Maybe not the current ones but as Commander in Chief he absolutely can form Seal Team 7, secretly have them swear complete loyalty to him, and then assassinate whomever he wants. I think you’re sincerely thinking logically about this within the confines of a working democracy, if Trump wins and with this SCOTUS decision, that all goes out the window.
Thanks for the citation. There's no language in that law that restricts the President's ability to directly appoint members to the military who are loyal to him. All it does is establishes a commission, chosen by the President, that can appoint members to the military. But it does not restrict the President from doing so. In fact the President is free to fire them all and let it languish.
Can you cite any other law or precedent that would restrict him from doing so?
The President is not capable of appointing members to the military unilaterally. Congress has sole power "To raise and support Armies" and "To provide and maintain a Navy." The President's role in accessions under title 10 exists only because Congress put it there.
There are 2 million people in the military. All the president would need to do is find a handful of existing personnel and organize them. He doesn't need to "raise" or "provide" anyone.
This is exactly how Trump organized the legislative coup within the White House. He went through the ranks of the DOJ to find someone who would draft a letter to send to all the states implying that fraud had been found (a lie) and DOJ was investigating (also a lie). No one at the DOJ would do this except for Jeffry Clark, a low ranking official who was promised the role of AG if he were to carry out Trump's scheme.
Donald Trump doesn't give a fuck about any civil service act. He never has, and never will.
He will do as he pleases, and a GOP led congress will simply let him, laws and precedent be damned (and the Supreme Court will comply). A DEM led congress will throw up their hands in uproar, and then refuse to actually do anything.
How is that not nothing? He continued to remain in Office until the end of his term and even attempted to prolong his stay. If those impeachments were worth more than the paper the Constitution is written on, that would never have happened.
Only the Senate can remove the president. The House can only introduce articles of impeachment and vote on whether or not they go through.
This, I believe, was originally set forth because the Senate was modeled as an “upper house” not subject to the whims of popular agitation (6 year terms vs 2 year terms. Appointment/selection by States vs direct election by district constituencies). The House, having more direct connections to the people is given the power to investigate and impeach a president, hopefully as a reflection of the public. The Senate, being composed of elder statesmen and slightly removed from the direct consequences of local constituents, is to be a check on potential rash impeachments.
So I’d dare say the impeachments were worth the paper the constitution was written on. The House impeached. The Senate tried, and acquitted him.
Parent comment specifically called out a "DEM led congress" refusing to do anything. An impeachment vote is the full extent of their power in getting rid of a president. And they did it twice in one term.
> that would never have happened.
What never would have happened? Some bizarre unknown chain-of-events which led to Trump staying in office? The occurrence which DEMs are somehow taking the heat for is the GOP outnumbering them and outvoting them in the senate to keep Trump in.
They must refuse to follow unlawful orders. They never get a choice. They always must follow the law. Refusing a lawful order is a crime, and following an unlawful order is a crime. But they never get a choice.
When someone can pardon you of the crime immediately after you do it, it doesn’t really matter much, especially is you are 100% dedicated to the cause.
Citation needed. Now on, we understand that powers granted the President by the Constitution are official. Actions even marginally associated with those powers cannot produce evidence in a court of law.
The judgement says that the President has immunity (in certain narrow cases). It does not say that members of the military have immunity for following an unlawful order.
It would also be very easy for a court to decide that executing a political rival is not an official act and deny the President immunity.
It would also be very easy for a court to decide that executing a political rival is not an official act and deny the President immunity.
What do you think the odds are for this Supreme Court to declare e.g. that shredding official documents (or moving them to the president's private property) is an official act?
Only the President can decide what happens to his records and documents. This has been made clear under Navy v. Egan. Congress can pass no laws regarding classification or record keeping. The Presidential Records Act has a caveat where the "personal records" of the President belong exclusively to him, and it's the President who decides what is personal or not.
That's a fascinating interpretation of PRA, which establishes public ownership of all Presidential records. Specifying if a record is private is the responsibility of his/her staff and done at the time of filing. Of course, Trump has tried to quote from the PRA, but he's not charged with any PRA violations, but under the Espionage Act.
Read the judgement. It's literally in the first pages.
> No, but it does say the President has an unreviewable pardon power to absolve them from any crime they are ordered by the President to commit.
A President can't pardon non-federal crimes or overturn the a conviction through impeachment as it would remove power from Congress and the Senate, which a President can't remove.
> It's now also very easy for a court to decide that it is. That is the problem.
Believing that ordering the assassination of elected officials would be considered lawful by judges is just so insane that it makes Alex Jones look like a legal scholar.
