pardon power he had, he could on his last day grant himself a “full, free, and absolute” pardon on crimes from the day of his birth to that morning he was leaving the Oval Office for any crime regardless of it being an official or unofficial act.
No it just means he couldn’t get prosecuted for it. FDR would have immunity that doesn’t mean it couldn’t be ruled as unconstitutional.
It’s literally just qualified immunity for politicians.
Im not sure i guess it depends on what is "official" lets say in a hypothrtical a Bill Clinton breaks the Presidential Records Act of 1978 by knowingly carrying files carrying classified files home. I feel that since there is a established proceedure that not following it would be a non official act.
So right now unless there isnt a clear and established procedure i would say (i hate i have to say it) until what is considered official is determined anything goes i guess. So as of right now and if i understand it right any major unconstitutional action taken by any president has been declared legal.
I dont make the assumption to spread fear and panic but it will be a interesting next couple of years. I can see an amendment being passed to end presidental immunity in the future.
Absolute for anything protected by the constitution. Presumed immunity for any official acts (would likely end up in front of the Supreme Court again). Though even if prosecuting a non official act you can’t use official acts as evidence, so it could largely hamper prosecution of a non official act.
No, it wouldn't make the order constitutional or legal, but it would remove personal liability from FDR (if there were any to begin with). Essentially, you couldn't send FDR to jail for EO 9066.
Maybe like giving the ok to take out terrorist cells? If we're not officially at war it is arguably murder, but it might also be ok under the right circumstances if it's the best way to protect the country/citizens.
They left it intentionally vague so any new immunity case would end up in front of them again, thus allowing them to pick favorites. Basically the same thing they did with Chevron deference.
Depending on the President, it will depend on if they wrote it down citing the laws they're using, or if they just think "official act". The standard applied will be if they're a Democrat or a Republican. The Republican just has to think to themself "official act" and then never go to court.
Official, President could order Seal Team Six to kill off the Clinton family but wouldn’t be able to use that same team to knock off wife after she divorces him.
If you read the dissent it means a President could order the CIA to eliminate a political rival (intentionally and without even hiding his motives) and be immune
If you read the dissent it means a President could order the CIA to eliminate a political rival (intentionally and without even hiding his motives) and be immune
If you read the dissent it means a President could order the CIA to eliminate a political rival (intentionally and without even hiding his motives) and be immune
Literally, it flips the first amendment on its head. Now we can propose that the president does things that are illegal to even say or suggest? We can suggest it then go to prison. They can go then do it and be fine.
Literally every president I can think of ordered extrajudicial killings of some kind. At the time I’m fairly certain JFK could have been imprisoned for adultery. In several states, Bill Clinton could have been charged with sodomy for receiving oral sex. The list goes on. The legal system isn’t supposed to be used as a weapon like it has been, yet it’s always been that way.
Edit: Sodomy in D.C. was defined as oral or anal, but it was conveniently made legal in 1993.
Oral sex between a man and woman was considered sodomy? That seems hard to believe. And I’m not looking that up. I don’t want that in my google search history.
Basically it means the debate over an official or non-official act will get bogged down in the courts for so long that no President will ever be held accountable for anything ever again, ever.
People all over this post pretty obviously didn’t read the actual decision
Roberts ruled that anything involving the Pres constitutional power is unpunishable even if Congress passes a law against it
Commander and chief of the armed forces is one of those powers, a Pres could order the military to massacre a college town and to take no prisoners and it is legal. He could order the murder of his political rival and it is legal etc etc
This is one of the worst at decisions in history and you have conservatives slapping each other on the back that it’s no big deal.
Lock up Americans of Japanese ancestry during World War II?
Drop nuculur weapons on 150,000 civilians, while fire bombing to death tens of thousands of other civilians?
Stage coups in scores of countries?
Use drones to assassinate American citizens abroad, without trial?
Hatch a scheme (Operation Fast and Furious) to let the Mexican cartels acquire thousands of high powered firearms?
Pass a law prohibiting people of Chinese ancestry from coming to the US?
Turn a blind eye to lynchings and the implementation of Jim Crow laws?
Forcefully segregate the US government (that was Woodrow Wilson)?
Do you want more of examples?
I’m saying, in part, that the concept of the President having immunity for official acts is longstanding even if it’s been an unofficial understanding. There is a reason why not a single President has attempted to criminally prosecute any of his predecessors before now.
And, yes, I think Presidents acted based on the assumption or understanding that they were immune. I don’t believe that Truman thought for a second that he could be prosecuted for dropping the bombs. I don’t think FDR believed he could be prosecuted for locking up Japanese Americans. Etc.
The question - still unsettled after today - is where the scope of immunity ends, in terms of what kinds of acts are “official.”
And thats why the courts decided this way and pushed it back to the lower courts to define the scope for this case as official acts.
Perfectly reasonable position.
I would say the deserved criticism is the way in which they went about it. The slow tracked it despite the numerous current implications. There have been countless times when the court fast tracked cases and issues of current/immediate controversy.
And I think Roberts, as an institutionalist, could have written more narrow to get a more unified court. Even Barrett has some issues she pointed out in her concurrence.
