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Ahead Of The Immunity Decision: My Position [1]

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Date: 2024-06-30  

Tomorrow the Supreme Court will rule on whether the Constitution gives the President of the United States immunity from criminal acts he commits while in office. Trump's position is that he is immune unless successfully impeached for the charges he is later faces in standard court. In my view there is no immunity, limited or otherwise. I base that view on many things including:

1. The complete absence of a single word in the Constitution suggesting any criminal immunity.

2. That our Founders showed they knew how to confer any limited immunity, as in the speech and debate clause for legislators.

3. The statement by our Constitution that the President "shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed." Article 2, Section 3. It is utterly antithetical to a Constitutional mandate that a President faithfully execute our laws to then say the same Constitution empowers him to violate them.

4. The entire history and tradition of our Constitution rooted in rejecting kings who are above the law. Our Constitution stands for the rule of law, and not granting exceptions to any national leader. Such perspectives are made clear in many writings of the Founders, to include the Federalist Papers.

5. Such immunity creates a free pass for a lame duck President, in the period after losing an election, to violate the law because there is little time, and little point, to impeaching him. A President in his last hours would have a free pass to commit crimes, to include crimes aimed at unlawfully keeping office, which is exactly what this former President is charged with.

6. Trump's approach says the President can commit any crime so long as the President believes that a third of the Senate plus one will support still support him.

7. At his second impeachment trial in the Senate, Trump's lawyers successfully argued against his current position. They convinced Senators to vote against impeachment arguing that Trump could otherwise be prosecuted for any crimes he committed while in office after he left office. Now Trump's lawyers demand that the Supreme Court reject the argument they successfully advanced in the Senate in 2021.

While this list is not complete, it's a good start. Most pundits say tomorrow the Supreme Court will disagree with me. That the Supreme Court will fabricate a limited immunity clause in the Constitution giving the President the right to commit criminal acts within the course of his official duties. They will then remand to the trial court for a determination on whether the charges against Trump are for official acts.

While I do not believe trying to stay in power unlawfully can be fairly considered an official act, I would oppose even that decision for reasons stated above. If we are to remain a republic we must not give our President the powers of a King that we rebelled against.

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