The Justices have no robes on. They are naked and robeless.
Ok, you guys don’t have to pretend anymore. You don’t have to hide behind your high-sounding legal theories and “hypotheticals.” And mostly, you can’t hide any longer behind your flowing black robes that give you austere authority and status. They are gone!
Some of the Justices on the Supreme Court are overtly pro-Trump as can be seen in the line of questioning in the former President’s arguments last week for total, complete, and absolute immunity (in other words: kingship). It has revealed the Justice’s true intent and purpose. Your robes are gone in the same way that “an emperor has no clothes.”
Justices Alito, Thomas, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and even Barrett…we can now see your motives and alliances. You are not impartial and scholarly jurists free of the influence of politics that you have tried to convince us you are. It is now clear with 20-20 hindsight and complete transparency, that you are cronies, hacks, and political operatives for Donald Trump and the MAGA movement.
Do you need examples?
Your so-called “vetting” before congressional hearings was, as we suspected, a sham and a joke. You lied, or in legal terms, perjured yourselves, with straight faces and with tongue in cheek. You told us you were non-ideological and impartial, but you weren’t…not even close.
Of course, we suspected this when you all announced your judicial commitment to legal precedent and law for abortion-care rights, and then summarily overturned Roe v. Wade at the first chance that came to your docket.
Most open-eyed and critically thinking citizens could see your subterfuge without any obstruction. The fact that you were all on the Federalist Society’s shortlist for the high court was a dead give-away. We knew what you would do when given the opportunity to overturn the bodily autonomy and legal rights of 50% of the population of the United States.
Yet you lied in public with a straight face, thinking you could fool the American people. No coherent-thinking citizen believed for a New York second that you would uphold a woman’s right to bodily autonomy. And you didn’t. You didn’t fool anyone.
But now, you have publicly displayed your true allegiance and devotion. You are beholden to not only a religious ideological political movement set on overturning the Constitutional provisions of the separation of church and state, but you are also indebted and beholden to a fraudster, rapist, and insurrectionist former President.
The question before you was simple…does a President have absolute immunity from any crimes they may have committed while serving as the Chief Executive? Specifically, can a President commit fraud, stop the peaceful transfer of power, conspire to put forward false electors in a state, and incite violence? It is a narrow case and the answer isn’t difficult.
But what did they do? The aforementioned Justices began a line of questioning that circumvented the issue before them that was staring them in the face and began to wander into hypotheticals and future possibilities. What if “this” and what if “that?” They went to every fanciful place they could go except the one place that they were required to go…the culpability of Donald J. Trump. Trump’s name was hardly mentioned.
The Court of Appeals did the right thing. They stayed with the pertinent question, and their answer was an unequivocal, NO! Donald Trump does not have immunity from prosecution for trying to overturn a lawful and secure election and his case should go to trial.
The answer is obvious when you consider that there is no prior experience in our history when an outgoing President tried to overturn the results. No clause in the Constitution allows the Chief Executive, whose major job is to see that laws are faithfully executed, to be able to violate those same laws. The complete immunity of an executive is why we fought a war for independence as a nation.
This is no small matter since the election is now only six months away and Mr. Trump is the likely Republican nominee for the highest office. Doesn’t it make sense to expedite this case quickly, rule on it fairly and impartially, and answer the immediate question? Should we be allowing a man criminally charged with trying to overturn an election the opportunity to run again? Federal charges are pending against candidate Trump, and yet, the Justices, who have no robes on, delayed the hearing on this case for two months.
By entering the twilight zone of questioning, it is clear that the Trump Justices (the only way to describe them) will be kicking this case back to the lower courts to sort through what is an “official act” and what is a “private act” by a President. Which ones can be prosecuted, and which ones have immunity? It is the judicial equivalent and arguing over how many angels can dance on the end of a pin.
The result of this dancing and weaving and dodging will be a delay in the Jack Smith case pushing it beyond the election. That is the goal, and that is the point. These Justices have no interest in seeing the Smith case go to trial. They are playing like an offensive front line for the former President, blocking all legal jeopardy for Trump.
It isn’t that the Court can’t act swiftly…when it wants to. Remember the Colorado case disqualification of Trump on the ballot in that state? On December 19, 2023, the Colorado Supreme Court voted 4-3 to bar Trump from the Colorado primary election coming up in March. Trump appealed the case to the Supreme Court on January 4th.
As fast as Mike Johnson can adjourn Congress when he doesn’t want to vote on a bill, the Supreme Court picked up Trump’s appeal and by March 4th they had made their decision. The justices determined that only Congress could enforce the constitutional provision against federal officeholders and candidates based on the 14th Amendment. Never mind that the conservative Justices, who have no robes on, are rabidly committed to state’s rights as in the Dobbs decision; this was for the Donald…move swiftly, protect his MAGA movement, and rule in his favor. The decision came down in Trump’s favor the day before Super Tuesday and the Colorado primary.
So, the Supreme Court knows and understands timelines and deadlines. What had become laughably clear is that they will use those timelines and deadlines to favor Trump and his movement. It isn’t a secret anymore. With a case that should never have been heard by the highest court in the land because of the ludicrous arguments being made by a former President, we are now faced with the likelihood that an indicted felon will be running for President this fall. And should he somehow win, with the disrobed Justices on his side, there will be no limit to Presidential power. Our system of government as we have known it and seen it work (or not work) over the centuries, will be gone.
The Supreme Court of the United States will have finally succumbed to fealty to the Executive branch of the government. Independent jurisprudence will be gone, and the Court will be providing supposed legal justification for more unlawful acts committed by a President.
The Supreme Court is dead….RIP!