Theoretically a president could bribe scotus as an official act, without deference to any experts and as an exclusive power given to the courts, to rule however they want. This has effectively opened the door for fascist dictatorship.
It most certainly has not opened the door to a “fascist dictatorship.” I say this as someone who voted for Obama and his VP, but these kinds of hysterics are absolutely not helpful and contribute to the simplification of our public discourse.
If the President wanted to bribe SCOTUS in the way you describe, they already could. Only the judiciary could him accountable and well…you see the problem.
Please go and actually read court rulings instead of reading rage bait articles. SCOTUS absolutely did not legalize bribery and overturning Chevron is not a power grab. Overturning Chevron means the power to interpret law returns the courts, which is literally its constitutional authority.
Lmao ridicoulus claim here that anything involving the Pres constitutional power is unpunishable even if Congress passes a law against it
Commander and chief of the armed forces is one of those powers, a Pres could order the military to massacre a college town and to take no prisoners and it is legal. He could order the murder of his political rival and it is legal
Just about every decision of SCOTUS is overblown. Social media, rage bait articles, and a public who doesn’t have a basic understanding of law or jurisprudence.
Lmao it’s an awful position, roberts ruled anything that ruled that anything involving the Pres constitutional power is unpunishable even if Congress passes a law against it
Commander and chief of the armed forces is one of those powers, a Pres could order the military to massacre a college town and to take no prisoners and it is legal. He could order the murder of his political rival and it is legal
The point is that you shouldn’t be able to prosecute the President just for sucking at his job. His office has certain powers, and they aren’t conditioned on whether he uses them “right.” If what he was doing was illegal then he doesn’t have the power to do it and it wouldn’t be an “official action.”
Jfc, this might be the only educated take I've seen on this today (so far). Sooo many people (on both sides of this debate) are interpreting this incorrectly.
This sub is cathartic after reading all of the bots, or teenagers, or dramatic adults idk what’s happening in the other subs but this sub always has the best discussions and conversation.
Those are all examples of Presidents doing terrible things because they thought it was right for the country or the world (it wasn’t). The dissenting SC judges remark that the decision clearly allows the President to use his office for personal gain, that’s more what I was going for
These examples are the exact reason why the argument that immunity is needed for presidents to do their duties is bogus. Presidents already did all of these things without explicit immunity. They were tempered by the idea of prosecution other than to not commit egregious crimes. Now with this ruling they will feel willing to commit egregious, personal crimes.
lol this is really burying the lede on this ruling. Roberta ruled that anything involving the Pres constitutional power is unpunishable even if Congress passes a law against it
Commander and chief of the armed forces is one of those powers, a Pres could order the military to massacre a college town and to take no prisoners and it is legal. He could order the murder of his political rival and it is legal
The president ordering the murder of political rivals would be 1) illegal 2) unconstitutional.
This according to the constitution, the bill of rights, and many laws.
So it would be an unofficial act, illegal, and unconstitutional.
Absolutely incorrect lol, the constitution makes the president the commander of chief of the armed forces, roberts ruled anything the president does that’s within the powers given to the president within the constitution is protected under absolute immunity even if Congress passed a law saying a president can’t do so such a law would be a violation of the separation of powers and therefore unconstitutional
Right. The Obama drone strike one was very much on my mind. That is just murder it it’s done any other way than the president ordering it. No trial, US citizens, not actively fighting US troops. If the President isn’t immune, than that was murder. Because the President deemed it necessary, it was allowed (although controversial).
Nixon firing people until he found someone to do what he wanted them to do. all an official act to officially interfere with an investigation.
Clinton committing sex crimes in the oval office, and then lying to congress was an official act because it was in an office and he officially didn't see the need to tell the truth.
Sorry, but in fairness none of the sex stuff during the Clinton WH was criminal. It does pretty much legalize all of Clinton’s obstruction charges and most of Watergate.
It doesn't legalize the original Watergate hotel break-in, however, because that would require unreasonably stretching the definition of an "official act".
I don't think this ruling says too much assuming the president is a decent person with ethics and morals. A potential president without morals could exploit left and right to their advantage.
I’ll start by saying Andrew Johnson would have been much more brazen in undermining Reconstruction. There could have been active collaboration with ex-Confederate figures, and enabled them to eventually disregard the 14th Amendment. He might not even have been able to be impeached.
Obama ordered a drone strike killing an American citizen. You think he should be subject to a later administration’s prosecutorial discretion? JFK green lighting the Bay of Pigs? LBJ and the Gulf of Tonkin fraud? George H. W. Bush going into Kuwait without a formal declaration of war?
Presidents have always had immunity. It’s just now a statement by the Supreme Court. No President has been on trial for his official acts as president.
The most concerning part of this ruling isn't the precedent it sets almost nothing really changed this has always been the law. The concern is they gave no clarity on what is official vs non official.
By leaving this to the lower courts they essentially gave themselves the power to decided what is and isn't and we all know what that means but I won't break the sacred rule 3.
Presidents are NOT above the law by this decision. For any constitutional transgressions conducted under the rubric of official duties, the Senate still has its impeachment powers.
