TLDR: there are no qualifying limitations on presidential immunity
Not only does any US president now have complete immunity from “official” actions(with zero qualifying restrictions or definitions), but if those actions are deemed “unofiicial”, no jury is legally allowed to witness the evidence in any way since that would interfere with the now infinitely broad “official” presidential prerogatives.
Furthermore, if an unofficial atrocity is decided on during an official act, like the president during the daily presidential briefing ordering the army to execute the US transexual population, the subsequent ordered executions will be considered legally official presidential acts since the recorded decision occurred during a presidential duty.
There are probably other horrors I haven’t considered yet.
Then again, absolute immunity is absolute immunity, so I don’t know how much threat recognition matters here.
If the US president can order an action, that action can be legally and officially carried out.
Not constitutionally, since the Constitution specifically holds any elected politician subject to the law, but legally and officially according to the supreme court, who has assumed higher power then the US Constitution to unconstitutionally allege that the US President is absolutely immune from all legal restrictions and consequences.
To this point, the military has remained an independent institution that has followed rule of law–the Iraq War, however awful, was legally authorized (note: I am not saying that soldiers haven’t done illegal things, but the military writ large has been beyond the reach of the president to be wielded like a weapon to do explicitly illegal things).
Trump mused bombing antiquities in his presidency, and the military swiftly responded that they are bound not to follow illegal orders.
My fear now is that if military leadership falls into the wrong hands, immunity can be used to argue that the conduct is no longer considered illegal, or the line becomes so blurred that it ceases to functionally exist.
If that happened under a president like Trump, God help us, every horrible nightmare outcome could be on the table.
Great point.
We’ve passed the point that everything “could be on the table”, everything is on the table as of that ruling.
Biden is right now absolutely unfettered by the Constitution, amendments, federal and state laws, according to the supreme Court.
Biden immediately made it clear that no American was above the law, but right now he is above the law and choosing not to take advantage of the now unrestricted power of his office.
Not likely to be a tradition in future presidents.
Yes, this is probably the real motive. “Arrest and execute my political opponents” cannot be ignored by the military without a coup or being in dereliction of duty. I think another nefarious change here is not that the actual power has changed but that the Supreme Court has given face value validity to illegal acts. The President has always has unmitigated pardon power for federal crimes. They could order the military to commit illegal acts and pardon them preemptively so that they were not punished. A reason why that hasn’t happened is that the optics of that are horrifying - the President and military must admit to a crime being committed to pardon that crime. With this ruling there is no admission, no face value legal wrongdoing, and plenty of plausible deniability.
SCOTUS knew precisely what they were doing. This is a significant expansion of presidential power, yes. But they know that the real issue is political. What they want is the President to be able to argue that illegal things are legal because the President did it, instead of arguing that illegal things are not punishable because the President pardoned the criminals.
The President can literally shoot someone in cold blood, in public, and as long as they can deem it an official act it is de jure legal.
You might be asking why the right isn’t worried that Biden will abuse this - the answer is because they know he doesn’t have the balls. The left still thinks we’re in 1968 fighting for rights with mostly peaceful protests. We’re in 1938 and we’ve already lost.
“Evil always wins, because good is dumb.” - Some moron in a helmet
Yet again, folks are confusing leftist with liberals.Edit: Never mind; turns out the POS I replied to knows he’s lying and is slandering leftists deliberately for some fucked-up reason.
Make no mistake: “the left” knows damn well that this is a fight to the death with fascism. It is 100% liberals like Biden, NOT LEFTISTS, who think what’s going on here is politics as usual and that the MAGAs can be appeased, just like Neville fucking Chamberlain thought he could appease Hitler.
That’s your takeaway? Seriously?
Obviously it’s not my only takeaway, but there’s no rule that my comment has to contain every single thought I had on the topic!
And this is the comment you chose to…what? Add to the discussion? Enlighten people? Promote some sort of discourse? Or is it just mindless pedantry?
I’m sick and tired of jerkwads fucking up the definitions. Happy now?
It matters because liberals have always been the enablers of fascists, and people need to understand that. Blaming the “leftists” instead is a scapegoating bullshit lie.
So pedantry it is, then. Cool thanks for your valuable and fascinating contributions.
FYI, correcting your lies isn’t pedantry. Quit being a condescending troll.
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You’re spot on until you conflated Biden with “the left”.
Liberals aren’t left.
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@originalfrozenbanana really seems to hate getting called out for his scapegoating lie.
Agree with everything except why Biden won’t do it–its a paradox of trying to maintain our status quo democracy with the traditional tools of our status quo democracy.
I recognize that its a horrible asymmetry of power that they will have presidents that abuse power while dems will try to respect traditional lines of power…but the populace and parties themselves are also a correlary assymetry—cult 45 will cheerlead any horrible thing their guy does (or pretend it isn’t real, or isn’t really that bad, whatever the moment requires to avoid cognitive dissonance), but it Joe abused power, both Republicans and Democrats in power and as citizens across the nation would cry out for accountability.
It’s a right clusterfuck, that is for sure.
Wasn’t trump firing a bunch of higher up and placing toadies trying to get the government to back him?
He was but didn’t quite get there last time. He’s learned from his shortfalls and will do a much more thorough job if he’s elected again, you can count on it.
Rome intensifies
Keep in mind the P2025 plan to turn fornerly career roles into appointments. How many of those were military?
Trump wanted to start wars, he assassinated an Iranian general cuz he wanted to… he knows now there is nothing to stop him
Well we still can if we are collectively smart enough that being fascist is worse than being old.
I put the odds at a coinflip.