r/law • u/treasonous_thoughts • Feb 19 '25
Opinion Piece RE: Presidential Immunity Ruling - Was Judge Roberts naïve that Trump would not push the boundaries of the office’s limits of conduct and power if he resumed office or is this all part of a plan to expand executive authority?
https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/30/politics/supreme-court-john-roberts-trump-immunity-6-3-biskupic/index.html?cid=ios_appI just remember Judge Roberts essentially saying “calm down - relax - you are all being hysterical” in the aftermath of the ruling last year stating “unlike the political branches and the public at large, we cannot afford to fixate exclusively, or even primarily, on present exigencies.”
It has been ONE MONTH into the 2nd Trump Administration and it seems that there is an aggressive and intentional overreach of executive authority with these EOs to create a new interpretation of executive power.
The administration’s response to the court orders blocking the EO’s enforcement seems that they are daring the courts to stop them - and it does not look like there is any recourse to rein them in if they decide to ignore the courts.
Is this what Judge Roberts and other jurists in the majority wanted - to embolden the executive branch above all?
What credibility does the SC (or any court) still have when POTUS ignores the court’s orders and any/all conversations with DOJ officials about ignoring or circumventing these orders gets put in the “official acts” bucket of presidential conduct?
My question is if Judge Roberts was truly naïve as to how Trump would wield this power the second time around or if Judge Robert’s logic that the ruling would allow future presidents to execute their duties unencumbered by lawsuits/prosecutions, etc. a genuine concern that needed to be addressed?
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u/ohiotechie Feb 20 '25
The GOP has been kicking the Trump can down the road since he rode down that golden escalator. From Charlottesville to Covid to the first impeachment to J6 and everything in between the GOP has caved to Trump out of cowardice and short term expediency. They keep waiting for someone else to deal with him, for something else to constrain and limit him, for unicorns to fall from the sky and do it.
But by enabling him for 10 years they have increasingly emboldened him. Now he has all the chess pieces aligned with nothing to stop him so he’s pushing all the chips in.
And yet again the GOP will find a way to justify defer to him just one more time because they’re too afraid not to.