Right now, the possibilities of stalling with with the NY trial are very limited. The defense has already exhausted motion practice. The prosecution is relying on tons of documentation. Defenses are non-existent.
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Doubtless all the Trump SCOTUS appointees will recuse themselves, right? Right?
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But not zero. And of course, this has always been considered the weakest of the cases and not the one directly connected to Jan. 6th. Those are the cases that NEED to go through before the election, or we might really be fucked.
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perfect header image. it says everything.
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I know it won’t happen but when Jack Smith (will it be him?) gets up in front of the justices, he needs to rip them to shreds for even hearing this case. Especially motherfucking Thomas for not recusing himself.
I can’t wait to see the amicus briefs the other side file. Good grief.
MR SMITH: Thank you Chief Justice and may it please the court: What the fuck are we even doing here?
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They didn’t want it in the first place, why take it now? Especially with this massive time frame - they took 15 days to decide to take it (a delay of this time usually means they punt it) and we don’t have arguments for another 7 weeks. Delay, delay, delay for something that is obvious to anyone who read the Constitution in the 5th grade.
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Because enough of the justices decided that they need to help trump drag this out. 
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That is Trump’s main legal tactic- delay, delay, delay.
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I can’t either, but if it is not a unanimous decision I will still be sad.
Also, does that mean Biden can do what ever he wants?
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Maybe declare trump a clear and present danger and deal him the old fashioned way?
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It wouldn’t have been very good for democracy, but it would have been very satisfying for Trump, his failsons, Ivanka & Jared, and his chief cronies to all vanish into Gitmo permanently on Jan 7th, 2021.
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They all believe trump has immunity but they also want to prosecute Biden for border crimes against humanity.
Can the Supreme idiots rule presidential immunity only applies to republican presidents?
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By claiming immunity, hasn’t he admitted he’s guilty?
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No worries, if there was even a hint of corruption, or that a Supreme Court Justice had accepted a bribe, or failed to recuse themselves when there was a conflict or interest or even the appearance of favoritism, then Congress would impeach them, remove them from office, and refer the to the DOJ for prosecution, right? Right?
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Strategy:
- Agree to consider the case
- Delay the case past the election, allowing Trump to run unhindered
- Some time in 2025, conclude that attempting to steal the election was not an official act and therefore prosecutable.
This allows the conservative justices to pose as defenders of the Constitution and the Rule of Law, while not actually exposing them at all. If Trump wins the election, he will put himself beyond reach of prosecution by executive fiat (or, at the very least, argue that he can’t be prosecuted until his term ends, a strategy that has worked for him before). If Trump loses, then he’s close to a spent force politically – he’ll be well past his sell-by date by 2028 – so they won’t really care what happens to him.
This is much better, from their point of view, than issuing a ruling before the election. If the Supremes hear the case before the election, there are two possible outcomes. One is that they rule in favor of Trump, in which case you have a court of questionable impartiality declaring that an incumbent president attempting to steal an election is an unpunishable “official act”, at which point you probably have a Constitutional crisis. The other outcome is that they decide that Trump can be prosecuted, which probably triggers a crisis all of its own (including but not limited to a court case against Trump taking place very close to the election).
Sweeping things under the rug by delaying the decision not only serves Trump, but also serves the interests of any conservative justices who don’t want to either (a) give democracy the finger publicly, or (b) risk incurring the wrath of the MAGA crowd by betraying the Maximum Leader.
I don’t know what they’ll end up doing, but my feeling is that there are strong incentives, at least for the conservative justices, to delay hearing the case as long as they can.
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To quote “Bush v Gore,” “Our consideration is limited to the present circumstances, for the problem of equal protection in election processes generally presents many complexities.” I.E. yes, they can declare a ruling only applies to “the present circumstances” and miraculously that case can not be used for precedent unless a future court decides it can.
Oh, wait: ProPublica “The Supreme Court decision that handed the 2000 election to George W. Bush is widely believed not to be a precedent, yet it’s been cited in hundreds of federal and state cases since.” Why Bush v. Gore Still Matters in 2020 — ProPublica
So, yeah, they can both not set precedent and, yet, when convenient also set precedent. It’s Schrödinger’s Supreme Court these days, but please only use them for gedankenexperiments.
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The justices will simply be re-assigned.
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There is not a reply emoji or gif showing sufficient outrage, anger and hatred for this. I just cannot…
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I’m almost certain it won’t be, at least without massive qualifying statements from the conservatives, and this is precisely why I think they took so long to take up the case. There was speculation that they would decline the case and that the 2 1/2 weeks was giving Alito or Thomas enough time to write a dissent. I have a feeling that it was really more of a punch-up and Roberts finally realized the only way to settle it was to have full hearing and give all justices their moment to vent and make statements on record.
Honestly, I’m ok with this, even though I was hoping for an expeditious outcome. My hope is that the reasoning behind this is that it is such a grave question and it deserves a SCOTUS ruling with comment. I sort of agree with that (assuming it is a big fat “no, of course not!”). The fact is that even imprisonment won’t bar him from running or winning the election (at which point all federal issues disappear) and MAGA just doesn’t give a shit either way. This election, both federal trials and the future of our democracy rely on one thing only; beating him at the polls come November. He’ll probably secure more swing/independent votes without a criminal judgement, but either way Biden has to win outright.
I also think that whatever negative impact a judgement against him has on the electorate, Georgia is likely to be more powerful as there is no veneer of Biden’s involvement (not that it’s legitimate, but it does exist). Also, I don’t see how dragging the federal cases well into the election cycle benefits trump.
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