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Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer will introduce legislation Thursday reaffirming that presidents do not have immunity for criminal actions, an attempt to reverse the Supreme Court’s landmark decision last month.
Schumer’s No Kings Act would attempt to invalidate the decision by declaring that presidents are not immune from criminal law and clarifying that Congress, not the Supreme Court, determines to whom federal criminal law is applied.
The court’s conservative majority decided July 1 that presidents have broad immunity from criminal prosecution for actions taken within their official duties — a decision that threw into doubt the Justice Department’s case against Republican former President Donald Trump for his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss.
Schumer, of New York, said that Congress has an obligation and the constitutional authority to check the Supreme Court on its decision.
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Who could possibly vote against not having a king? I’ll go get my surprised face ready.
The democrats after the GOP add a whole ton of riders to it to make it a poison pill.
Thanks, I realize now that in my rush to be humorously cynical, I was actually understating how bad things are.
Soon to be named the “No Kings, Queers, Trans, Ukraine Aid, Unmarried Women, No-Fault Divorce, JD Vance Couch-Fucking Jokes, And We Were Just Kidding About The No Kings Thing” Act.
Renamed ‘the inclusion act’ or some reversal drivel like citizens United or other similar
Bold of you to assume this makes it out of committee
What, you want us to have a king? (Or federal mandatory ten commandments posted in schools, birth control to be made illegal, and an MPAA surveillance program to be required for every PC?)
Only one yes or no, please.
Yeah, and who could vote against being a Patriot? Man, that Patriot act sure did wonders.
Brilliantly stated.
Who could possibly vote against not having a king?
Besides a king?
You may be making a joke, I’m not sure, but, in case you’re not, this line of thinking is often used by governments to push through legislation whose content would otherwise be objectionable. It’s akin to just reading the headline of a news article without reading its content. An example could be something like “The Patriot Act”: “Who could possibly vote against patriotism at a time like this?” — look at its content. One could also look at the COVID relief bills and notice just how much content has absolutely nothing to do with COVID relief. The names of legislative bills are manufactured for the very purpose of appealing to one’s emotions and to distract from objectionable content.
My humor can be awkwardly multifaceted. I know the internet likes jokes to be obvious, but I have found this difficult.
I still think the correct response to that would have been Biden unilaterally ordering the arrest of the supreme court, citing the immunity they had just granted him. Then asking if maybe they would like to change their mind and not actually arresting them
No, not arrest. He should issue an executive order stating that all their property be seized using eminent domain. Of course he should do that while they’re in session and then immediately send Federal Marshals to go and change all the locks on all the properties and secure their contents and tow all their vehicles. He can then sell all of it at auction to pay for programs providing broadband and health care for poor people
When all the uproar starts over that, he should then close the Supreme Court building and put it up for sale for the same purpose, then rent a space in a D.C. strip-mall for SCOTUS to use as office space and to hold hearings in. You know, treat them with the respect they deserve.
I don’t think the Marshals have enough manpower to seize all of Thomas’s “totes not bribes they’re just gifts bro!”
Then burn it.
The problem with this ruling was that they left “official act” incredibly vague, giving the SC the power in determining legitimate acts that are immune
People keep saying Biden should just order a drone strike on the justices or his opponent but the next court could just be like ‘nope, not allowed’ and throw him in jail
They really need to clarify it so that the SC can’t legislate from the bench
left “official act” incredibly vague, giving the SC the power in determining legitimate acts that are immune
For the last few decades conservatives have been building a SCOTUS with the sole intent of centralizing as much power as possible within them as they aren’t elected and have lifetime positions. They go for the youngest heritage foundation choices so they can retain that power for as long as possible.
Chevron Deference is another perfect example of a power grab by the corrupt SCOTUS.
The problem with this ruling was that they left “official act” incredibly vague, giving the SC the power in determining legitimate acts that are immune
But if they were arrested they wouldn’t be able to rule against Biden. 🤔
The next seated judges would.
Even if they did, so what? Good, even!
As long as the fascists are removed from the Court, the job is done.
Sure, but it increases the volatility and partisan nature of the court
I don’t think SC reform is optional, nor do I think executive immunity is a solution. A fun one-time trick to make a point isn’t going to fix the systemic issues of the court or legislature.
Edit: a huge symptom of the dysfunction of the federal government is the power that’s accumulating into the executive. ‘You can do whatever you want so long as the court happens to agree with you’ is just shit politics.
I’m not really sold on constitutionalism, but the least we could do is make it democratic.
Appoint every adult in America to the Supreme Court and let the majority decide what the Constitution means. 🤷♀️
Keep arresting them.
