“But under our system of separated powers, the President may not be prosecuted for exercising his core constitutional powers, and he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for his official acts.”
He's not being prosecuted for exercising core constitutional powers or official acts. He's being prosecuted for election fraud, inciting an insurrectionist mob and mishandling classified documents. None of those are core constitutional powers and they clearly can't be official acts.
Edit: I just love this part-
Without immunity, Trump's lawyer said, sitting presidents would face "blackmail and extortion" by political rivals due to the threat of future prosecution.
Trump just faces blackmail and extortion from his political allies. Like Vladimir Putin.
2021-01-02 Trump on a call with Georgia election officials asked them "All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have because we won the state."
Not an official act on any planet in this solar system, how is this not a loss for Trump?
(3) Presidents cannot be indicted based on conduct for which they are immune from prosecution. On remand, the District Court must carefully analyze the indictment’s remaining allegations to determine whether they too involve conduct for which a President must be immune from prosecution. And the parties and the District Court must ensure that sufficient allegations support the indictment’s charges without such conduct. Testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing such conduct may not be admitted as evidence at trial. Pp. 30–32
This is how fucked we are. Right here.
Testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing such conduct may not be admitted as evidence at trial.
So nevermind all that evidence you have of them planning it out in the open. Inadmissible in trial!
"My grandfather rode a camel, my father rode a camel, I drive a Mercedes, my son drives a Land Rover, his son will drive a Land Rover, but his son will ride a camel,"
This was the moment for the the United States where we all start "ride a camel" again. "The American Republic" Apex is over.
Looking beyond the fate of this particular prosecution, the long-term consequences of today’s decision are stark. The Court effectively creates a law-free zone around the President, upsetting the status quo that has existed since the Founding. This new official-acts immunity now “lies about like a loaded weapon” for any President that wishes to place his own interests, his own political survival, or his own financial gain, above the interests of the Nation. Korematsu v. United States, 323 U. S. 214, 246 (1944) (Jackson, J., dissenting). The President of the United States is the most powerful person in the country, and possibly the world. When he uses his official powers in any way, under the majority’s reasoning, he now will be insulated from criminal prosecution. Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in ex- change for a pardon Immune. Immune, immune, immune.
Let the President violate the law, let him exploit the trappings of his office for personal gain, let him use his official power for evil ends. Because if he knew that he may one day face liability for breaking the law, he might not be as bold and fearless as we would like him to be. That is the majority’s message today.
Even if these nightmare scenarios never play out, and I
pray they never do, the damage has been done. The relationship between the President and the people he serves has shifted irrevocably. In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law.
After mulling this over for these few hours, I realize what this ruling really does is render the President unaccountable to his Oath of Office. Any official act is presumed to be totally legal by the courts, unless he is impeached and removed from office over it. Much of his communications with his staff is now also not subject to review anywhere but Congress, as part of a formal impeachment proceeding.
A President is now officially a king, restrained by no law in what he can use his office to do, as long as he has the support of half of the House, or 1/3 of the Senate.
This ruling sounds good on its face, but it's mixed at best and somewhat bad in the broad view.
It doesn't define what is or isn't an official duty or act. It gives some examples and then says it's up to the lower courts to decide what is or isn't on a case by case basis. It specifically said some of the current allegations are official acts that can't be prosecuted and said some of the others are probably not official acts but the lower courts will have to rule on them. I'm sure that will be a speedy process that gets done before the election!
It also says it is the government's burden to prove an act isn't official, which will slow everything down and bring the cases back to SCOTUS again on a case by case basis. This also opens the possibility of political assassinations as being argued as official acts.
It mentions Presidents having limited immunity from having to make documents available. It does say it isn't absolute, but it definitely leaves the door open to block current court cases from using many documents as evidence and also leaves the door open to claim immunity for the classified docs case. Evidence fights at the current criminal cases are about to be much harder for the prosecution to win. Now, it does say that former Presidents no longer have this immunity but isn't clear whether that is for all docs or only docs for after they are former Presidents.
Maybe the worst is that it rules INTENT cannot be questioned. That is a core concept of criminal cases: intent matters! They are holding that it would bog down a President to be constantly asked about his/her intent when doing official acts, so therefor courts cannot question it. This REALLY opens the possibility of political assassinations, since intent behind the act cannot be questioned (e.g. it presupposes the person who was assassinated was committing treason or planning a terrorist attack and therefor the Presidential act was official). It does not say that former Presidents no longer have the Intent immunity, so this might be rough to clear in courts.
It specifically ruled that it is 100% OK to fire a person if they don't do the illegal thing the President asks them to do, as long as that person's job is something the President can hire/fire. It also ruled that if the illegal thing the President asks them to do falls within their job duties, then the President is immune from prosecution for asking for that illegal thing.
Held: Under our constitutional structure of separated powers, the nature of Presidential power entitles a former President to absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority. And he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for all his official acts. There is no immunity for unofficial acts.
The President enjoys no immunity for his unofficial acts, and not everything the President does is official. The President is not above the law.