The Senate couldn't impeach a paper bag. Impeachment is wholly and entirely nonfunctional, a vestigial procedure with no modern relevance.
Also, impeachment was a political matter. Our kings would still above the law, just not above politics.
Nixon would have finished his terms.
W wouldn't have bothered with pretending WMDs exist.
Lincoln would have had Marylanders to voted for succession executed instead of imprisoned.
Warren would have allowed the privatization of all US oil resources.
JQA or Henry Clay likely would have had Jackson arrested.
No President in history except John Tyler would have faced impeachment.
Reagan wouldn't have had to deny Iran-Contra.
And Wilson would have likely gone alot farther than re segregating the government
I don’t understand the argument being made that, since we don’t use the legal rope to restrain the presidency, we might as well just give the President all of the rope. Or am I misunderstanding the argument here? My English is pretty good, but I don’t understand why the arguments being made in this thread defending this decision are supposed to make sense.
I have to admit I'm confused by the concern over this decision. Did we think that official acts were open for prosecution? How is an official act defined? Can an illegal act be an official act?
I'm just working off headlines and a brief excerpt of the decision, but it sounds to me like they got this one right.
I think that's part of the issue, they just said that official acts have absolute immunity but punted the definition of official acts back to lower courts, and it'll inevitably come back to them anyway. They literally didn't answer if an illegal act is an official act. In fact, if it's considered an official act they say Congress and the courts can't question it or investigate any motives. How then do you determine if the act was official, if the President just says it is and you aren't allowed to look into it further? It just becomes absolute immunity. Do we want the President to be above the law?
It's vague, and leaves open some scary interpretations that we can't be sure no president will try to push. Especially if they have enough pull in Congress to avoid/survive impeachment, there's nothing that can be done?
I don't think it's the precedence rather than the statement (or lack thereof) in the opinion of what is and isn't official. We certainly have wartime precedents for certain actions of extreme discrimination (see, internment camps), so it's not a stretch this has been 'best practice' unofficially for a long time coming. But by putting it in writing, without even drawing a rather vague and general outline around such things that could or could not be considered an official duty, the court has not done due diligence and opened the way for some very problematic issues, especially when coupled with the addendum that communications between the President and other officials cannot be held as admissible evidence.
To name some absurd hypotheticals, imagine an insanely racist president. One so racist they basically re-enact the Trail of Tears, but with black people. Is this an official duty? We have precedence for it, after all.
What if, in their function of commander in chief, they opt to instead dispossess political rivals due to potentially unpatriotic actions and use the military to achieve this means under the guise of fighting threats to the nation both foreign and domestic? They achieve this by, say, picking an outspoken opponent whose actions do not line up with their words and would be convenient to remove (I'll select Texas in this case for their independent power grid). While we don't have any kind of precedent for, say, stripping a state of statehood barring secession, we do have both financial and military incentives used to cajole them into accepting federal decisions as precedence.
Alternatively, if it is an official act delivered in writing and is not contestable in court, even without the Chevron defense allowing experts to interpret vague outlines provided to them, the various departments *are* branches of the executive, and per the opinion of the court, their respective heads can be considered the legitimate, official voice of the president in the course of their duties. Ostensibly (though again, purely hypothetically), the president can now dictate to the IRS in writing to simply stop accounting for charitable contributions in the taxes of corporations for deductions, and furthermore they must now pay a base amount equal either to a selected, flat proportion of their revenue, or a percentage of profits, whatever is higher with no negotiation. Or the FCC could be instructed to collect on grants or loans made to certain companies like Comcast effective in full in three months, provided they did not meet the appropriate conditions, lest they face total liquidation.
While the scenarios above are extremely unlikely to actively occur, it is a bit of a brief glimpse into what could happen, and remain untouchable, despite being so wholesale outlandish.
This is by far the worst take that’s gone around today. Peoples heads are exploding because the Supreme Court ruled that the Senate must do its job? For official acts, the President much be impeached. He or she is not immune from that process by any stretch of this decision. It doesn’t place the President above the law. It provides that there are Constitutional processes for holding the President accountable, and for official acts, that’s impeachment. For acts outside of the official Presidential Office, criminal prosecution is still available.
These news sites are just fear mongering. Also, as an aside, I would argue this topic doesn’t actually belong on this sub and is more appropriate on the Supreme Court sub or on Politics.
I'd argue that it is significant in that (in my understanding) a former president cannot be held accountable *after* their term for criminal action taken *during* their term, as long as it can be construed as an official act. At that time congress would no longer have authority and the DOJ of whatever future administration or state prosecutor's wouldn't be able to take action either.
So that leaves a fairly narrow time frame of a criminal act needing to be discovered, followed by swift action by Congress to impeach and convict. And this also assumes that neither the House nor Senate shields the sitting president from impeachment or conviction). And if all those stars align, a president could avoid accountability by resigning *without* the need for a pardon à la Gerald Ford.
It also feels like it undermines the supreme court's own authority because the executive now has protection to functionally ignore the judiciary and carry on with potentially unconstitutional behavior, as long as they have a friendly majority in either the lower or upper body of the legislature... But honestly this is way outside of my own wheelhouse and perhaps everything I'm saying here is untrue.
