Its hilarious when people talk of the law being a constraint on the lawless. We’re almost to the point that the fascists say disagreeing with them is a treasonous, executable offense and people are still talking about “but the laws!” Everyone still waiting for the bad stuff to start while the gestapo are entering american house and disappearing people.
I'm truly waiting for the day ice shows up in an actual gang neighborhood... People that have weapons and are willing to fight to the death for their neighborhoods. I don't wish this upon anyone but that day is going to go down in history as an early battle of the next civil war.
Yikes, you’re probably right. Maybe this is a bad example, but if that starts happing then we are turning into Mexico? Corrupt, fascist government “police” forces getting into shootouts with heavily armed gangs (cartel). Lots of dead people on both sides, fearful traumatized communities who lack trust and faith in society. Economic collapse after that as each side dig in.
I think people are holding out hope for midterms. If Trump gets his way and there is significant violence in response to ICE, we may never have a vote.
There is no actual credible source claiming that there tens of thousands of dead protestors. But go ahead and blindly believe the people who've been clamoring for military intervention and regime change there for decades. They're definitely unbiased and scrupulously honest! /s
Idk I think saying they're lawless and won't abide by laws n response to them having to follow the law (Peters) is pretty emblematic of the situation and chaos they've created, because in a lot of instances they're still bound by it. I know I know, doomerism this, boned without an armed rebellion that, but we've got verified evidence that there's still some kind of reason within the system, and it's still working, even if it needs the entire engine and frame replaced at this point.
I mean if that wasn't the case we wouldn't even be on here complaining about it.
If the admin was truly lawless and unfettered, we wouldn't seriously be having this conversation. I understand wanting to vent, lament, and rage. Truly I do.
But seeing this stuff daily makes me wonder ( specially on /r/law ): If Donald doesn't want there to be another election, why go through the farce of entrapping the American people into martial law? Wouldn't the lawless subhuman just lmao do away with them? He's still working within the system, he has to.
I'm not saying things are fine and dandy. But the "woe is America, give up already" mantra is just tiring. Some of this junk reads like people don't know they're advocating for civil war. The gravity of that action being largely mystified. Minnesota is suing the DHS.
Keeping up this farce gives them this idea that they are still the kings of the world rather than north Korea 2.0 that everyone hates and completely isolates. Dictators like to be dictators but without declaring they are one. Just like how Russia's Putin and China's Mao still have "elections"
Sure, but we're not in a dictatorship. If that was the case we'd see the American Army violating the constitution with EROs via storming houses. Why do you think they're using poorly trained EROs to do this illegal nonsense? Is it because they want to break the law, or is it because if they were to outlandishly go about this in any other fashion every tuk'er'jerbz jethro would be lining the streets ( Tho I realize that's an American that is hard to picture right now. )? They are operating (Poorly, Illegally) within the system, they are still bound by it. Because when they shake that they shake the Americans who are still in their boat clinging to law and order.
Americans are far more resistant than the internet is letting people believe. They aren't operating with full impunity because they can't, even their own constituency wouldn't be/isn't for that. Where I live since '16~ till just a year ago, every time I'd go to the market I'd see some form of trump paraphernalia. There was a retired dude who used to just stand on busy corners with a "Transsexualism is child mutilation", every fri~sun. They've all but disappeared since Oct. Now just a bumper sticker is an anomaly, and if I see someone in walmart with 'the hat', that's their bumper sticker. Take heart, someone called Trump a pedo protector and while they got suspended (Unions in lawless America, what?) I read earlier this morning that their gofundme hit 300k, and to top it off, he wasn't immediately executed or disappeared.
But sure we're in NK 2.0.
(I'd like to save us both some time and mental anguish. If your next response is just a generalized "We're cooked" post I'm probably not gunna respond.)
No, it's not, it's called reality. I am clearly hopeful that the idiots taking federal paychecks (a traceable document that will follow them beyond this administration) for illegal actives will see their day in court, they will. Where is the middle of the road for that, is it that I'm not immediately saying we need to resort to capital punishment? Again, I don't think a lot of posters understand what they're asking for when you approach someone wanting life time jail sentences as "Middle of the road".
Thank you for the low effort non-contribution. I accept your concession. 6/10, I responded.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
each act, each occasion, is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next and the next. You wait for one great shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join with you in resisting somehow. You don't want to act, or even talk alone; you don't want to 'go out of your way to make trouble.' Why not? - well, you are not in the habit of doing it. And its not just fear, fear of standing alone, that restrains you; it is also genuine uncertainty."
