Upcoming Supreme Court Cases

1. 91

   IslandBitesposted 17 months ago

   The Supreme Court’s biggest decisions of the term are coming. I thought it'll be good to have one thread, kind of a tracker of the upcoming decisions.
   
   The high court has 10 opinions left to release over the next week before the justices begin their summer break.

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2. 91

   IslandBitesposted 17 months ago

   Supreme Court justices rule state lawmakers do not have exclusive control over elections in key decision
   
   In a 6-3 opinion authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, the high court ruled that the Elections Clause of Article 1 of the U.S. Constitution "does not insulate state legislatures from the ordinary exercise of state judicial review."
   
   Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh, Amy Coney Barrett and Ketanji Brown Jackson were in the majority. Justice Clarence Thomas dissented, in which Justice Neil Gorsuch and Samuel Alito joined.
   
   "State courts retain the authority to apply state constitutional restraints when legislatures act under the power conferred upon them by the Elections Clause," Roberts wrote.
   
   "But federal courts must not abandon their own duty to exercise judicial review. In interpreting state law in this area, state courts may not so exceed the bounds of ordinary judicial review as to unconstitutionally intrude upon the role specifically reserved to state legislatures by Article I, Section 4, of the Federal Constitution," the majority opinion states.
   
   https://www.foxnews.com/politics/justic … y-decision
   
   https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/suprem … -rcna68630

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3. 73

   Kathleen Cochranposted 17 months ago

   Thank you for doing this work or the rest of us?

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4. 79

   Credence2posted 17 months ago

   "The majority opinion, which united the court’s three liberals with Chief Justice John Roberts and two conservative justices, preserves the ability for state courts to hear partisan gerrymandering lawsuits in congressional redistricting and review other federal election rules set by state legislatures."
   
   In its most extreme form, the Independent State Legislature Theory could have weakened the foundation of our democracy, removing a crucial check on state legislatures and making it easier for rogue legislators to enact policies that suppress voters and subvert elections without adequate oversight from state court. We are incredibly relieved that the Supreme Court decisively rejected this dangerous theory.”
   
   
   
   --------
   
   So, am I,
   
   This is great news, this will keep partisan legislatures from having a failsafe control over the voting process within their respective states. Which again supports my view that no one entity may be free from oversight and being held accountable,
   
   As I suspect, the conservatives would be the most upset at this ruling, it figures.....
   
   Do the dissenting justices have a leg to stand on?

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5. 91

   IslandBitesposted 17 months ago

   Supreme Court strikes down affirmative action programs at Harvard and UNC
   
   The ruling is the culmination of a decades-long effort to end the consideration of race in admissions.
   
   The court’s six conservative justices invalidated Harvard’s and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s (UNC) admissions policies by ruling they did not comply with the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection.
   
   The court ruled that both programs violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution and are therefore unlawful. The vote was 6-3 in the UNC case and 6-2 in the Harvard case, in which liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was recused.
   
   The court effectively overturned the 2003 ruling Grutter v. Bollinger, in which the court said race could be considered as a factor in the admissions process because universities had a compelling interest in maintaining diverse campuses. In doing so the court scrapped decades of precedent including one ruling dating to 1978 that upheld a limited consideration of race in university admissions as a way to combat historic discrimination against Black people and other minorities.

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6. 91

   IslandBitesposted 17 months ago

   Supreme Court hands religious freedom win to postal worker who refused to work on Sunday
   
   Gerald Groff, a Christian mailman, said USPS should have accommodated his religious beliefs about work on Sundays
   
   The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled unanimously for a postal worker in Pennsylvania in an important religious liberty dispute, over how far employers should go to accommodate faith-based requests in the workplace.
   
   Gerald Groff, a Christian mail carrier, from Pennsylvania, asked the court to decide if U.S. Postal Service could require him to deliver Amazon packages on Sundays, which he observes as the Sabbath. His attorney, Aaron Streett, argued in April that the court should revisit a 50-year-old precedent that established a test to determine when employers should make accommodations for their employees' religious practices.
   
