Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor said on Saturday that she hopes the court’s decision granting former presidents broad criminal immunity will be overturned, saying her colleagues have done some “crazy things.”
Appearing for a civics education talk at George Washington’s Mount Vernon estate, the liberal justice also publicly commented for the first time on this week’s midterm contests, when Democrats swept control of both chambers of Congress.
The justice specifically singled out the court’s 6-3 decision along ideological lines that former presidents enjoy at least presumptive immunity for their official acts. At the time, the justice wrote that it made Trump and his successors a “king above the law.”
Impeach Clarence Thomas for his acceptance of bribes and gifts from Harlin Crow. As per: https://factually.co/fact-checks/justice/clarence-thomas-accepted-bribes-allegations-explained-2db13c
“…the question of whether gifts rose to bribery under federal law remains contested and legally unresolved in the public record”
Yes.
Impeach him, but don’t sit a new one because it’s too close to the election
The only official that has a chance of getting booted before the new Congress is sworn in is Hegseth, because absolutely nobody likes him, and Republicans can make him into a scapegoat on the war. Then Senate Republicans can turn around and tell Trump to put a sane person in charge, or else they wont seat his replacement and Trump will have to work with Schumer to get a new guy in office.
Thomas definely needs to be impeached, I think all the evidence is there, but I doubt there will ever be enough votes in the Senate to do it, even after the new Senate is seated. We have a better chance of reforming the Court through an amendment than of impeaching Thomas. Republicans might as well be voting to dissolve themselves if they vote to boot Thomas.
just the words ‘presidential immunity’ seem so unpatriotic and not american.
Blame the SCOTUS for turning an unofficial Justice Department Policy into a Constitutional Principle. The Justice Department is run by the President, after all. What guarantee do we have that any investigation would be fair?
The President’s bogus lawsuit against the IRS awarding him eleventy billion dollars and “settling” for a ban on auditing his finances is a perfect example. A judge threw that out, legitimately, because when the President sues an agency he is in charge of, there are no adverse parties, and any “settlement” is a sham. (That whole affair would be an impeachable offense if someone with a blue tie tried that.)
That wasn’t a criminal prosecution, but imagine if Todd Blanche tomorrow announced that he had “investigated” Trump’s crypto grift and found that it was entirely above board, nothing to see there, and we should all just stop talking about it. Would we believe him?
The policy of the DoJ not investigating the President was meant to protect the integrity of the DoJ, not the President.
It was always envisioned that a truly corrupt President could be investigated after the fact, by a DoJ that doesn’t report to him. I have no clue why the SCOTUS saw something stricter in the penumbra of the Constitution.
I’ve always wondered - why on earth is the Justice Dept. under the President? Like, I get that he’s supposed to Execute the legislative and Judicial decisions and laws. But there needs to be some serious tweaks to the powers of the president, regardless. I’d be in favor of getting rid of the position entirely. But that’s never going to happen.
I been a proponent of moving the US Marshall Service under the Judicial. Give them an enforcement mechanism that isn’t reliant on the Executive cooperating. Because they clearly aren’t following court orders currently.
That’s interesting. I like that, actually.
This is a really great question! You’ve already got the underlying reason down too - all the various executive departments were created to distribute the enormous administrative burden of figuring out how to enforce laws that have been passed.
Interestingly, Congress is actually in charge of creating the various departments. The President is not authorized to abolish or create new ones, or to expand their jurisdiction or invent new powers, however they are responsible for proposing leaders to each and soliciting their guidance for topics within their domain. How this currently gets enforced is part of the issue however.
Independent agencies also exist that do not explicitly fall under the authority of the President. While the President can remove heads of departments for any reason, there is a much higher bar for removal of independent agency board members.
As the office of the attorney general is one of the government’s oldest, established during the first Congress, this may be a matter of combatting tradition more than anything else! This predates independent agencies by something like 100 years.
I should also edit in a clarification that the DOJ not being an independent agency is what allows it to be more partisan than something like the FTC. Also that an independent agency does not in and of itself entirely mitigate partisan politics from its decision making.
Three branches of government is too few
Are there examples of systems with more?
If a newly-elected Democratic president Officially Acted on some top Republicans and Justices first, then I imagine there would be an appetite for a legislative fix to the original misruling.
Can’t we like, just make it a law now? Supreme Court doesn’t make laws they are just supposed to enforce them.
The executive branch enforces laws, the judicial branch interprets them.
Do nine men interpret? Nine men, I nod.
No, sir, away! A papaya war is on!
The current conservative controlled court would strike it down as unconstitutional, probably on a shadow docket so they wouldn’t have to write up why.
Trump and/or 6 or so Senate Republicans would need to get on board to make this a law
Well on top of MAGA fatigue, I could see 6 Republicans voting for that under the premise that it’s “to ensure that we can prosecute any future democratic president for things like Hunter Biden’s laptop and yada yada yada”. It doesn’t need to make sense it just has to be framed as against democrats.
they can get the votes by showing six senators evidence of their crimes, and extorting them into choosing between voting and prison. I would prefer they go to prison, but IMHO correcting the serious harm this much presidential power causes is a worthwhile tradeoff.
Alternatively, the next dem president walks into the Senate with a shotgun and tests that immunity ruling.
I would love to see this happen but have little hope. I think Trump’s base support would have to completely crater for that many senators to cross him
