Justice Delayed Becomes Injustice, What the HELL

When I heard this (I saw it on Twitter but I'll provide an official report from NPR via Carrie Johnson and Nina Totenberg) my first thought was 

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments the week of April 22 in a high-stakes dispute over whether former President Donald Trump enjoys immunity from federal criminal prosecution.

The order from the court on Wednesday keeps Trump's prosecution in the Jan. 6 case on hold for at least a few more months.

The justices said, in an unsigned order, that their review would be limited to a single question: "Whether and if so to what extent does a former President enjoy presidential immunity from criminal prosecution for conduct alleged to involve official acts during his tenure in office."

(deep inhale) "FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK"

The good news: I was getting in my car at the workplace parking lot when I checked Twitter so I wasn't upsetting the kids at the library when I dropped that F-Bomb.

The bad news: JFC WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED

The ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals was supposed to be airtight. That panel of jurists came back with a unanimous ruling that they "cannot accept that the office of the Presidency places its former occupants above the law for all time thereafter... Doing so would collapse our system of separated powers by placing the President beyond the reach of all three branches."

Apparently there were at least five Supreme Court Justices who decided "nah" and want to jump into this mudpit to make their own ruling.

I considered three possible reasons why this is now happening:

1) This is just the Far Right Conservatives on the Supreme Court - three of them appointed by trump himself, expecting favors in return - doing what they can to stretch out the calendar on trump's DC felony insurrection trial (and maybe the South Florida classified documents trial) to keep it from even starting before the November general election happens, with Early Voting starting in some states by mid-September. Even if the Supreme Court ultimately affirms the lower court's ruling, it won't be until mid-August when they're expected to make such a ruling and the trial itself is expected to last at least two months (the South Florida trial is expected to last four to six months, it was never expected to wrap up before November). 

This is the most likely reason, as it's the one defense trump truly has: DELAY EVERYTHING. Even then it's such an extreme partisan move that no honest American should ever trust a SCOTUS ruling under the Roberts regime ever again.

2) The Justices saw something in the Appellate ruling that required either clarification, or they believed that a decision on Presidential Absolute Immunity required a final say from the highest court in the land. This is the least likely reason, because most legal scholars agreed with the Court of Appeals and there was no reason for SCOTUS to rule on this other than ego.

3) There are at least five Supreme Court Justices - considering how many of them are members of a Federalist Society that supports the Unitary Executive Theory that Presidents can wield incredible powers not even allowed in the Constitution - who legitimately think donald trump can claim Absolute Immunity as President and even to keep claiming after leaving office.

This is the nightmare scenario. This possibility would do exactly what the Court of Appeals warned against: Immediately break the Checks and Balances of the Constitution and basically be a suicide note ending any judicial power of the Supreme Court itself.

You might think even the Far Right Justices would recoil from the reality that granting trump that Absolute Immunity would be the end of their own power of Judicial Review. But remember, those Justices believe it is not only possible under Unitary Executive rules, but necessary. They agree with the idea of a dictator in the Oval Office just as long as it's a conservative standard bearer seizing all that power. It may destroy the Constitutional order we've all lived with for 230-plus years, but it'll give them the excuse to rebuild their conservative utopia on those ashes.

We now are facing the real and serious reality that at least five Justices - Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett (with Roberts being the only conservative who might balk at the destruction of his own jurist legacy) - will try to find a way to give trump the "Get Out of Jail Free" card that Absolute Immunity could give him.

The logical argument that would deter such a ruling - that by agreeing Presidential Absolute Immunity exists, the Supreme Court may be giving current President Joe Biden a literal license to overthrow government himself - ignores the fact that the Republican-backed Justices have twisted rulings and precedent in previous decisions in order to carve out narrow rulings to benefit only a select few. Don't put it past the Far Right Justices to come up with a legal argument that grants that immunity to trump alone. Even though our entire legal system is supposed to be based on "equality before the law" as a rule.

The Far Right may also be gambling on the possibility that even granted this weapon, Biden's own personal nature would prevent him from wielding it as he sits in the White House right now. But don't count on that. Biden may have no choice but to use such absolute power if it comes to it. He's got solid evidence right now that trump and the Republicans are colluding with a hostile foreign power - Russia - to subvert the 2024 elections, and his own intelligence agencies could be telling him by October the only way to save the United States is to declare emergency powers and arrest everybody in the GOP from trump on down. Granted, that move will trigger an open and bloody civil war, but the alternative would be to risk the likelihood that trump and his wingnut allies will sabotage the Electoral College count one way or another. And then trump gets to be dictator on Day One, and the Constitution dies for good.

Sanity and common sense tells us no one person should hold such absolute power: Not in politics, not in religion, not in law, not in life. But we're not living in sane times, are we. Not since 2015 when trump upturned everything this nation was supposed to stand for.

I'd been trying to calm other people down over the last few years, people at work and people I know online, trying to get them to hope that the worst can't happen.

Tonight, I am panicking in a way I haven't felt since that terrible night back on November 9 2016.

I am honest-to-God worried now that the worst CAN happen. That trump will evade justice for his crimes altogether. And that he'll lie and cheat his way back into a White House he will NEVER give up again.

Even exhorting every American out there to get the vote out this election cycle - which we need to do, anything we can to make it clear the majority of us DO NOT WANT trump BACK IN POWER - doesn't feel like it'll be enough.

Fuck it. We're going to fight. 

Stop trump. That's the mission now. Just fucking STOP trump.