   In ruling for the government worker, the high court overturned its 1977 precedent that said employers had to "reasonably accommodate" an employee's religious beliefs and practices, so long as it did not create an "undue hardship" on the business.

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   1. 85

      Sharlee01posted 17 months agoin reply to this

      Yeah!

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7. 79

   Credence2posted 17 months ago

   As for the Affirmative Action ruling, I sort of knew that with this court the actual outcome was expected.
   
   But,
   
   In a dissenting opinion, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote that deeming race irrelevant in law does not make it irrelevant in reality.
   
   "And having so detached itself from this country’s actual past and present experiences, the court has now been lured into interfering with the crucial work that UNC and other institutions of higher learning are do- ing to solve America’s real-world problems."
   
   I still stand by this.....

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   1. 91

      IslandBitesposted 17 months agoin reply to this

      Yes. This was Sonia Sotomayor.
      
      “In so holding, the Court cements a superficial rule of colorblindness as a constitutional principle in an endemically segregated society where race has always mattered and continues to matter,” Sotomayor said in the 69-page dissent.
      
      “The Court subverts the constitutional guarantee of equal protection by further entrenching racial inequality in education, the very foundation of our democratic government and pluralistic society,” she added.
      
      The liberal justice slammed the majority’s use of the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision in their ruling, describing it as “nothing but revisionist history” and an “affront” to the legacy of the late Justice Thurgood Marshall, who argued the case before the Supreme Court.
      
      Sotomayor added that the ruling’s interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment is “grounded in the illusion that racial inequality was a problem of a different generation.”
      
      “Entrenched racial inequality remains a reality today,” Sotomayor said. “That is true for society writ large and, more specifically, for Harvard and the University of North Carolina (UNC), two institutions with a long history of racial exclusion.”
      
      “Ignoring race will not equalize a society that is racially unequal,” she continued. “What was true in the 1860s, and again in 1954, is true today: Equality requires acknowledgment of inequality.”

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      1. 79

         Credence2posted 17 months agoin reply to this

         "Equality requires acknowledgement of inequality"
         
         How appropriate, what other yardstick is there that can measure this?
         
         Oftentimes what appears to be equal is not always fair.....

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         1. 95

            Readmikenowposted 17 months agoin reply to this

            So, now Asian students who have superior academic achievement will now be able to get into top-tiered colleges where they belong.  Asians are the wealthiest segment of American society and the best academically. 
            
            Maybe we should respect this work and academic talent. We shouldn't look at race but only ability.  Admission should be color blind.

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            1. 79

               Credence2posted 17 months agoin reply to this

               But, i would like to see the concept of "legacy" taken away as an advantageous circumstance for admission.
               
               White folks will start howling as Asians take more coveted admission spots, merit or no, because with them it is more about control and power within the broader society.
               
               How does Uncle Clerance explain the exception, the contradiction, where he himself admits that affirmative action opened a door that would have remain shut, otherwise?

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               1. 95

                  Readmikenowposted 17 months agoin reply to this

                  "White folks will start howling as Asians take more coveted admission spots, merit or no, because with them it is more about control and power within the broader society."
                  
                  I don't think you could be more wrong. If an Asian student is admitted to a college or university because they were the best in regards to test scores, academic achievement, etc. They would be applauded. They are considered an inspiration. Their success would be something to be examined and replicated.
                  
                  The problem is that Affirmative Action throws test scores and academic achievement out of the window.  It lets people less qualified into top tier schools based on nothing but their skin color, and that is wrong.  There should be one standard that applies to everyone without consideration for race. 
                  
                  If affirmative action is so good, I suggest we apply it to sports so the NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB all have make ups of their teams that better represent the  racial make up of the country.
                  
                  I don't know why this doesn't happen.