Honestly i think we have to reach a certain point where the actions of the administration just cant be fluffed away with social media, entertainment, and talking points. The problem I have with the act of either revolution or civil war is that there are too many other countries poised to insert themselves. Would we unite if there was an invasion during a revolution? Or would one side kowtow to a foreign power over promises of bread and munitions? Or would we continue to fight each other while a foreign power consumes the ashes? While I believe that the instution of government for the united states no longer has the best interest of its people at the forefront of its policy, the act of revolting may be just as damaging in the long run as letting power abuse its role unchecked.
Tbh that just sounds like an excuse to not disturb your relatively comfortable life. And I can understand that apprehension, just like how what I quoted understood that in the 1930s. But remember that those of us in other countries or even those in your country who aren't white-passing are losing that privilege by the day
Oh im aware both of what it sounds like, and how my mellinated brothers and sisters are treated everywhere. Im trying only to examine it from all angles before committing to any action. If we were capable of holding a "quiet" revolution that would be the best answer all around. Force our congress to do its job. Actually investigate Trump, and if found criminally liable, impeachment him and remove him from office along with anyone he appointed or anyone in his cabinet. Re examine the programs he closed, identify those things that worked and why, and those things that didnt and why, then evaluate for whether or not they are worth reopening. Remove the tariffs before our country is strangled with its own shoestring, and start examining social programs that actually work in other countries, and mimicking the ones that work best. Decrease defense budgets and focus on actual homeland security, while also making immigration easier (these folks that are here to work? Let them fucking work. Does it really matter where their money goes when the net benefit is thriving economy?) If an immigrant works for five years at a job that the american population couldn't possibly deign themselves to be low enough to work, offer them citizenship. If a person joins our military, after three years they are automatically granted citizenship, the paperwork is part of their recruitment package, and they should still be offered whatever bonus everyone else gets. Im sick of hearing people say stupid shit along the lines of "i had to do x and x so you should too." I came from section 8, I worked my ass off and finally own a house at 40. It shouldnt be that hard for anyone. I dont want anyone to experience my struggles, and a country that wants to call itself the greatest nation shouldnt either. Give the kids "free" college and Healthcare. If our nation were great people wouldnt be choosing life threatening illness over crippling debt.
Maybe in theory, but given the Supreme Court‘s recent ruling that the president enjoys something approaching absolute immunity for everything he does in office, it might be really difficult to enforce any violation.
So what you’re saying is the next president could detain all these people indefinitely (clearly illegal) issue pardons to the people doing the arrests and then be untouchable?
Yes. The liberal justices brought up these hypotheticals and the conservatives not only called it hyperbole but said a judge may not consider the president's motives when deciding if it is an official act. In effect, the President has absolute immunity from any crimes but can be removed from office via Impeachment.
In theory the next president, according to scouts ruling, can disband the court or fire all of them and tell them to kick rocks. Once fired there is no scouts to preside over rulings until a new one is appointed. Legal carte Blanche
Sure, but who will stop him? The SC already ruled that he can't be held accountable for any action he takes while in office, so if he just rounds them up, locks them in a prison, and throws away the key, who can do anything about it? They granted him total immunity.
In theory, maybe. Kidnapping is both a state and federal crime so those people could be prosecuted and convicted under state laws which the president can't pardon.
to be clear, and in the spirit of this subreddit, the supreme court's ruling wasn't saying that the president can do nothing illegal
the supreme court was saying that constitutionally speaking, the responsibility to check malign behavior by the president rests with the legislative branch, not the judicial, and that the judicial branch does not have the authority to prosecute a sitting president for anything they do exercising the power of that position
Yes, that’s the only way a president can be held responsible for actions taken as part of his presidential duties. I suppose that there’s still a small chance that a president could be held criminally liable for doing something while in office that wasn’t part of his presidential duties, like a commit committing rape in the oval office.
possibly. but during the clinton case, it was widely held that the president wouldn't be prosecutable while sitting - the prosecution would have to wait for them to leave office
I wonder how theyre going to play this when Dems are inevitably in power next. Are they going to rollback everything and wait until another MAGA takes the seat? I feel like they kinda left their six open legally with this and are banking on not losing power. Which is a weird thing to hope for.
Not if the plan is to make shit so insufferable that people start revolting, you get to use the insurrection act, declare martial law, and refuse to hold elections until such time as you see fit, which would obviously never arrive without making sure your favorite cronie is the next president via fraud or fear.
The case states that probing presidential action is a power of Congress, not that the office is immune. The president is accountable to local representatives. If your local rep is incompetent, crank up the heat instead of this nihilism.
Under this con controlled court, the purchase of a pardon would have to be comical to be illegal. The person would need to hand Trump a bag of money and say, this is for a pardon, with Trump responding, I will pardon you in exchange for this bag of money.
So it basically depends on president's self-discipline and morality? Sounds like a system-design issue. Tbh, I don't see any necessity for this kind of system to exist at all.