The most bananas part of this decision is that it forbids courts from inquiring into the motives of the president. It would be one thing to establish qualified immunity or a rebuttable presumption of immunity for official acts, if courts could remove immunity upon a finding that the president abused an official act for a personal motive.
But this opinion says that as long as the president is using/abusing *official* powers, he is *absolutely* immune. And it creates a presumption that when the president is speaking with other government officials, he is acting under his official capacity.
So, this isn’t just carrying on with tradition that a president won’t face criminal liability for things like, as another comment pointed out, interning Japanese Americans. Yes, that is an official act that may violate the constitution (and I know SCOTUS said it didn’t at the time but that’s not my point) but it didn’t constitute a criminal act committed by the president.
This ruling means that specific criminal acts still don’t expose a president to liability so long as he was abusing an official authority. For example, if the president takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon, he is immune from anti-bribery laws. In fact, since presidents are typically on bribed to use their official power for the befit of the one doing the bribing, this ruling basically legalizing the president taking bribes.
So not his doesn’t “change nothing.” This alters the concept of having a civilian president to having a leader who is in most instances above the law.
I mean congress still can impeach them, but if the supreme court rules that they can’t be prosecuted for something Congress convicts them of or that you can’t impeach a former president than yeah their is clearly a flaw
I'm with SCOTUS on this one. It has always been part of the implicit constitution of the US that presidents cannot be prosecuted for official acts, which is why it has never happened. The opposite doctrine leaves open the possibility of a president prosecuting their predecessor (which is not a hypothetical concern at present).
Which is to say, every president has acted with the knowledge that they were (implicitly) immune from persecution for actions undertaken within the powers and duties of the presidency.
Didn't hear anyone worry about incipient fascism when cool, erudite Barack Obama assassinated an American teen without charge, trial, or even opportunity to surrender
Who wants to make him criminally liable? Show of hands
Let's be honest, none of this would be needed if the Democrats weren't trying to jail their political opponent and former President in guise of trying to "save democracy".
Basically all this says is Presidents are allowed to President even if the next administration doesn't like they way they Presidented. Seems pretty reasonable to me.
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More like "When the president does, that means that it is not illegal."
Nixon has nothing to do with Watergate. So put it to rest.
I was implying that he may not have resigned. I wonder what this ruling means for vice presidential immunity.
The Watergate shenanigans would fall under unofficial acts under any reasonable definition of the term.
Can someone give me an example of how this would apply? I understand the “non official” not being immune part but not the official capacity part
Idk, i think this has to he tested in courts first
Obama ordering a drone strike on an American citizen fighting with the Taliban in Afghan is an official act. Nixon’s Plumbers trying to kill Daniel Ellsworth is a private act.
Sort of shows it didn’t matter anyway since the Presidential pardon power is ultimate.
Not really. Because the pardon can only be used while they are still president. If you charge someone after their term is up the pardon doesn’t really help them
The ruling today is actually more restrictive than the power the President already has to pardon. For example, under this ruling Barack Obama could be convicted with any crime that occurred before January 2009 or after January 2017. He could also be convicted of crimes that were “unofficial” acts between 2009-2017. With the pardon power he had, he could on his last day grant himself a “full, free, and absolute” pardon on crimes from the day of his birth to that morning he was leaving the Oval Office for any crime regardless of it being an official or unofficial act.
I'm pretty sure that this was made to be purposefully vague so that the supreme Court could allow things depending on what side the president is on
Republican = official. Democrat = Nonofficial.
I think an example would be FDRs executice order 9066 would be legal and not against the constitutional rights of the JP-US citizens.
No it just means he couldn’t get prosecuted for it. FDR would have immunity that doesn’t mean it couldn’t be ruled as unconstitutional. It’s literally just qualified immunity for politicians.
Is it absolute or does the “official action” have to comply to the constitution? Because if it’s absolute that’s super fucked
Im not sure i guess it depends on what is "official" lets say in a hypothrtical a Bill Clinton breaks the Presidential Records Act of 1978 by knowingly carrying files carrying classified files home. I feel that since there is a established proceedure that not following it would be a non official act. So right now unless there isnt a clear and established procedure i would say (i hate i have to say it) until what is considered official is determined anything goes i guess. So as of right now and if i understand it right any major unconstitutional action taken by any president has been declared legal. I dont make the assumption to spread fear and panic but it will be a interesting next couple of years. I can see an amendment being passed to end presidental immunity in the future.
That amendment would be a most welcome one to say the least
It would make us feel better at the very least
Absolute for anything protected by the constitution. Presumed immunity for any official acts (would likely end up in front of the Supreme Court again). Though even if prosecuting a non official act you can’t use official acts as evidence, so it could largely hamper prosecution of a non official act.
It would still be unconstitutional but the president wouldn't be prosecuted for it.
No, it wouldn't make the order constitutional or legal, but it would remove personal liability from FDR (if there were any to begin with). Essentially, you couldn't send FDR to jail for EO 9066.