> Read the judgement. It's literally in the first pages.
I read it. I read that it's absolute immunity in core function, which seems pretty damn broad to me. Can you explain how nonreviewable power over control of the military and DOJ fits the description of "limited"?
> A President can't pardon non-federal crimes
He won't need to -- the whole point of giving the President this broad unreviewable power was so that non federal officials couldn't harass the president by charging him with crimes for carrying out his official duties. Where again what constitutes an "official duty" is left up to SCOTUS.
> Believing that ordering the assassination of elected officials would be considered lawful by judges is just so insane that it makes Alex Jones look like a legal scholar.
The prospect of this very ruling was considered so insane by legal scholars so as to be implausible, and yet here we are!
Judges don't have to find the assassination of elected officials to be legal, they just have to find the Supreme Court doesn't allow them to use most of the evidence of that crime at trial, and that they must presume motive for the assassination was good. How do you prosecute that case? Can't subpoena any evidence because it wouldn't survive an "absolute immunity" challenge by the President's lawyers.
That is the implication of the plain text of this law, it's with Justice Sotomayor is worried about, and I think it's pretty beneath you to try to compare her vast level of expertise to Alex Jones.
> read that it's absolute immunity in core function, which seems pretty damn broad to me
It's limited in scope, and still subject to impeachment, which immunity comes from because otherwise going through impeachment would be pointless.
> Can you explain how nonreviewable power over control of the military and DOJ fits the description of "limited"?
The President can't just kill anyone he wants, it's just a power he doesn't have. The President is not judge, jury and executioner. Having control doesn't mean you can do what you want with it.
> e won't need to -- the whole point of giving the President this broad unreviewable power was so that non federal officials couldn't harass the president by charging him with crimes for carrying out his official duties.
You're beginning to understand
> Where again what constitutes an "official duty" is left up to SCOTUS.
And?
> The prospect of this very ruling was considered so insane by legal scholars so as to be implausible, and yet here we are!
These same legal scholars were fine with not charging the last 4 presidents with war crimes and other atrocities. Because it was always the case, nothing has changed except limiting the scope of presidential immunity.
> Judges don't have to find the assassination of elected officials to be legal, they just have to find the Supreme Court doesn't allow them to use most of the evidence of that crime at trial, and that they must presume motive for the assassination was good. How do you prosecute that case? Can't subpoena any evidence because it wouldn't survive an "absolute immunity" challenge by the President's lawyers.
If the armed forces are killing politicians then at this point the Constitution is a mere piece of paper and no amount of super-majority or SCOTUS rulings is going to make a difference.
> That is the implication of the plain text of this law, it's with Justice Sotomayor is worried about, and I think it's pretty beneath you to try to compare her vast level of expertise to Alex Jones.
Sotomayor is an emotional militant judge and not taken seriously outside left leaning political militant circles. The oral hearings over the vaccine mandates is a good example: "but there are millions of dead children" she said crying. Yes, she did that. This is JFK assasination level conspiracy theory whether you like it or not.
Okay but the entire DOJ and military is a huge freaking scope, so what's the real limit here? We're talking about absolute nonreviewable control of the most powerful army and the biggest law firm on the planet.
> still subject to impeachment
This might be reassuring if we didn't go through two egregious examples of impeachment that didn't result in removal. In the first one, Trump attempted to us federal dollars to extort a bribe from a from the Ukrainian President. At the impeachment trial, Trump via Alan Dershowitz argued this conduct was okay because it was taken to increase his electoral chances, and Trump viewed his own election as benefitting America, therefore his actions were to benefit America and not grounds for removal. Because after all how can you be removed for doing what you think is best? From the trial:
“If a president does something which he believes will help him get elected in the public interest, that cannot be the kind of quid pro quo that results in an impeachment”
The Senate AGREED with that argument and acquitted him on the charges. So even in the case of extorting a bribe, impeachment is not operable as long as the executive claims the extortion and bribe were for the good of the country. The supreme court in their latest ruling seems to agree with this perspective.
In the second impeachment, Trump attempted to stay in power by orchestrating a coup. Mitch McConnell all but voted to impeach, but fell short because in his view, the impeachment happened after POTUS left office and there was a criminal justice system to hold him accountable.
On the first part, well that just means the period between an election and inauguration is a now a crime-spree zone for any lame duck POTUS. They can commit any crimes they want using the DOJ and military during that period, and we know the Senate won't impeach because there's too little time for the impeachment to happen, and now we know the DOJ will probably not be able to prosecute due to this ruling hamstringing the types of evidence and charges that can be brought.