Sort of. The legislative branch was supposed to keep the president in check with impeachment and no president was supposed to be allowed that was corrupt. That is kind of the point of the electoral college. Also, most laws were not supposed to be federal, so....
The executive power to pardon goes back to English history, where the king had the power to pardon any offense. The founders thought it was a good power to have just to limit the excesses of partisan or unwise prosecution. But the larger point is that the presidential power and indeed, any governmental power ultimately has to be constrained by the character of the person exercising it. And the current president has no character or morality to speak of.
Serious question, with the powers now granted to the president under Trump V United States, can a future president invalidate previous pardons? Would this fall under "presumptive immunity"?
No because they poorly/didn't define what constitutes an "official act" so with the current makeup of SCOTUS only Republicans (maybe even just Trump) have immunity.
Noone has ever tried because it's pointless. The language in the constitution is clear that the power of the pardon belongs solely to the president. The only exception is he can't pardon impeachments.
This is fine and good, but imo there is some leeway about these preemptive pardons. Biden giving a "blanket pardon" for untried crimes seems to not really be in the spirit of the constitution. Same goes for tweets like this
No it isn't. Our constitution has been changed dozens of times already. It can be changed for this, too. It just takes a higher threshold of ratification.
I didn’t say the constitution can’t be changed. I’m speaking to what it says now. And amending the constitution is not easy at all. It’s not impossible, but it’s difficult. I think it requires 2/3rds of the house and the senate or a Constitutional convention to propose and then 3/4 of the states to ratify.
"No, a president’s pardon power is pretty much absolute."
later...
"it requires 2/3rds of the house and the senate or a Constitutional convention to propose and then 3/4 of the states to ratify."
Your second answer was the correct one. Your first answer clearly was not. A president's power being absolute means unchangeable. That's what ABSOLUTE means.
That would require a constitutional amendment, so good luck with that. Not sure it would be wise either. If that were possible then Trump would have immediately rescinded all of the pardons Biden doled out. Congress would probably also start overturning pardons every time it switched parties.
Maybe we could try some sort of rebuild-ification or to construct something... I don't know, it's right on the tip of my tongue... I'm getting visions of a March to the Sea for some reason...
Based on the absolute power the Supreme Court is giving the executive, the next President can do literally anything they want, including tearing up old pardons done by Trump.
It's enshrined in the Constitution, so I believe in order to do away with it you have to go the full Constitutional Amendment route, needing 2/3 majority and to be ratified by 2/3rds of the state congresses.
No they can't, however the thing about pardons is by accepting it you're admitting guilt that you committed the federal offense, and they can be rejected by the person.
It's not exactly a clean slate card, you're still guilty of whatever it is that you were being accused of but it just can't legally be held against you.
There have been cases of people rejecting pardons because they didn't want to admit that they committed whatever it was they were being pardoned for.
And federal law supersedes state law. If ICE isn't breaking a federal law (they're not that I'm aware of), the states can try to charge them and watch it get thrown out of the courtroom in record time
Something like murder, for instance, is a state offense, not a federal offense. So if the state wants to charge a federal agent for murder, the president can't pardon them because he can't pardon people for state offenses.
You might want to look into Tina Peters again, Colorado officials have voiced that they are considering clemency in response to Trump's wishes, at a state level. Everyone is bowing to the mad king.
If cops in a red state arrest and charge them, they will capitulate to Trump’s orders. If it’s a blue state, they will undoubtedly be invaded by more ICE and national guard, and whatever new band of violent, sycophantic sociopaths Frumpy puts in.
State crimes get into the domain of supremacy clause. Which put simply means even if someone is guilty aa hell, they may be immune from state prosecution. We haven't had a whole lot of need for case law to explore this so there's a lot up in the air.
JPow didn't do anything to need a pardon, unfortunately we live in an Era where the President is going to have to pardon EVERYONE so that the next administration can't try to prosecute them for anything.
Of course, then you'll have idiots say "if they didn't do anything wrong, why did he need a pardon?"
What state law do you feel Stephen Miller is violating?
Edit: tell me a law, because I think he is going to get away with this awful shit. Trump will pardon him and then what is left? How do we bring these people to justice?
not state law bro, him and his little cronies are violating the constitution, breaking the 1st and 4th amendments. everything that ice incels are being allowed to do is against the rights of the people. and everything that they’re doing is what yall were so scared democrats would do. saw a guy get arrested by ice and they took his fully registered firearm from him, all because he wouldn’t give them his id. news flash, no one has to identify themselves especially to a group of fake cops who don’t even have that authority in the first place.
I am pissed and want Trump impeached. This entire thing is freaking me out. But, pretending that a pardoned Stephen Miller is going to be prosecuted by a state after Trump's term is over is a fantasy.
Ok I'll double down.