That seems like a colossally stupid thing to do.
Why? Biden’s immune and a lame duck, especially after the election.
It would give them ammo for all the crap they’ve been saying about him from the beginning. And as much as it sucks, what the president does will affect what happens in November. Doesn’t happen in a vacuum.
Well, the Supreme Court has become colossally stupid, so it’s appropriate. It’s simply malicious compliance.
It is apparently necessary to show the real world implications in practice for people to understand.
Just to be clear, in England/the UK, at least, kings were established as not being above the law by the Magna Carta and when Charles I tried to dispute that they cut his head off. The powers that SCOTUS is giving to the President go well beyond the ones given to the monarchy that most Americans are familiar with.
“Does no one remember Magna Carta? Did she die in vain?”
But seriously, it’s one of the most interesting and important documents in Western history.
I need to know this reference.
It’s the vibe of the thing.
Nae king! Nae quin! Nae laird! Nae master! We willna’ be fooled again!
nae lard
Well I guess Trump is out then.
Nac Mac Feegle, wahey!
*Nac Mac, but aye!
You might not have heard of us. We’re from the, er, other mountain, over yonder way.
(Edited.)
I can’t thank you enough for sharing! I have a hare through flame tattoo and the Tiffany Aching series is my favourite series within my favourite series and I have never heard this album before.
This is a rather slow response from me, but I’m glad that you clicked blindly on my Spotify link and were rewarded 😊 I’d recommend the live concert DVD as well - with a guest appearance by a certain behatted author who came out to see his favourite band play an album based on his books. And frankly from there I’d recommend everything Steeleye Span have ever recorded.
Certainly not going to pass (1) as long as there is a filibuster in the Senate and (2) as long as Republicans control the House.
Of course even if it does pass someday, what does anyone think the odds are that there would be 5 votes on the current SCOTUS to uphold it?
But I’m all for making Republicans block it.
it’s to make republicans unambiguously invalidate their own “we don’t want a dictatorship” claims
They don’t want a dictatorship? I pretty much thought they’ve been staying they want their dictatorship.
And what does that accomplish?
trump is already telling his followers to elect him and never have to vote again. project 2025 is a similar shitfest.
This is the usual Democrat “we care about decorum”. It doesn’t impact the base of either party. And the “independent” voters aren’t actually all that independent and either already realize “Holy shit, this matters” or “Whatever. Douche and a turd sandwich”.
it seems like nothing accomplishes anything anymore: impeachments, convictions, even his own constant unintentional self sabotage doesn’t sink him
doesn’t mean anyone should stop trying
There are very clear options that are outright supported by the supreme court. Just like we had opportunities in the past to reinforce Roe v Wade or to replace supreme court justices before they died of old age.
But, instead, we do these futile efforts to sound good in the hopes that politicians can bank enough cash before the republican firing squad comes for them.
It allows Democrats to run adds showing the middle-of-the-road, undecided voters what they’re going to get if they keep letting Republicans get elected. Those are the votes that we need to strive for. You will never convert Trump’s cult followers. It’s the independent voters that can save this nation but we have to get their attention and show them that what’s happening is not normal.
But I’m all for making Republicans block it.
They just blocked the moonshot program to find a cure for cancer.
There is nothing that is blow them as they have massive propaganda outlets to give them cover. Only the conservatives who look outside their propaganda bubble will even understand what happened.
(I fully realize they see “us” in the exact same way.)
What’s the actual rationale though?
For the cancer research, it was ostensibly too expensive. But what is the excuse now?
For the record, while I wholeheartedly agree with the principles behind this, this has to be handled with a Constitutional Amendment. Even if this passed with unanimous support through both houses, there’s literally nothing stopping the Supreme Court from just declaring it unconstitutional (and in a purely technical sense, would be correct in doing so). Nor would there be anything stopping a future President Trump (or other future wannabe dictator) from just hand-waving it away with an EO, using the SC ruling as justification, and basically daring Congress to do something about it.
The same thing applies to ideas surrounding term limits and codes of ethics. It has to be done through a Constitutional amendment. I believe Biden even acknowledged this. And that’s where the problem lies. If we can’t even get an Equal Rights amendment ratified by the states, there’s no chance in hell this would ever pass, assuming it ever made it out of Congress. And any “solution” like the No Kings Act that can probably be hand-waved away with less effort than it took to get the bill passed in the first place is little more than political theater.
Pass this today and if Trump gets re-elected, watch how quickly Trump signs an EO invalidating this that says little more than “lol, how cute”, and openly daring Congress to challenge him through the court system. The Supreme Court would hold his coronation in the courtroom.
