307
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 04 Mar 2024
307 points (96.7% liked)
politics
19120 readers
2878 users here now
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.
Example:
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
They were probably all afraid that banning Trump on the ballot would tear so violently at the fabric of the country that it could end in a civil war with armed members of Trump's base roaming the streets creating chaos.
This ruling is very unsurprising to me. I'd been very surprised if they had gone the other way.
The US is a very unhealthy country.
Edit: Spelling
Lol, no. They don't give a shit about the country or its citizens.
They knew their asses would be targeted by his cult if they did the right thing. Honesty, Trump probably fits the bill for a RICO case. Maybe the IRS can take him down like they did Capone.
Generally not a good idea to use the legal system to suppress the most popular political candidate in a democracy. They tried it with Hitler, he came back stronger. They just tried it with Lula in Brazil and likewise he came back stronger.
To speak to the actual Supreme Court ruling, of which all 9 justices agreed... here's the 14th amendment.
https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/amendment-14/
Here's the little section at the bottom that basically killed this whole thing that Colorado tried
Here's the relevant part of the Supreme Court ruling
I mean, how much clearer can it be? Fuck Trump but a) we're a country of laws and if we start breaking the laws to try and stop Trump we are no better than Trump and are headed towards the same direction anyways and b) he is the most popular candidate, not just Republican but for the general election. No good will come of suppressing him, especially unlawfully
I just hope that by tossing the Republicans this bone, that they will end up not ruling that the president has absolute immunity in the next case.
Losing this one is not a big deal, because he only would have been removed from states that he was almost certain to lose anyway. Republicans love their insurrectionists, after all.
I think with a ruling like this where the intent was so crystal clear that it couldn't have possibly been misinterpreted by anybody yet the ruling was entirely backwards, that now is a good time for a constitutional convention and a total rewrite of the constitution. If it's not clear, let's make it clear.
I have a very strong feeling that they're going to find that the President has immunity for his official acts. That's the only question before the court in that case. However, what he was accused of doing clearly was not an official act as President but an act as a candidate in his capacity as a private citizen.
So it'll get kicked down to the district court and they'll decide that, and it will proceed. The terrible part is the timing which is partly on the Supreme Court but also largely on Merrick Garland for slow rolling everything for the first two years of the Biden administration.
That's not really the argument that the Trump legal team is making, though. They are arguing that the President of the United States has absolute immunity from civil or criminal prosecution. Absolute being the key word here. According to Trump's lawyers and Trump himself, no president would be able to do the job if they weren't allowed to bend or break the law with impunity because they'd be so tied down in the courts that they would never get anything done.
Setting aside how ridiculous that assertion is, the historical basis for presidential immunity has always been that the President does have civil immunity, although that too has some limitations (The E. Jean Carroll case, for instance) but we have never had a situation quite like the one we are in right now where the president is accused of committing felonies while in office. Theoretically, we would have tested this with Nixon, but Ford pardoned him and that was that.
I do think that they will not find that his argument has any merit, but the slow-boating and stalling on behalf of Trump and his cronies is frustrating to watch. It's almost like they want this court stuff to all coincide with the election so that they can claim they are being politically persecuted. I mean, they already are, but people are going to be sick of hearing about it by November and might be persuaded that Trump is the victim just by the inconvenient timing of the trial dates.
This is a very real possibility. There's a lot of politicking that goes on in SCOTUS, and I've heard from other lawyers that they cut deals amongst themselves all the time ("I'll go with you on this, if you go with me on the other").
They do it less, due to having a conservative majority, but they don't all always agree on everything in spite of that power imbalance.
Fat chance. The way they're handling the immunity case almost certainly puts the trial in or after November. They've completely stopped all pre-trial movement while they take at least 3 months to return a decision on immunity.
So the immunity decision is scheduled for the end of April, and assuming the verdict is that Trump does not have immunity from prosecution, the trial should resume in June and be wrapping up by October. Very close to the election to be receiving potentially the worst news of Trump's life and political career, but hopefully we get the decision before mail-in ballots are cast so that the American people can have the opportunity to make an informed decision.
Oh no. Arguments are scheduled for April. These arguments were just to see if the criminal trial would be stopped. Trump had appealed to stop the trial and the government asked the court to let the trial go forward or treat the appeal as a full thing that requires all the normal stuff. SCOTUS chose that last option.
So now we get arguments again in late April. Then we get a decision any time after that. Then they have at most 30 days to physically deliver the decision to the lower court. Who would then have to issue their own decision. (But that court isn't playing for time so probably within 24 hours.) At that rate the trial can't even resume pre-trial stuff until late May thru late June.
Then the trial judge said pre-trial stuff should take about 80 days. So we aren't getting in front of a jury until after early voting starts. And if SCOTUS drags things out long enough, maybe not even before November.
Ah heck, I thought it was still on pace for earlier than that. Drat.
Yeah and we haven't even gotten to the rest of the pre-trial delay tactics yet.
So they’ve traded almost-certain major civil unrest, and perhaps eventual civil war, as a direct result of their decision, for…
checks notes
…almost-certain major civil unrest, and perhaps eventual civil war, as an indirect result of their decision, and also get a fascist government.
Where they'll surely be in the in-group of power. Right? Right...‽
/s
The problem is this is something that needs to be lanced earlier than later. In almost every historical case of a government in crisis like this, the earlier it is handled, the better the outcome.
Basically this is a test of our country and we can either weather it or not. By deferring it gets worse. For example if we had prosecuted Nixon there would be far less appetite for breaking the rules. And as we go forward extreme opinions will seep further into the intelligence and armed organizations of the government. Whereas a problem now might see the military mostly stay on their bases, in 8 years that could be completely different. Especially if conservatives purge officers not loyal to the president personally.
I'm not saying you're wrong, it's always just so weird to hear people say that they don't just, you know... interpret the law.