A lot of people, myself included, expected some carve out for "official acts". There was never going to be blanket immunity and the Court was going to take the case just to agree with the DC Circuit Court of Appeals [1]. SCOTUS slow walked this case. They could've taken it back when they were asked to in December. They waited until the end of hte term to deliver a verdict. The verdict ensures that any trial court findings of "official court" are going to simply make their way back to this exact same court.
The majority opinion even had the gall to call the prosecutions "hasty" when we're largely talking about things that happened in 2021.
But this decision is so much worse than many (myself included) expected. Not only is there blanket immunity for "official acts" but there is presumptive innocence for anything on the peripherey. Even worse, if something is a statutory or constitutional power of the office of President, the reason does not matter. The reason can't even be considered in deciding if something is an "official act" or not.
So the president has the right to issue pardons with ultimate discretion. If they want to sell pardons, now they can. Why? Because the reason this "official act" happened is irrelevant. That's what the Court decided.
Same for selling judgeships or presidential appointments.
We already have the donor-to-ambassador pipeline [2]. Now we don't even need the ruse of it being a donation. The President can simply sell ambassadorships for personal gain.
The majority opinion even had the gall to call the prosecutions "hasty" when we're largely talking about things that happened in 2021.
But this decision is so much worse than many (myself included) expected. Not only is there blanket immunity for "official acts" but there is presumptive innocence for anything on the peripherey. Even worse, if something is a statutory or constitutional power of the office of President, the reason does not matter. The reason can't even be considered in deciding if something is an "official act" or not.
So the president has the right to issue pardons with ultimate discretion. If they want to sell pardons, now they can. Why? Because the reason this "official act" happened is irrelevant. That's what the Court decided.
Same for selling judgeships or presidential appointments.
We already have the donor-to-ambassador pipeline [2]. Now we don't even need the ruse of it being a donation. The President can simply sell ambassadorships for personal gain.
That's what this decision did.
[1]: https://www.cadc.uscourts.gov/internet/opinions.nsf/1AC5A0E7...
[2]: https://campaignlegal.org/press-releases/new-campaign-legal-...