Maybe like giving the ok to take out terrorist cells? If we're not officially at war it is arguably murder, but it might also be ok under the right circumstances if it's the best way to protect the country/citizens.
They left it intentionally vague so any new immunity case would end up in front of them again, thus allowing them to pick favorites. Basically the same thing they did with Chevron deference.
Depending on the President, it will depend on if they wrote it down citing the laws they're using, or if they just think "official act". The standard applied will be if they're a Democrat or a Republican. The Republican just has to think to themself "official act" and then never go to court.
Courts have also previously determined that personal social media accounts count as official government communication
Official, President could order Seal Team Six to kill off the Clinton family but wouldn’t be able to use that same team to knock off wife after she divorces him.
If you read the dissent it means a President could order the CIA to eliminate a political rival (intentionally and without even hiding his motives) and be immune
If you read the dissent it means a President could order the CIA to eliminate a political rival (intentionally and without even hiding his motives) and be immune
If you read the dissent it means a President could order the CIA to eliminate a political rival (intentionally and without even hiding his motives) and be immune
[удалено]
Literally, it flips the first amendment on its head. Now we can propose that the president does things that are illegal to even say or suggest? We can suggest it then go to prison. They can go then do it and be fine.
Kid, SCOTUS affirmed what has always been the case with presidents. You're just mad it applies to all presidents.
Literally every president I can think of ordered extrajudicial killings of some kind. At the time I’m fairly certain JFK could have been imprisoned for adultery. In several states, Bill Clinton could have been charged with sodomy for receiving oral sex. The list goes on. The legal system isn’t supposed to be used as a weapon like it has been, yet it’s always been that way. Edit: Sodomy in D.C. was defined as oral or anal, but it was conveniently made legal in 1993.
Oral sex between a man and woman was considered sodomy? That seems hard to believe. And I’m not looking that up. I don’t want that in my google search history.
Huh? Why would Obama do that? Is that not who you’re referring to?
The actual text is a reference to a joke Reagan made. I assume it’s supposed to come from Obama’s perspective, though. Unless they’re breaking Rule 3.
Rule 3 ☹️
January 21st 2005: President George W Bush declares John Kerry an enemy combatant and sends him off to Guantanamo for some “enhanced interrogation”
Kerry will survive cause he has thee Purple hearts
Basically it means the debate over an official or non-official act will get bogged down in the courts for so long that no President will ever be held accountable for anything ever again, ever.
As opposed to? Presidents have always been implicitly immune from prosecution for (what SCOTUS now calls) official acts.
Nixon would have never left
People all over this post pretty obviously didn’t read the actual decision Roberts ruled that anything involving the Pres constitutional power is unpunishable even if Congress passes a law against it Commander and chief of the armed forces is one of those powers, a Pres could order the military to massacre a college town and to take no prisoners and it is legal. He could order the murder of his political rival and it is legal etc etc This is one of the worst at decisions in history and you have conservatives slapping each other on the back that it’s no big deal.
Another nail in the coffin of American democracy…
I did. It’s bad, and there’s no spinning it.
Lock up Americans of Japanese ancestry during World War II? Drop nuculur weapons on 150,000 civilians, while fire bombing to death tens of thousands of other civilians? Stage coups in scores of countries? Use drones to assassinate American citizens abroad, without trial? Hatch a scheme (Operation Fast and Furious) to let the Mexican cartels acquire thousands of high powered firearms? Pass a law prohibiting people of Chinese ancestry from coming to the US? Turn a blind eye to lynchings and the implementation of Jim Crow laws? Forcefully segregate the US government (that was Woodrow Wilson)? Do you want more of examples?
So what you’re saying is this had precedent
I’m saying, in part, that the concept of the President having immunity for official acts is longstanding even if it’s been an unofficial understanding. There is a reason why not a single President has attempted to criminally prosecute any of his predecessors before now. And, yes, I think Presidents acted based on the assumption or understanding that they were immune. I don’t believe that Truman thought for a second that he could be prosecuted for dropping the bombs. I don’t think FDR believed he could be prosecuted for locking up Japanese Americans. Etc. The question - still unsettled after today - is where the scope of immunity ends, in terms of what kinds of acts are “official.”
And thats why the courts decided this way and pushed it back to the lower courts to define the scope for this case as official acts. Perfectly reasonable position.
Exactly right. The criticism of SCOTUS's decision is wildly overblown.
I would say the deserved criticism is the way in which they went about it. The slow tracked it despite the numerous current implications. There have been countless times when the court fast tracked cases and issues of current/immediate controversy. And I think Roberts, as an institutionalist, could have written more narrow to get a more unified court. Even Barrett has some issues she pointed out in her concurrence.
I mean couple this with Chevron and “not bribes, just gratuities” and it’s making up the bigges power grab by the judiciary in our history
Theoretically a president could bribe scotus as an official act, without deference to any experts and as an exclusive power given to the courts, to rule however they want. This has effectively opened the door for fascist dictatorship.
It most certainly has not opened the door to a “fascist dictatorship.” I say this as someone who voted for Obama and his VP, but these kinds of hysterics are absolutely not helpful and contribute to the simplification of our public discourse. If the President wanted to bribe SCOTUS in the way you describe, they already could. Only the judiciary could him accountable and well…you see the problem.