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            2. 79

               Credence2posted 17 months agoin reply to this

               I understand your point, and I do respect their achievement. Ability is a by product of opportunity to attain it, are we respecting that?

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         2. 82

            GA Andersonposted 17 months agoin reply to this

            Yep, that has to be the starting point. The 'whys' come next and then the 'what to dos.'  That's reality. You can't fix something without understanding what needs to be fixed.
            
            But, there is another piece of reality (get ready, it's a [C]onservative mantra, one of your 'cheap suits') that is also a starting point. How many addendums does it take to rationalize using discrimination to combat discrimination as a solution?
            
            Now, take a breath. That isn't thrown down as a challenge. The illogic of the solution doesn't seem to leave room for a constitutional challenge, so the only rationalizations must be ideological ones. And that's what I'm hearing from the critics of the Court's ruling.
            
            Is there an argument that this wrong (discrimination) is right — because of the 'cause,' or, is this action of unequal treatment not discrimination?
            
            GA

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            1. 79

               Credence2posted 17 months agoin reply to this

               Yeah, GA, it is a good starting point.
               
               Why: is that if America wishes to operate consistent with its creed , it would be necessary. Also on a larger scale, continued and intense inequity will undermine the security and cohesiveness of our society, if there is enough discontent from enough people.
               
               
               What to do? I am opposed to reparations, the scale that would need to be given to blacks would bankrupt the economy. Some of the ideas like relieving educational costs for the poor without even specifying blacks specifically might be a path I would go on. So, even though I am short on specifics I am reasonable, but this problem has to be acknowledged.
               
               In the beginning as late as 1970 it was not to hard to see that in a society with stark racism, people were being unfairly held back. The truth is that the color blind thing is a myth, the course that this country has taken since inception ensured that. We all know what systemic racism is and how when practiced by government sanctioned entities for so long can lead to generational disadvantages suffered to the recipients through no fault of their own.
               
               As I mentioned before, Affirmative Action is hard to defend when in theory we all should be evaluated on the same standards. But do we all have the same opportunities to attain to those standards? I read that in Texas there is a provision where any student in the upper 10 percent of his class from any high school within the state is eligible for Admission to Texas State Universities. These are the sort of compromises i like which allows for the fact  that we are not all priveliged to go to exclusive acedemies with the finest professors and up to date equipment. Even the people in more rural West and North Texas, farmers, expressed the same concerns minorities did for the same reasons. Thus, the idea was put into law. I will work with the compromise, even if Affirmative Action disappears.
               
               Avoiding a caste like society, where Thurston Howell and his son, Wentworth, are structurally set to have all the advantages. That is not earning by merit, but by preference and privilege.
               
               Discrimination is never right, but that assumes that we all have equal opportunity to achieve and from there the best and brightest comes to the top. That has not been true for most of this country's history. If you tie someone up from being able to compete in several laps of a marathon race, but now suddenly release them, is it really equal? Do we give them motorcycle to allow them an advantage in the ability to catch up?
               
               Conservatives like to point to flashes in the pan as evidence of progress in the race question. Look at Oprah, Colin Powell, Barack Obama, etc. I prefer to take a more substantive, comprehensive yardstick to determine levels of progress. For example, why is the household wealth of the average white family 10 to 15 times greater than that of black households? How can we all exist in the same country for so long and yet so stark an disparity exist? It may take a while, but when those stark numbers statistics modify, I can have more confidence in the idea of progress.

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               1. 82

                  GA Andersonposted 17 months agoin reply to this

                  It seems we agree that the Court's decision is correct — discrimination is wrong and unconstitutional.
                  
