On Monday, the Supreme Court ruled that American presidents have “absolute immunity” from prosecution for any “official acts” they take while in office. For President Joe Biden, this should be great news. Suddenly a host of previously unthinkable options have opened up to him: He could dispatch Seal Team 6 to Mar-A-Lago with orders to neutralize the “primary threat to freedom and democracy” in the United States. He could issue an edict that all digital or physical evidence of his debate performance last week be destroyed. Or he could just use this chilling partisan decision, the latest 6-3 ruling in a term that was characterized by a staggering number of them, as an opportunity to finally embrace the movement to reform the Supreme Court.

But Biden is not planning to do any of that. Shortly after the Supreme Court delivered its decision in Trump v. The United States, the Biden campaign held a press call with surrogates, including Harry Dunn, a Capitol police officer who was on duty the day Trump supporters stormed the building on Jan. 6; Reps. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.) and Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas); and deputy campaign manager Quentin Fulks.

Their message was simple: It’s terrifying to contemplate what Donald Trump might do with these powers if he’s reelected.

“We have to do everything in our power to stop him,” Fulks said.

Everything, that is, except take material action to rein in the increasingly lawless and openly right-wing Supreme Court.

  • enkers
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    85 months ago

    Except that we know for a fact the refs are incredibly biased against specifically one team.

    The ref’s just gave either team the power to choose new refs that are biased against the other team.

    • @BReel@lemmy.one
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      15 months ago

      I know that’s what all our Lemmy lawyers are saying. But I’m pretty confident SCOTUS would find a way for rules to apply to Biden that weirdly wouldn’t apply to Trump.

      Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to see him try. I’m just saying if I was in his spot, I wouldn’t immediately jump in assuming everything will just be “that easy”.

      You should at least sleep on it once or twice before you do something as drastic as everyone wants.

      • enkers
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        45 months ago

        I’m not sure you’re understanding what I’m laying down. If all previously extra-judicial actions are now potentially on the table, that opens new avenues for changing the members of SCOTUS.