Judd Legum: A five-alarm fire for democracy

https://popular.info/p/a-five-alarm-fire-for-democracy

On Monday, six members of the Supreme Court granted Donald Trump — and every future president — broad criminal immunity. The court found that, as president, Trump was free to use his "official" powers to commit crimes. Considering the President of the United States is the most powerful position in the world, this is a breathtaking pronouncement.

Writing in dissent, Justice Sotomayor details the implications:

When [the President of the United States] uses his official powers in any way, under the majority’s reasoning, he now will be insulated from criminal prosecution. Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune.

The Supreme Court invented this new kind of presidential immunity 235 years after the Constitution was ratified. And it lacks any grounding in the Constitution's text. Instead, Chief Justice Roberts, writing for the majority, cites the need for the president to take "bold and unhesitating action" without "undue caution."

Justice Sotomayor explains that the Constitution contains provisions granting various forms of criminal immunity to federal officials. But the President of the United States was not included:

The Framers clearly knew how to provide for immunity from prosecution. They did provide a narrow immunity for legislators in the Speech or Debate Clause. See Art. I, §6, cl. 1 (“Senators and Representatives . . . shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place”). They did not extend the same or similar immunity to Presidents.

*snip*