                  GA

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                  1. 79

                     Credence2posted 17 months agoin reply to this

                     Simply put and narrowly agreed to, yes

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8. 60

   Joiedevieposted 17 months ago

   Justice Sotomayor's dissent
   "Today is a sad day in American constitutional law and in the lives of LGBT people,” she wrote. “The Supreme Court of the United States declares that a particular kind of business, though open to the public, has a constitutional right to refuse to serve members of a protected class. The Court does so for the first time in its history. By issuing this new license to discriminate in a case brought by a company that seeks to deny same-sex couples the full and equal enjoyment of its services, the immediate, symbolic effect of the decision is to mark gays and lesbians for second-class status. In this way, the decision itself inflicts a kind of stigmatic harm, on top of any harm caused by denials of service. The opinion of the Court is, quite literally, a notice that reads: ‘Some services may be denied to same-sex couples.'”
   
   How long before we start seeing signs in Windows? " No blacks" "no Jews" 
   Allowing businesses to pick and choose who to serve under a free speech claim opens the door to widespread discrimination against many groups of people. Indeed a sad day. It sure does feel that factions in this country desperately want to drag us back centuries.
   Since when does religion excuse discrimination?
   This court has provided open season for all kinds of discrimination.

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   1. 91

      IslandBitesposted 17 months agoin reply to this

      ^This is about:
      
      Supreme Court rules in favor of Christian designer in gay wedding website case
      
      The Supreme Court ruled Friday that Colorado cannot require an evangelical Christian web designer to provide same-sex wedding websites.
      
      The court found that the state’s anti-discrimination law violates Lorie Smith’s free speech rights under the First Amendment by demanding she creates same-sex wedding websites if she wants to do so for opposite-sex unions. Smith argued the requirement violated her religious beliefs.

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      1. 60

         Joiedevieposted 17 months agoin reply to this

         This court is so politicized. The decision is not only bad for gay people who want to have a wedding website made in Colorado. But from a legal perspective, there is exactly zero difference between civil rights laws protecting gay people and laws protecting Black people. Under today’s decision, the web designer could have refused to make a website for an interracial or interfaith wedding.
         The Supreme Court has led the First Amendment further down the path to a disastrous conflict with civil rights.

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         1. 95

            Readmikenowposted 17 months agoin reply to this

            There is a big difference.  Black is a person's race.  Gay is a person's sex life.  You can change your sex life.  There are hundreds of people who leave the "gay" lifestyle every year.  If gay people want to get a wedding website, they simply go to a web designer who will make it. There are plenty of them in Colorado.

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            1. 79

               Credence2posted 17 months agoin reply to this

               I used to think that is was that simple "gays can change their sex life" but that has to be somewhat naive. Homosexuality has been around a long time and is not the "choice" conservatives say that it is.

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               1. 95

                  Readmikenowposted 17 months agoin reply to this

                  "Homosexuality has been around a long time and is not the "choice" conservatives say that it is."
                  
                  You are correct.  It is part of the human condition. Just like adulatory, alcohol abuse, etc. People have stopped being adulterers, quit addiction to alcohol and have left the gay lifestyle.  Michael Glatze started the organization Young Gay Americans.  Jan Clausen is a well-know writer who was married to a woman.  Actress Gillian Anderson as well as actress Anne Heche and hundreds of others left the gay lifestyle.
                  
                  What does that say?

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            2. 60

               Joiedevieposted 17 months agoin reply to this

               "Gay is a person's sex life.  You can change your sex life."
               
               Really? Should they have to? Should we force them to?
               The supreme Court opened the door to refuse services to gay people, who will be refused service next? The intolerance of some people in this country is truly breathtaking.
               The woman who brought this case leans into her christianity, her religion as the basis for her bigotry. She ignores a fundamental teaching of Jesus and that would be best described by this verse
               "There is only one lawgiver and judge, he who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?".  The hypocrisy of these people hiding behind religion is incredible.
               Please, if anyone has the story of Jesus shunning people let me know.

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               1. 95

                  Readmikenowposted 17 months agoin reply to this

                  There is the book in the Bible known as Leviticus.