Please go and actually read court rulings instead of reading rage bait articles. SCOTUS absolutely did not legalize bribery and overturning Chevron is not a power grab. Overturning Chevron means the power to interpret law returns the courts, which is literally its constitutional authority.
Usually is. With some exceptions: citizen united.
Lmao ridicoulus claim here that anything involving the Pres constitutional power is unpunishable even if Congress passes a law against it Commander and chief of the armed forces is one of those powers, a Pres could order the military to massacre a college town and to take no prisoners and it is legal. He could order the murder of his political rival and it is legal
Just about every decision of SCOTUS is overblown. Social media, rage bait articles, and a public who doesn’t have a basic understanding of law or jurisprudence.
Lmao it’s an awful position, roberts ruled anything that ruled that anything involving the Pres constitutional power is unpunishable even if Congress passes a law against it Commander and chief of the armed forces is one of those powers, a Pres could order the military to massacre a college town and to take no prisoners and it is legal. He could order the murder of his political rival and it is legal
Yes except the timing. They could have done this in December except for slow walking it. That was deliberate.
The point is that you shouldn’t be able to prosecute the President just for sucking at his job. His office has certain powers, and they aren’t conditioned on whether he uses them “right.” If what he was doing was illegal then he doesn’t have the power to do it and it wouldn’t be an “official action.”
Jfc, this might be the only educated take I've seen on this today (so far). Sooo many people (on both sides of this debate) are interpreting this incorrectly.
This sub is cathartic after reading all of the bots, or teenagers, or dramatic adults idk what’s happening in the other subs but this sub always has the best discussions and conversation.
Did the Supreme Court at least deem whether the acts in question in the specific case before them were official or unofficial?
Point of order, the President isn’t criminally prosecuting anyone. The DOJ is.
Very well said. I think you might be too smart for Reddit.
What he’s saying is it as ALWAYS been this way. Just now the SCOTUS said the quiet part out loud.
We just never really cared because it wasn't being done to us
You should join r/FuckWilliamMcKinley. We need more members. Edit: I'd post memes on there but I'm lazy. I'll probably get around to it eventually.
I joined up. I like the guy as a person, but his actions as president are one of the worst.
Those are all examples of Presidents doing terrible things because they thought it was right for the country or the world (it wasn’t). The dissenting SC judges remark that the decision clearly allows the President to use his office for personal gain, that’s more what I was going for
[удалено]
I'm pretty sure you know the explanation is racism.
I never said those things weren’t completely and totally fucked
These examples are the exact reason why the argument that immunity is needed for presidents to do their duties is bogus. Presidents already did all of these things without explicit immunity. They were tempered by the idea of prosecution other than to not commit egregious crimes. Now with this ruling they will feel willing to commit egregious, personal crimes.
So uh all that is null and void and now it’s retconned into being allowed again!
lol this is really burying the lede on this ruling. Roberta ruled that anything involving the Pres constitutional power is unpunishable even if Congress passes a law against it Commander and chief of the armed forces is one of those powers, a Pres could order the military to massacre a college town and to take no prisoners and it is legal. He could order the murder of his political rival and it is legal
The president ordering the murder of political rivals would be 1) illegal 2) unconstitutional. This according to the constitution, the bill of rights, and many laws. So it would be an unofficial act, illegal, and unconstitutional.
Absolutely incorrect lol, the constitution makes the president the commander of chief of the armed forces, roberts ruled anything the president does that’s within the powers given to the president within the constitution is protected under absolute immunity even if Congress passed a law saying a president can’t do so such a law would be a violation of the separation of powers and therefore unconstitutional
Yeah, this ruling changes nothing. They were never prosecuted for official acts.
Right. The Obama drone strike one was very much on my mind. That is just murder it it’s done any other way than the president ordering it. No trial, US citizens, not actively fighting US troops. If the President isn’t immune, than that was murder. Because the President deemed it necessary, it was allowed (although controversial).
Nixon firing people until he found someone to do what he wanted them to do. all an official act to officially interfere with an investigation. Clinton committing sex crimes in the oval office, and then lying to congress was an official act because it was in an office and he officially didn't see the need to tell the truth.
Sorry, but in fairness none of the sex stuff during the Clinton WH was criminal. It does pretty much legalize all of Clinton’s obstruction charges and most of Watergate.
It doesn't legalize the original Watergate hotel break-in, however, because that would require unreasonably stretching the definition of an "official act".
It wasn’t a sex crime and he didn’t actually lie so …
I don't think this ruling says too much assuming the president is a decent person with ethics and morals. A potential president without morals could exploit left and right to their advantage.
Perfect. I'm not worried even a little bit
Nixon would never have resigned.
King George was just doing official acts
I’ll start by saying Andrew Johnson would have been much more brazen in undermining Reconstruction. There could have been active collaboration with ex-Confederate figures, and enabled them to eventually disregard the 14th Amendment. He might not even have been able to be impeached.
Looks like the forum is buzzing with a mix of humor and disbelief over the idea that presidents could be above the law.
