Frank's Musings

On 28 February 2024 SCOTUS ordered the presentation of arguments on the appeal by Trump’s lawyers of the criminal charges against him based on Presidential Immunity.  This process will inevitably delay a legal resolution of the issue until after the next presidential election on 5 November 2024.   At best, it makes impossible the  determination of Trump’s guilt or innocence on those criminal charges until way past the inauguration of the next POTUS. 

Therefore, the real verdict on both issues, presidential immunity and Trump’s criminal conduct, will only be the outcome of the 2024 presidential election.  SCOTUS has effectively abdicated its responsibility to make that decision in time for fairly informing the public before its being called on to choose its next president.  The ultimate jury to decide that verdict will be the U.S. citizens who vote in that election.  They will have to rely on the evidence collected by the January 6 Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives for making that determination, just as SCOTUS was asked and failed to do.

The earlier SCOTUS decision in Bush v. Gore was based on the conduct of the 2000 presidential election in Florida, rather than on a criminal trial.  Although it showed that a SCOTUS decision bearing on the outcome of a presidential election could occur after the relevant election day, it did not address a case that would have to await a criminal case, a jury verdict and the inevitable appeals that could delay its final effect beyond the Constitutional inauguration date.   Therefore, Bush v. Gore is not fully relevant.

The Democratic opponent of Trump later this year, therefore, should make a leading element of the campaign the closing argument in what will effectively be the criminal trial of Donald Trump.  The campaign message must be prepared by experienced prosecutors who have succeeded in disabusing juries of falling for the showmanship of other narcissistic criminal defendants.  Only by keeping him out of the White House will Trump be held accountable for his high crimes and misdemeanors.