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                     Joiedevieposted 17 months agoin reply to this

                     And what does it say about judging others over the authority of Jesus? The overall message of Leviticus is sanctification. The book communicates that receiving God's forgiveness and acceptance should be followed by holy living and spiritual growth. It says nothing about judgment and hatred for others.

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                     1. 95

                        Readmikenowposted 17 months agoin reply to this

                        I think you need to spend a bit more time studying the Bible. It is a very complex text. Maybe try learning the history of Leviticus and then reading the passages. Did you know this book is also found in the Jewish Torah? The entire old testament is taken from the Jewish Torah.  Remember Jesus was a devout Jew.  He believed in the Torah.  There is even a version of Leviticus in the Muslim Qur'an.

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                        1. 60

                           Joiedevieposted 17 months agoin reply to this

                           Scripture tells us we are not to judge. When we presume to judge those around us , God states He will use on us the same measurement of judgment we have used .  That's really  going to sting for many folks right here on this forum.

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                              GA Andersonposted 17 months agoin reply to this

                              More accurately . . .  for all of us here on this forum.
                              
                              GA

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                           2. 85

                              Sharlee01posted 17 months agoin reply to this

                              Not judging is in the scripture --- Although a sin may not be judged, it does not make that sin, not a sin. So, does it not come to reason one may not, and should not judge the sin of another, but one does have the right to not participate in the sin, or encourage the sin?   To step aside and not judge, but not become involved in something that Scripture clearly denotes as a sin.

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                                 Joiedevieeposted 17 months agoin reply to this

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                                 1. 95

                                    Readmikenowposted 17 months agoin reply to this

                                    You really need to put these scriptures into context.  It is so easy to simply cherry-pick a passage of the Bible here and a passage there that that on the surface of it. 
                                    
                                    It is important to put things into context, know the history of how the book was written, etc. 
                                    
                                    It is the difference between reading the Bible and actually understanding it.

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                           3. 95

                              Readmikenowposted 17 months agoin reply to this

                              It is a little more complicated.
                              
                              I suggest you read the Book of Leviticus.

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9. 91

   IslandBitesposted 17 months ago

   Supreme Court strikes down Biden’s student debt forgiveness plan
   
   The Supreme Court on Friday blocked the Biden administration’s student debt relief plan in a 6-3 decision, stopping more than 40 million borrowers from receiving loan forgiveness and delivering a major defeat to one of the president’s key campaign promises.
   
   Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for himself and his five conservative colleagues, ruled that Congress had not authorized the executive branch to forgive the debts that are estimated at hundreds of billions of dollars.
   
   “The Secretary asserts that the HEROES Act grants him the authority to cancel $430 billion of student loan principal. It does not,” Roberts wrote.
   
   “We hold today that the Act allows the Secretary to ‘waive or modify’ existing statutory or regulatory provisions applicable to financial assistance programs under the Education Act, not to rewrite that statute from the ground up,” Roberts continued.

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   1. 85

      Sharlee01posted 17 months agoin reply to this

      Yeah!

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   2. 85

      Sharlee01posted 17 months agoin reply to this

      https://www.foxnews.com/politics/justic … an-handout
      "Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts cited former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., in his majority opinion to help explain why President Biden’s student loan handout was unconstitutional.
      
      "On Friday, Roberts released the Supreme Court’s opinion blocking Biden's student loan forgiveness plan, one of the president's major campaign promises.
      
      In the opinion, Roberts cited then-Speaker Pelosi’s words saying the president did not have the power to cancel federal student loan debt."
      
      Biden had no right to give out false hope... He did not have the power to forgive student loans --- according to Roberts ex-Speaker Pelosi.
      
      "As then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi explained: ‘People think that the President of the United States has the power for debt forgiveness. He does not,’" Roberts quoted Pelosi’s July 28, 2021, press conference. "‘He can postpone. He can delay. But he does not have that power. That has to be an act of Congress.’"
      