Dubya just put his paint brush down and breathed a sigh of relief
Iran-Contra isn’t even a scandal, because fuck you.
Obama ordered a drone strike killing an American citizen. You think he should be subject to a later administration’s prosecutorial discretion? JFK green lighting the Bay of Pigs? LBJ and the Gulf of Tonkin fraud? George H. W. Bush going into Kuwait without a formal declaration of war?
Yes, yes, 1000% yes, and yes
Things happening overseas are very different than things happening at home. Also, kinda ya. Don’t commit crimes.
Yes. Obama is a war criminal
Are we just gonna create a prison that’s basically a presidential retirement home then where they all go after they serve? lol
Goodbye…. nice to know you.
Presidents have always had immunity. It’s just now a statement by the Supreme Court. No President has been on trial for his official acts as president.
The most concerning part of this ruling isn't the precedent it sets almost nothing really changed this has always been the law. The concern is they gave no clarity on what is official vs non official.
That’s very true.
By leaving this to the lower courts they essentially gave themselves the power to decided what is and isn't and we all know what that means but I won't break the sacred rule 3.
Regardless of rule 3, it just makes me very disappointed in our government and the Supreme Court. Seems to be happening quite often.
This is the real issue, why don’t they clarify what is and isn’t official?
Presidents have always been above the law. Obama unilaterally killed an American citizen. Bush Jr. is a war criminal.
When is this sub changing to r/kings or is it already taken?
Andrew Jackson probably would have killed more people
So watching an assault on The Capitol rather than acting to swiftly end it is...?
What's the test for an act being official?
Why even have a legislative and judicial branch anymore?
they always have been
Presidents are NOT above the law by this decision. For any constitutional transgressions conducted under the rubric of official duties, the Senate still has its impeachment powers.
The Senate couldn't impeach a paper bag. Impeachment is wholly and entirely nonfunctional, a vestigial procedure with no modern relevance. Also, impeachment was a political matter. Our kings would still above the law, just not above politics.
Nixon would have finished his terms. W wouldn't have bothered with pretending WMDs exist. Lincoln would have had Marylanders to voted for succession executed instead of imprisoned. Warren would have allowed the privatization of all US oil resources. JQA or Henry Clay likely would have had Jackson arrested. No President in history except John Tyler would have faced impeachment. Reagan wouldn't have had to deny Iran-Contra. And Wilson would have likely gone alot farther than re segregating the government
I don’t understand the argument being made that, since we don’t use the legal rope to restrain the presidency, we might as well just give the President all of the rope. Or am I misunderstanding the argument here? My English is pretty good, but I don’t understand why the arguments being made in this thread defending this decision are supposed to make sense.
I have to admit I'm confused by the concern over this decision. Did we think that official acts were open for prosecution? How is an official act defined? Can an illegal act be an official act? I'm just working off headlines and a brief excerpt of the decision, but it sounds to me like they got this one right.
1. In practice yeah mostly. 2. It's up to the lower courts. 3. Yes, and the president wouldn't be prosecuted for it.
I think that's part of the issue, they just said that official acts have absolute immunity but punted the definition of official acts back to lower courts, and it'll inevitably come back to them anyway. They literally didn't answer if an illegal act is an official act. In fact, if it's considered an official act they say Congress and the courts can't question it or investigate any motives. How then do you determine if the act was official, if the President just says it is and you aren't allowed to look into it further? It just becomes absolute immunity. Do we want the President to be above the law? It's vague, and leaves open some scary interpretations that we can't be sure no president will try to push. Especially if they have enough pull in Congress to avoid/survive impeachment, there's nothing that can be done?
I don't think it's the precedence rather than the statement (or lack thereof) in the opinion of what is and isn't official. We certainly have wartime precedents for certain actions of extreme discrimination (see, internment camps), so it's not a stretch this has been 'best practice' unofficially for a long time coming. But by putting it in writing, without even drawing a rather vague and general outline around such things that could or could not be considered an official duty, the court has not done due diligence and opened the way for some very problematic issues, especially when coupled with the addendum that communications between the President and other officials cannot be held as admissible evidence. To name some absurd hypotheticals, imagine an insanely racist president. One so racist they basically re-enact the Trail of Tears, but with black people. Is this an official duty? We have precedence for it, after all. What if, in their function of commander in chief, they opt to instead dispossess political rivals due to potentially unpatriotic actions and use the military to achieve this means under the guise of fighting threats to the nation both foreign and domestic? They achieve this by, say, picking an outspoken opponent whose actions do not line up with their words and would be convenient to remove (I'll select Texas in this case for their independent power grid). While we don't have any kind of precedent for, say, stripping a state of statehood barring secession, we do have both financial and military incentives used to cajole them into accepting federal decisions as precedence. Alternatively, if it is an official act delivered in writing and is not contestable in court, even without the Chevron defense allowing experts to interpret vague outlines provided to them, the various departments *are* branches of the executive, and per the opinion of the court, their respective heads can be considered the legitimate, official voice of the president in the course of their duties. Ostensibly (though again, purely hypothetically), the president can now dictate to the IRS in writing to simply stop accounting for charitable contributions in the taxes of corporations for deductions, and furthermore they must now pay a base amount equal either to a selected, flat proportion of their revenue, or a percentage of profits, whatever is higher with no negotiation. Or the FCC could be instructed to collect on grants or loans made to certain companies like Comcast effective in full in three months, provided they did not meet the appropriate conditions, lest they face total liquidation. While the scenarios above are extremely unlikely to actively occur, it is a bit of a brief glimpse into what could happen, and remain untouchable, despite being so wholesale outlandish.
