Donald Trump has asked the Supreme Court to block a lower-court ruling rejecting his claim of presidential immunity in efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
His lawyers argue that prosecution would disrupt his reelection bid and pose a threat to the presidency.
The case’s outcome will impact future elections.
Legal experts argue that presidential immunity only applies to official acts, not personal actions, and that prosecuting Trump would serve as a deterrent to future candidates.
Hofstra University constitutional law professor James Sample, said, “Trump’s attempt to use election disruption concerns as a bulwark against prosecution for actions aimed at not only disrupting, but actually overturning, a valid election is, at best, cognitive dissonance.”
“I sincerely doubt that the Supreme Court wants to sanction future January 6’s,” he continued.
The D.C. Circuit Court previously ruled, “Former President Trump has become citizen Trump, with all of the defenses of any other criminal defendant.”
“We cannot accept former President Trump’s claim that a president has unbounded authority to commit crimes that would neutralize the most fundamental check on executive power — the recognition and implementation of election results,” their ruling continued.
David Schultz, professor of political science at Hamline University, said, “The prosecution here is of acts that were not part of the official duties of the president.”
“To allow former presidents carte blanche immunity from all criminal prosecution renders the president above the law and sets a dangerous precedent that he can do whatever he wants. The threat of criminal prosecution is one of several checks to restrain presidential abuses of power, and it also ensures, as Article II Section 3 of the Constitution states, that the president takes care that the laws are faithfully executed. One cannot ‘take care’ if one can violate criminal law with impunity,” he continued.
Schultz added, “One cannot do something wrong and then argue that this wrongdoing unfairly limits my ability to wage an effective political campaign.”
“Trump should have thought of all of this before he did what he did,” explained the professor.
“If presidents are sworn to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution, failing to prosecute them as candidates essentially says that they are exempt from honoring or upholding the very oath they must take if elected to that office,” he concluded.
Failure to prosecute would set a bad precedent and imply exemption from upholding the presidential oath.
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