      "Aside from reiterating its interpretation of the statute, the dissent offers little to rebut our conclusion that ‘indicators from our previous major questions cases are present’ here," Roberts wrote, citing Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s concurring opinion."

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10. 95

    GoldenRod LMposted 17 months ago

    The problem seems to be that there are a huge number of people who enjoy telling other people what to do.

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11. 79

    Credence2posted 17 months ago

    So with all this emphasis on color blindness, what is the obvious exception here?
    
    
    https://theconversation.com/military-ac … les-205112

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    1. 95

       Readmikenowposted 17 months agoin reply to this

       It does make you wonder why.

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       1. 79

          Credence2posted 17 months agoin reply to this

          Funny how this rightwing tribunal makes exception for the military regarding diversity and its import. Why are these sacred, vaunted merit standards not applied to military academies?
          
          Diversity is part of national security but not important in society as a whole? I want them to explain the difference and dispense with the typical rightwing ruse in the answer.

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          1. 95

             Readmikenowposted 17 months agoin reply to this

             The right wing tribunal? Huh?
             
             I gave it some thought. I think the military academies are government entities and universities are not, they are civilian organizations.
             
             I think we need diversity in professional sports?  Wouldn't you agree? Shouldn't professional sports teams represent the make-up of our society in the name of diversity and equity?

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             1. 79

                Credence2posted 17 months agoin reply to this

                So, you gave it some thought? it is a distinction without a difference. Conservatives love to bring out that athlete stuff, it is irrelevant.
                
                Why isn't the merit standard applied evenly, whatever distinction you offer is not answering the question? so, what is good for the goose is not good for the gander?
                
                it is a value for Government entities and not civilian, why not? Maybe the rightwingers on the court could actually offer a coherent answer?

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12. 91

    IslandBitesposted 7 months ago

    Supreme Court hears abortion clash over emergency room treatment for pregnant women
    
    WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Wednesday grapples with whether provisions of Idaho's near-total abortion ban unlawfully conflict with a federal law aimed at ensuring certain standards for emergency medical care for patients, including pregnant women.
    
    The justices are weighing an appeal brought by Idaho officials who are contesting a lawsuit filed by the Biden administration over abortion access in emergency situations.
    
    The state law says that anyone who performs an abortion is subject to criminal penalties, including up to five years in prison. Health care professionals found to have violated the law can lose their professional licenses.
    
    There is an exception if an abortion is necessary to protect the life of the pregnant woman.
    
    The federal government sued, leading a federal judge in August 2022 to block the state from enforcing provisions concerning medical care that is required under the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA).
    
    The federal law, enacted in 1986, requires that patients receive appropriate emergency room care. The Biden administration argues that care should include abortions in certain situations. The law applies to any hospital that receives federal funding under the Medicare program.
    
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfeI-5lCMiM

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    1. 88

       wildernessposted 7 months agoin reply to this

       Although I find it ever more common to nit-pick through the legal system as a method of getting/denying laws (exactly what is being done here) I would sure like to see Idaho be forced to back off of it's ridiculous law.
       
       Of course, if that happens they will just make another one that doesn't have the loophole.

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13. 91

    IslandBitesposted 7 months ago

    LIVE
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWfYS_4L1TE
    
    Supreme Court hears case on whether Trump has presidential immunity from prosecution
    
    The Supreme Court is hearing arguments on former President Donald Trump’s claim of presidential immunity from prosecution in special counsel Jack Smith's election interference case against him.
    
    Arguments begin at 10 a.m. ET.

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14. 79

    Credence2posted 7 months ago

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?time_contin … mp;noapp=1
    
    
    
    
    I thought that I should include a demonstration of conservative jurors remaining true to the letter and spirit of what is in the Constitution.  NOT..
    ----------
    President Nixon did not object to a pardon for his crimes in Watergate. Notably, no prior president or court has ever suggested presidential immunity from prosecution after leaving office. Under the argument of John Sauer, Trump’s lawyer, President Biden might initiate a coup to avoid the coming election, or order his rival assassinated, and be immune from prosecution.
    