For starters, someone would have to prove standing to have a case. And this law only targets the Office of the Presidency, so only a President could challenge it. However, since we’re wishing for the Dems to play hardball, Article 3 Section 2 of the Constitution says this:
In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make.
Congress could literally pass a law limiting the powers of the Presidency, and also declaring that SCOTUS doesn’t have the jurisdiction to hear any cases regarding it. Congress could also create a whole other court system solely to handle challenges to Presidential authority and there’s nothing SCOTUS could legally do to stop it. (Not that Roberts’ corrupt Court cares much about the law, but still.)
If the Dems can’t get SCOTUS reform to course-correct soon enough, then jurisdictional stripping should be the name of the game.
For starters, someone would have to prove standing to have a case. And this law only targets the Office of the Presidency, so only a President could challenge it.
And if Donald Trump or a future wannabe-dictator gets elected, they’d have the exact standing needed to make such a challenge.
However, since we’re wishing for the Dems to play hardball, Article 3 Section of the Constitution says this:
In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make.
The Supreme Court usurped that power for themselves in (I belive) 1803 and hasn’t been challenged in 200+ years. Since then, if the SC makes a ruling, Congress has historically said “aw, shucks”, and that’s the end of it. At most, you’d put both branches of government into a conflicting “You’ve made your ruling, now let’s see you enforce it” scenario which would bring us dangerously close to civil war.
Also, how would it work out? Trump gets into office and wipes his ass with the “No Kings Act”. Do you honestly think for half a second that Congress is going to impeach, convict, and remove him any time soon? Because if so, I’ve got a whole lot of beachfront property on Mars that you may be interested in. The only other way would be…through the court system. Which would end up at…the exact Supreme Court, the exact same six judges that just gave him those powers in the first place. I’ll let you sit there and think over how that would ultimately end.
Or, the SC could go the “malicious compliance” route. They let the NKA stand, knowing full well Trump is going to ignore it anyway, and knowing impeachment and removal is nigh on impossible in today’s political climate. So Congress tries to sue and gets “well golly gee darn, you just got finished telling us we can’t interfere. So he’s your problem now. Good luck.” Now what?
Or later in the future. 10 years, 20 years from now and the SC somehow gets rebalanced into something legitimate. Except now it’s congress that are openly corrupt. Do we really want a situation where our SC would be able to do exactly nothing as a corrupt congress runs roughshod and starts further narrowing the oversight of a non-corrupt SC while passing more draconian legislation? It becomes a situation of being careful of what you wish for. You might get it.
Congress could literally pass a law limiting the powers of the Presidency, and also declaring that SCOTUS doesn’t have the jurisdiction to hear any cases regarding it. Congress could also create a whole other court system solely to handle challenges to Presidential authority and there’s nothing SCOTUS could legally do to stop it. (Not that Roberts’ corrupt Court cares much about the law, but still.)
Good luck getting the general public to accept that there’s literally a completely different legal system for some people and not others. I don’t care who it is or what the purpose of this secondary court system should be, you will (and should) never get the general public to accept setting up a secondary court system just because some people don’t like the rulings of the primary one.
Would you consider a secondary court system headed by Aileen Cannon as the Trump-appointed “New Supreme Court” head judge legitimate? Of course not. The same applies in the other direction. The idea is absurd on its face and turns our justice system into a glorified game of Calvinball.
We could do what’s right and help voters because it’s the right thing to do, and maybe they’ll be excited to continue to vote against Republicans because we can deliver.
Or we can continue to be cowards, afraid to do anything because the GOP somehow won’t be assholes if we don’t?
You’re completely misunderstanding the point. It isn’t about what’s right; the principles behind the NKA are without a doubt the right principles. But it’s about what actually accomplishes something.
Passing a law that has absolutely no chance of actually having an effect (because a future president Trump could just hand-wave it away with an EO or file a suit to bring it up to the Supreme Court which will immediately strike it down) isn’t “doing what’s right”. It’s political theater. It’s making people believe you’re doing something when you damn well know what you’re doing will have no real world impact at all.
That is where I have the problem. Engaging in feel-good political stunts that have 0% chance of having an effect, then saying “well, shucks, we tried” when it inevitably fails isn’t “doing what’s right”.
And no, I’m not saying to capitulate to the GOP. We’ve already seen what that gets. I’m just saying that this entire idea is useless because the next GOP president (Trump or whoever the next wannabe-autocrat is) will (Not might. Will.) do exactly one of two things on the first day in office.
