U.S. Supreme Court justices on Thursday quizzed lawyers for Donald Trump and Special Counsel Jack Smith about the former president’s claim of immunity from prosecution for trying to undo his 2020 election loss, posing questions about what happens if a president sells nuclear secrets, takes a bribe or orders a coup or assassination.

Trump appealed after lower courts rejected his request to be shielded from four election-related criminal charges on the grounds that he was serving as president when he took the actions that led to the indictment obtained by Special Counsel Jack Smith.

Michael Dreeben, representing the special counsel, told the justices that the Supreme Court has never recognized the kind of immunity that Trump seeks for a public official.

Conservative Chief Justice John Roberts signaled concern about relying merely on the “good faith” of the prosecutors to prevent abusive prosecutions against presidents if the Supreme Court rejects presidential immunity.

“Now you know,” Roberts told Dreeben, “how easy it is in many cases for a prosecutor to get a grand jury to bring an indictment. And reliance on the good faith of the prosecutor may not be enough in some cases - I’m not suggesting here” in Smith’s indictment of Trump.

  • Makeitstop@lemmy.world
    171·
    6 months ago

    “We’re writing a rule for the ages,” conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch, said during the arguments.

    That’s not your fucking job! You are not legislators, you aren’t there to invent laws that you think would be a good idea. If there isn’t already a legal basis for Trump’s presidential immunity to all prosecution, your job is to tell him to fuck off and throw the case back to the lower courts.

    “Without presidential immunity from criminal prosecution, there can be no presidency as we know it. For 234 years of American history, no president was ever prosecuted for his official acts,” Sauer told the justices

    So, the presidency as we know it can’t exist if we continue as we have for the past 234 years? For fuck sake, do you even listen to yourself when you say this shit? I would hope not since you’re openly defending the right of the president to commit treason and murder with impunity. And yet, here we are, with those arguments actually being considered by the Court.

    • zib@kbin.melroy.org
      13·
      6 months ago

      What gets me is their whole reason for overturning Roe v Wade was because they claimed their job wasn’t to legislate from the bench. The only thing the current SCOTUS does consistently is fuck the people.