    The notion simply cannot be reconciled with the text of the Constitution. It includes no immunity provision for presidents. It expressly recognizes that a president is subject to criminal prosecution, even if impeached and convicted for high crimes and misdemeanors.
    
    Contrary to the nonsensical argument made up by Trump’s lawyers – that a president must be impeached and convicted in the Senate before he can be prosecuted – “high crimes and misdemeanors” may include misconduct not even criminalized in federal statutes. In no rational universe would the choice by a House of Representatives as to which abuses of political power to allege in impeaching a President determine whether he has committed statutory offenses.
    
    Here is what is crystal clear. If the Court waits until the end of its session in June to decide the case, there is little chance for a trial to complete before the election. If the Court sends the case back to the lower courts, there is no chance. We will know that we have a Supreme Court majority who think that preserving the power of a future president who aims to be a dictator is more important than giving the people the information we need to make an existential choice as voters.

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       GA Andersonposted 7 months agoin reply to this

       It sounds like you are condemning the Court because they won't rush to reach the only possible verdict that will allow Pres. Trump to be tried before the election.
       
       Considering what is being said about this decision being so important as a precedent for all future presidents, not just this one case, you should want them to be proper and thorough in their deliberations.
       
       Instead, you want them to reach your verdict now so it can be announced tomorrow and Trump convicted the day after. Everyone knows he's guilty, right?
       
       GA

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       1. 79

          Credence2posted 7 months agoin reply to this

          GA, This has all taken much too long, regardless of what conservatives say.
          
          An important decision, yeah sure, it is a pretty easy one for anyone who has take elementary school civics classes. No Man is Above the Law. So the Court wants to rewrite the Constitution coronating Donald Trump as a King? We managed to get through since 1789 with this never occurring. Now with this insufferably stupid man all the sudden what should have always had a simply answer has now, thru rightwing cryptic crap, risen to monumental proportions?
          
          Donald Trump is an unique criminal unprecedented in American politics but the Right will follow him anywhere he goes, its dumb.
          
          For the sake of credibility of this court, they had better step lightly when deciding this. Many of us already believe that right wing members are in Trumps back pocket, let's hope they prove me wrong.

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             GA Andersonposted 7 months agoin reply to this

             You shouldn't hold back. Say what you really feel.  (snicker, snicker)
             
             GA

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                Credence2posted 7 months agoin reply to this

                No, I say what I think.....

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15. 73

    Kathleen Cochranposted 7 months ago

    The Bible is full of judgement. But it is also full of grace.

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16. 85

    Sharlee01posted 7 months ago

    
    
    Justice Thomas raised crucial question about legitimacy of special counsel's prosecution of Trump
    
    Jack Smith was a private citizen when AG Garland appointed him as special counsel to investigate Trump in 2022
    
    Fox Article --  "Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas raised a question Thursday that goes to the heart of Special Counsel Jack Smith's charges against former President Donald Trump.
    
    The high court was considering Trump's argument that he is immune from prosecution for actions he took while president, but another issue is whether Smith and the Office of Special Counsel have the authority to bring charges at all.
    
    "Did you, in this litigation, challenge the appointment of special counsel?" Thomas asked Trump attorney John Sauer on Thursday during a nearly three-hour session at the Supreme Court.
    
    Sauer replied that Trump's attorneys had not raised that concern "directly" in the current Supreme Court case — in which justices are considering Trump's arguments that presidential immunity precludes the prosecution of charges that the former president illegally sought to overturn the 2020 election.
    
    Sauer told Thomas that, "we totally agree with the analysis provided by Attorney General Meese [III] and Attorney General Mukasey."
    
    "It points to a very important issue here because one of [the special counsel's] arguments is, of course, that we should have this presumption of regularity. That runs into the reality that we have here an extraordinary prosecutorial power being exercised by someone who was never nominated by the president or confirmed by the Senate at any time. So we agree with that position. We hadn't raised it yet in this case when this case went up on appeal," Sauer said.
    