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Issue an Executive Order nullifying the No Kings Act, based on the Supreme Court ruling on Presidential Immunity, and then all but daring Congress to either impeach him or sue through the court system, which will end up in front of the exact same Supreme Court that gave themselves and Trump those powers in the first place, who will probably invalidate the NKA at warp speed.
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File a lawsuit himself to ask the Supreme Court to strike the law down, and since they were the ones to grant Trump that power in the first place, they are almost guaranteed to oblige.
That’s it. If Trump gets elected and one of those things doesn’t happen within the first week if not day, I will personally post a video of me cutting off the left body part of your choice. Without the backing of being a constitutional amendment, any NKA-type of legislation is toothless and all-but-unenforceable political theater.
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The situation is more dire than a constitutional amendment.
I first wondered why this was downvoted. Seems likely it’s because the post links to a site called american-doom.com. I don’t know anything about the site except that the name isn’t helping their credibility.
The Rolling Stone article this was guy investigated with.
Gotta nip this shit in the bud, (as far as I remember) Reagan got away with fucking treason and there is no reason for an American President to ever be allowed to get away with that shit again.
I know this is mostly for show, but how strong is the Constitutional argument being made? I can’t think of another example of Congress attempting to limit the authority of the Supreme Court via legislation. Can it be done at all without triggering a Constitutional crisis?
Yes. The supreme court exists to interpret unclear parts of legislation. If you make a constitutional amendment that says “you cannot do X”, it is outside of their authority to say “actually, you can do X”. Not that that’s stopped them before…
AFAIK if it were normal legislation the SC could rule it unconstitutional. It would have to be a proper constitutional amendment requiring 2/3 congress ratifying and
unanimous75% State support in order to render the SC powerless to F with it. Even then, SC could probably F with its interpretation to the point it is toothless. Please correct me if I’m wrong because I hope I am.Edit: 75% State support (thanks for not letting me down)
Not unanimous state support, 75%
Which is still basically impossible right now
3/4s of states need to ratify. So 38 state legislatures need to agree.
If you look into the history of the court, most of the Supreme Courts power today is something it’s just been “allowed” to claim and has been institutionalized over time. Knocking them down a peg is doable on paper, it would just be crazy contentious since the GOP likes the current status quo.
The constitution doesn’t even give the supreme court the power to declare things unconstitutional. They just decided to do that early on and everyone went along with it.
Suppose the court does declare such a law unconstitutional. Imagine how it would look. Yes, such a law might not be the end of things, but if it was declared unconstitutional it would be a clear call for hobbling the court, because it would demonstrate they’re corrupt.
it would demonstrate they’re corrupt
I think all the corruption already demonstrate that.
The SC is fully captured by the far right, they’re already throwing away pieces of democracy to save trump, they’re past caring about open corruption.
You don’t need to convince me. I’m talking about gathering critical support for something like a constitutional amendment. Nothing wrong with passing a bill first. Amendments are hard.
It would add further pressure on top of all the previous examples of open corruption, for sure.
Remember you need two thirds of both chambers to pass an amendment, followed by three fourths of states. In our current environment that’s nearly impossible. We should be throwing everything at the wall, and if one thing is rejected, that may sway people who haven’t been tuned in, which could be crucial in applying further action.
There’s also value in doing fucking anything. Why should people support a party that won’t fight for what’s important? I refuse to just complain, or to accept hopelessness. I expect that something will be done, and I’m going to vote and act accordingly.
The courts are only supposed to interpret laws, not make them. Every time Congress passes a new law (assuming it’s constitutional) they limit the power of the courts by constraining the interpretations the courts can make. Saying the President is not above the law doesn’t limit the power of the courts in any way that isn’t totally routine.
No Kings Act
Title of the Act points to a loophole.
Or just the one king.
*or Queens
Especially not them! /s
Wish they named it no gods, no masters act.
“No kings” is pithier, and doesn’t bring in any religious element to distract the issue.
Nah. Liberals know how they can earn the right, they made their decision.
He could have named it “Sic Semper SCOTUS.”
This is gorgeous.
The whole purpose of separation of powers into executive, legislative, and judicial branches is to prevent consolidation of power. It is supposed to be like the 3-way standoff from the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.
I think the root problem here is that a justice shouldn’t be allowed to serve until after the president who nominated them is out of office, and if they would be otherwise eligible for another term, would no longer be permitted to run for the presidency while the justice is serving on the court. This would also cut-down on the issue of lifetime appointments by shortening their appointments by 4-8 years.
That and the President obviously shouldn’t have immunity from the law.
What happens with the vacancy on the court while we are waiting for the president to leave office? It gives the legislature plenty of time to argue about the appointment, which they will do anyways.
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