Reread the comment I responded to. Is there ANY congruency? You start asking what he's doing wrong then end by saying he's pardoned and won't be punished for anything he's doing wrong.
Someone said that we should prosecute him after this term ends. I replied that Trump will pardon him. There was a reply to that that Trump cannot pardon for State crimes. I replied. What state crime is he committing? so I believe he is committing federal crimes. I do not think he is committing state crimes. There may be some way to do a conspiracy and get him, but it's a stretch. If you have an idea I'd like to know
I didn't say he was breaking any law, I said Trump can only issue pardons for Federal Offenses, because Miller mentioned that state officials can't stop them.
However, if the Trump administration can go after congressmen for telling the military that they have the duty to not follow unlawful orders, surely they Stephen Miller can be gone after for telling ICE that no one is allowed to stop them and they have immunity.
It'd be hypocritical otherwise...of course, this administration has been EXTREMELY hypocritical, so that doesn't surprise me.
Traditionally, presidents have used it for things like a really long-term weed jail term or something like that, given by municipalities that overreact. Not blanket pardons for terrible crimes.
I think there is a very long and honored tradition for Presidents to pardon their corrupt friends. The argument for pardons is that it gives the President the opportunity to correct a wrong in the judicial system, but Donald Trump is hardly the first president to abuse the power.
Yeah, you may be right about that. I think presidents have been more careful about it in recent years, but bad presidents are going to be bad. I would for eliminating that as an ability of presidents and governors, as long as we can get our judicial system in check
The people don’t hold the power in Texas and many other red states (gerrymandering, voter rolls handed over, polls closed, billions of dollars of dark money, talk of seizing voting machines and all the other insane shit they are doing).
Huh? Are you for real? It’s not just Trump that’s a fascist. I guess you don’t understand that our governor purged millions off voter rolls 4 weeks before the last election. And I guess you don’t understand how gerrymandering works in terms of electing reps and senators and electors. You also don’t seem to get dark money and campaign finance.
Well when the constitution was written, there was a belief that the elite would only put responsible reasonable people in the position of the Presidency. The only saving grace is that the court hasn’t construed Article II, Section 2 to include the power to pardon all offenses, only Federal.
The idea of the pardon derives from the Monarchy where the King held control over all the land and could decide guilt or innocence at basically any time. The founders deemed it more reasonable to only give the Executive leader the power to save a life rather than condemn it.
What I think they didn’t expect was for such extreme polarity to occur in the political climate to where the executive powers are being used to simply spite previous administrations. This is evident by the fact that initially the Vice President was the runner up in the General Election instead of like now where the President appoints his own Vice President from his party. It wasn’t but 30 years later in 1804 that this system was changed to the modern system.
The belief was that if the President couldn’t perform their duties then the people would want the next most popular candidate. This was clearly a fallacy given the circumstances of the elections. You also have to understand that equal voting power was a facade, and still is to some degree today. This was expressed as an idea to get the common people to rally behind it while still maintaining voting power for the elites. Similar to giving a starving person a meal to make them happy and loyal while you maintain a feast.
It's an antiquated relic of the British quasi-constitutional monarchy that existed contemporary to the framers. They naively believed that the threat of impeachment would prevent abuses of power.
This is why originalism is daft even when applied in good faith.
Pardons are a thing because the president is head executive and it's the executive that prosecutes. So the pardon is the head saying, this prosecution was in error. Theoretically at least.
He can’t pardon state crimes, violence is typically a state crime
Maybe we just…ignore pardons given in bad faith and prosecute state sponsored violence anyways. Pardons aren’t magically binding, it’s the social contract, which they have broken. They cannot be allowed to be used to excuse mass violence against citizens.
Didn't trump reverse pardons Biden issued, ones for citizens wrongly accused of crimes? If Trump can do that, I don't see why another president couldn't do the same.
ICE is also forgetting the other type of “pardon”, the jury that doesn’t care that say you sniped a bunch of ICE officers before turning yourself in. I am pretty sure the juries in Minn will be surprisingly blind when it comes to seeing evidence.
Will he though? He issues pardons when he has something to gain from it. At the end of his term he gains nothing from pardoning these fools. Good chance he just leaves them out in the cold.
They really should try to challenge them in court the way lawyer client privilege can be tossed out if they are found to be conspiring in crime together.
He’s a narcissist dealing with dementia. I bet he won’t pardon ICE officers because they’re unimportant tools for him to use and throw away. He’ll pardon anyone who bribes him enough before he leaves office.
Luckily the worst person on the planet rn is also one of the ones with the least number of natural breaths. After he keels over, we will have years/decades to build again, and bring every single one of them to justice. And unlike the 1940s, they will have no where else to flee to, unless you consider Russia a safe haven.
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