On the second part, we have yet to see whether the system of justice can hold him accountable for the coup. To date, it has not worked and it's been 3.5 years. So it's not clear the federal system of justice can hold any former executive accountable for any criminal conduct whatsoever. States have proven to be more effective at charging and trying criminal conduct, but we have yet to see if it results in any accountability.
So no, impeachment doesn't fix this system. This is a huge exploit. Since it was added intentionally we might call it a back door.
> The President can't just kill anyone he wants, it's just a power he doesn't have. The President is not judge, jury and executioner. Having control doesn't mean you can do what you want with it.
Who is going to stop him though? That's the thing people don't understand about executive power. Before the thing stopping that conduct was the thought it was illegal and he would be prosecuted for it after he left office. But now? Now as long as the act was "official", good luck proving it without evidence. Good luck even charging it.
How did people end up in Guantanamo Bay without trial? Tortured? Imprisoned for years without charges or a trial. Who stopped that from happening? What makes you think you're safe from the same treatment now?
> And?
Well that's a pretty big hole in your argument since you're trying to convince me the powers are limited. If the limits of the powers are currently unbounded and the bounds are left up to the people who just gave POTUS sweeping immunity over the DOJ and military, then what are the actual limitations? Neither you nor I nor the SCOTUS judges actually know, so your insisting that the powers are limited is not really true.
> These same legal scholars were fine with not charging the last 4 presidents with war crimes and other atrocities. nothing has changed except limiting the scope of presidential immunity.
The ones I had listened to had predicted some limited immunity around things like the military and DOJ, especially the DOJ.
> If the armed forces are killing politicians then at this point the Constitution is a mere piece
I mean... yes? The point is to raise the alarm before it gets that dire by pointing out the ways we can go from here to there. Are you suggesting that it's impossible the armed forces would kill politicians in America? Doesn't that happen elsewhere in the world? Hasn't there already been a civil war here?
> Sotomayor is an emotional militant judge and not taken seriously outside left leaning political militant circles.
Lol I wouldn't even say the same things about the right leaning justices, glad to see where your extreme biases are.
The citation is the Supreme Court ruling itself, which I had assumed people participating in this discussion were familiar with. It grants "absolute immunity from criminal prosecution [only] for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority".
That is a narrow standard. The only acts in this case which met that standard were discussions with Justice Department officials.
Everything else in this case was in fact remanded, and it remains within the power of the lower courts to deny Trump immunity on all other aspects of the case.
Thank you for the citation (citations are not limited to documents, but often and especially in a large document of hundreds of pages, direct one to specific passages, as you did did here).
Your citation is exactly the bit that makes the President immune for directing Seal Team 6 to execute a political rival -- directing the military is within the President's "conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority". According to the Supreme Court, such a direction is now "absolute immunity from criminal prosecution".
But the President can declare a person an enemy combstant, or have them arrested in the name of national security, and their private records are now inadmissible.
> Testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing such conduct may not be admitted as evidence at trial. Pp. 30-32.
Trump's influencers work around that in a different way: by singling out individuals for military tribunals[1], he is not using the pardon power to deprive them of due process, or excuse someone else from doing so. The military tribunal deprives them of due process. But trying a civilian in a military tribunal is only constitutional if a civilian court is unavailable, which happens out of convenience in places like Guantanemo Bay.
It's pretty much a truism that one should never rely on a dissent's characterization of what the majority opinion says. Especially if the dissent writer is Sotomayor or Alito, frankly.
Murdering political rivals isn't a core constitutional duty of the President with automatic immunity. If he orders Seal Team 6 to do it, it's an official act, for which he has a rebuttable presumption of immunity. That means the prosecution has to prove he hasn't got immunity.
Roberts at least strongly hints in the majority opinion that Trump's immunity for trying to coerce Pence to commit crimes on Jan. 6 should be rebuttable. If that's the bar then ordering Seal Team Six to kill people will definitely get a president sent to prison the day he leaves office, whether the regular way or by impeachment.
Immunity before impeachment has pretty much been the position of the Justice Department (I think wrongly btw) with regard to current presidents for decades, including the Biden justice department. This isn't as big of a change as it makes sense for the Democrats to make it out to be.
Personal preference admittedly, but I much prefer Kagan and so far, Jackson. Sotomayor, like Alito and sometimes Thomas but generally not the rest, strikes me as purely results-oriented. The Chief justice is results-oriented in a different way. I think the reasoning matters more than the outcome, but I understand that not everyone does.
I've listened to her during the vaccine mandates oral arguments.
She was emotional during all the hearing and made blatantly false emotion based statements such as "think of all the millions of dead children".