Boy, the astroturfers are out in force today.
Tell me again why fdr didn't stack the court???
This is by far the worst take that’s gone around today. Peoples heads are exploding because the Supreme Court ruled that the Senate must do its job? For official acts, the President much be impeached. He or she is not immune from that process by any stretch of this decision. It doesn’t place the President above the law. It provides that there are Constitutional processes for holding the President accountable, and for official acts, that’s impeachment. For acts outside of the official Presidential Office, criminal prosecution is still available. These news sites are just fear mongering. Also, as an aside, I would argue this topic doesn’t actually belong on this sub and is more appropriate on the Supreme Court sub or on Politics.
I'd argue that it is significant in that (in my understanding) a former president cannot be held accountable *after* their term for criminal action taken *during* their term, as long as it can be construed as an official act. At that time congress would no longer have authority and the DOJ of whatever future administration or state prosecutor's wouldn't be able to take action either. So that leaves a fairly narrow time frame of a criminal act needing to be discovered, followed by swift action by Congress to impeach and convict. And this also assumes that neither the House nor Senate shields the sitting president from impeachment or conviction). And if all those stars align, a president could avoid accountability by resigning *without* the need for a pardon à la Gerald Ford. It also feels like it undermines the supreme court's own authority because the executive now has protection to functionally ignore the judiciary and carry on with potentially unconstitutional behavior, as long as they have a friendly majority in either the lower or upper body of the legislature... But honestly this is way outside of my own wheelhouse and perhaps everything I'm saying here is untrue.
The most bananas part of this decision is that it forbids courts from inquiring into the motives of the president. It would be one thing to establish qualified immunity or a rebuttable presumption of immunity for official acts, if courts could remove immunity upon a finding that the president abused an official act for a personal motive. But this opinion says that as long as the president is using/abusing *official* powers, he is *absolutely* immune. And it creates a presumption that when the president is speaking with other government officials, he is acting under his official capacity. So, this isn’t just carrying on with tradition that a president won’t face criminal liability for things like, as another comment pointed out, interning Japanese Americans. Yes, that is an official act that may violate the constitution (and I know SCOTUS said it didn’t at the time but that’s not my point) but it didn’t constitute a criminal act committed by the president. This ruling means that specific criminal acts still don’t expose a president to liability so long as he was abusing an official authority. For example, if the president takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon, he is immune from anti-bribery laws. In fact, since presidents are typically on bribed to use their official power for the befit of the one doing the bribing, this ruling basically legalizing the president taking bribes. So not his doesn’t “change nothing.” This alters the concept of having a civilian president to having a leader who is in most instances above the law.
Magna Carta much?
Isn't the Magna Carta famous for *curtailing* the authority of the sovereign?
https://www.parliament.uk/magnacarta/#:~:text=Magna%20Carta%20was%20issued%20in,as%20a%20power%20in%20itself.
It was the first document stating a king and it's government was not above the law
I mean congress still can impeach them, but if the supreme court rules that they can’t be prosecuted for something Congress convicts them of or that you can’t impeach a former president than yeah their is clearly a flaw
Everything every one of them's already done when it was ''illegal'' and maybe more, probably.
Free tricky dick!
Guys, this is the way it has always been. SCOTUS reaffirms the status quo.
I'll bet Andrew Jackson would've found a way to be even more smug about defying the Court and causing the Trail of Tears eviction.
Babe, check it out. We’re canonizing the president!
Nixon - jeez.
Wasn't this already kind of the case though?
Barack Obama might have murdered a US citizen with a drone, for example.
I'm with SCOTUS on this one. It has always been part of the implicit constitution of the US that presidents cannot be prosecuted for official acts, which is why it has never happened. The opposite doctrine leaves open the possibility of a president prosecuting their predecessor (which is not a hypothetical concern at present). Which is to say, every president has acted with the knowledge that they were (implicitly) immune from persecution for actions undertaken within the powers and duties of the presidency.
This just broke our country.
Oh crap **NO MORE IMPEACHMENTS?**
Yes, but good luck getting evidence.
This is treading Rule 3 territory
Drone striking American citizens without trial or judicial approval. Oh, wait...
Didn't hear anyone worry about incipient fascism when cool, erudite Barack Obama assassinated an American teen without charge, trial, or even opportunity to surrender Who wants to make him criminally liable? Show of hands
Let's be honest, none of this would be needed if the Democrats weren't trying to jail their political opponent and former President in guise of trying to "save democracy". Basically all this says is Presidents are allowed to President even if the next administration doesn't like they way they Presidented. Seems pretty reasonable to me.