    In a 42-page amicus brief presented to the high court in March, Meese and Mukasey questioned whether "Jack Smith has lawful authority to undertake the 'criminal prosecution'" of Trump. Mukasey and Meese — both former U.S. attorneys general — said Smith and the Office of Special Counsel itself have no authority to prosecute, in part because he was never confirmed by the Senate to any position.
    
    Federal prosecutions, "can be taken only by persons properly appointed as federal officers to properly created federal offices," Meese and Mukasey argued. "But neither Smith nor the position of special counsel under which he purportedly acts meets those criteria. He wields tremendous power, effectively answerable to no one, by design. And that is a serious problem for the rule of law — whatever one may think of former President Trump or the conduct on January 6, 2021, that Smith challenges in the underlying case."
    
    The crux of the problem, according to Meese, is that Smith was never confirmed by the Senate as a U.S. attorney, and no other statute allows the U.S. attorney general to name merely anyone as special counsel. Smith was acting U.S. attorney for a federal district in Tennessee in 2017, but he was never nominated to the position. He resigned from the private sector after then-President Trump nominated a different prosecutor as U.S. attorney for the middle district of Tennessee.
    
    Meese and Mukasey argued that because the special counsel exercises broad authority to convene grand juries and make prosecutorial decisions, independent of the White House or the attorney general, he is far more powerful than any government officer who has not been confirmed by the Senate.
    
    Sauer and Trump's other attorneys objected to the legitimacy of Smith's appointment in the charges against Trump in the classified documents case, also brought by Smith, before a Florida federal court.
    
    In a March court filing in Florida, Trump's attorneys claimed that the special counsel's office argues in federal court that Smith is wholly independent of the White House and Garland — contradicting Trump's arguments that the federal charges against him are politically motivated. But at the same time, the special counsel's attorneys insist that Smith is subordinate to the attorney general, and therefore not subject to Senate confirmation under the Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution.
    
    "There is significant tension between the Office’s assurances to that court that Smith is independent, and not prosecuting the Republican nominee for President at the direction of the Biden Administration, and the Office’s assurance here that Smith is not independent and is instead so thoroughly supervised and accountable to President Biden and Attorney General Garland that this Court should not be concerned about such tremendous power being exercised to alter the trajectory of the ongoing presidential election," Trump's attorneys wrote in the filing.
    
    The special counsel's office, responding to Trump's claims in the Florida case, argued that the attorney general "has the statutory authority to appoint a Special Prosecutor" and that the Supreme Court even upheld that authority "in closely analogous circumstances nearly 50 years ago" — in a 1974 case that challenged the prosecutor investigating the late President Richard Nixon.
    
    Meese and Mukasey wrote in their brief that the Nixon case was irrelevant because it "concerned the relationship between the President and DOJ as an institution, not between the President and any specific actor purportedly appointed by DOJ."
    
    The pair also said special counsel investigations are necessary and often lawful, but stated that "the Attorney General cannot appoint someone never confirmed by the Senate, as a substitute United States Attorney under the title ‘Special Counsel.’ Smith’s appointment was thus unlawful, as are all actions flowing from it, including his prosecution of former President Trump."
    
    Smith was a private citizen when Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed him as special counsel to investigate Trump in 2022.
    
    Other recent special counsels — including John Durham's Trump-Russia probe; David Weiss of the Hunter Biden investigation; and Robert Hur, who investigated Biden's mishandling of classified documents — were all confirmed by the Senate to various positions before being named as special counsels.
    
    The Florida court has yet to rule on Trump's motion to dismiss the classified documents case due to claims that Smith was improperly appointed.
    
    The Supreme Court is expected to rule on Trump's immunity arguments before its term ends in June."
    https://www.foxnews.com/politics/justic … tion-trump

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