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.”
Just a reminder that term limits for justices seem a good idea, but opens up another possibility for corruption when justices use the Supreme Court to set themselves up for a nice job somewhere else, most likely a lobbying firm. Maybe the benefits outweigh that, but it’s a thing to keep in mind
They are being directly bribed right now with no repercussions, so not sure how much of a change that would be.
It’s noteworthy that Sotomayor – a sitting justice – believes that this is now possible.
I’d love to ask her why she believes that, and by what means she thinks it can be done, because I would get on board in a heartbeat.
They aren’t having an epiphany. This is just conservative nazi self-preservation. They know the next president is unlikely to be who they thought it would be.
The idea of having their own permanent conservative kingdom seems less likely to them, so that ruling could become a serious liability for them with a highly motivated progressive president in place.
I want to remind all other us voters that the french created the guillotine for this exact scenario, might be worth keeping in mind.
Damn right!
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”
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.
reforming the Court through an amendment
I agree with everything you said, just want to point out that no amendment is needed. The Constitution explicitly grants that right to Congress without requiring non-standard approval such as a supermajority. It would just take a law.
The last overhaul was in 1869, which matched the number of Supreme Court justices with the number of (then) circuit courts. These are now federal district courts, and there are thirteen. I am all for doing the same thing they did in 1869: increasing the number of justices to thirteen to match the current number of district courts.
The amendment will be needed to impose term limits, which is sorely needed.
I don’t disagree. There is a strong argument that SCOTUS term limits can be constitutionally imposed with legislation. But I would be the first to point out that not everyone agrees and of course, SCOTUS interprets legislation, which gives them veto power over their own term limits if that specific reform is undertaken legislatively. Either way, it’s never even been tried, so who knows.
There is also an interesting proposal that instead of term limits, splitting the current roles of justices and attaching a length of service to specific judicial roles be used. In other words, have a justice sit on the general bench for eighteen years, and then move into an emeritus role where they remain a justice but take up specialized work for the court. They still “hold their Offices during good Behaviour” for as long as they like in this emeritus period, and thus fulfill the sole constitutional requirement, but others take their place on the larger bench. This idea too would require no amendment, but as good an idea as it is it will very likely never happen. (I think the Brennan Center link above covers this plan as well.)
For myself, I’d be happy if Congress just increased the number to thirteen to match the district courts without making any further provision, which would dilute the effect of the current corruption while opening no new loopholes for future McConnells to exploit. My concern is that if the number of justices are tied to anything, that thing – like district courts – will then become the football with which to game the court.
An amendment is the only way to make sure that the current court doesn’t scuttle any novel way to reduce their power. Anything short of that will have the Conservative majority channeling the Founders to come up with an Originalist interpretation that, conveniently, agrees with their opinion.
It takes a supermajority in the senate which we don’t have, to impeach a justice, I forget if 2/3, which is somewhat possible, or 3/4, which will never fucking happen.
2/3
I think 2/3 is possible.
So many Republicans just watched safe-seeming seats go blue. If ever there were a time for a Republican to reach across the aisle, it’s now.
Yes.
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.
Prez can still pardon any of the for any reason at any time.
He’s not going to pardon anyone that isn’t paying him for the pardon.
The only reason he pardoned the Jan 6ers was because his handlers and their cronies were mixed up in it, and it was easiest to cover the entire thing up and give it an air of bullshit credibility at once. His other pardons are always in response to a payment of some sort because he doesn’t care about anyone but himself.
I know it. Just making a point about how federal charges are pointless in the face of a faithless admistration.
But they do some pardon, perhaps, for political reasons, like giving license to similar elected officials to break the law. But one wonders if even then some donor has to pay the prez to 6 layers of shell companies ending in his possession.
He was selling them for 1 million in a firesale in 2020 after he lost. I bet it’s higher now, and a sliding scale for the rich notorious cases, like Zua or whatever of binance the crypto exchange. I bet he paid a lot. I think he got 10 years, or a ten year felony not sure which.
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?
I don’t think the most applicable systems describes it formally as different branches comparable to what we’re used to. But the TLDR is really too distribute power so nobody has too much power.
Overturning presidential immunity would only be a start. How about abortion, citizens united, etc.
Fucking legislate abortion rights. Write a damned law and pass it. Using a court decision by itself for this has always been stupid.
Agreed. However, they didn’t have to address the issue after 50 years. Clearly they always will, I guess, if they don’t get something more concrete in place.
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!
I stand corrected. 🙂↕️
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
