Prosecutor LAUGHS In Court As He Rips Trump Lawyer’s Absurd Argument Assassinating Rival Is Legal If No Impeachment
Justice Department Attorney James Pearce couldn’t contain laughter as he ripped Trump attorney John Sauer’s argument that under certain circumstances, a president could order Seal Team Six to assassinate a political rival and not face prosecution.
Sauer made the claim in a stunning exchange at an appeal hearing on former President Donald Trump’s claim of presidential immunity in the DC Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday.
The appeal was heard by a three-judge panel consisting of Judge J. Michelle Childs, who was nominated by President Joe Biden in January 2022 and confirmed in July 2022; Judge Florence Pan, nominated by Biden in May 2022 and confirmed in September 2022; and Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson, who was appointed by then-President George H.W. Bush in 1990.
After Sauer concluded his presentation, Pearce tore into the argument repeatedly, and laughed each time he described Sauer’s jaw-dropping contention that unless a president is impeached and convicted by the Senate, he or she cannot be prosecuted for ordering the assassination of a rival:
JAMES PEARCE: I think if the court gets to that second question, there are some hard questions about the nature of official acts. And frankly, as I think Judge Pan’s hypothetical described. I mean, what kind of world are we living in? If, (laughs) as I understood, my friend on the other side to say here, a president orders his Seal team to assassinate a political rival and resigns, for example, before an impeachment, not a criminal act president sells a pardon, resigns or is not impeached. Not a crime.
I think that is (an) extraordinarily frightening future! And that is the kind of we’re talking about a balancing and a weighing of the of the interests. I think that should weigh extraordinarily heavily in the court’s consideration.
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JUDGE PAN: Do you agree that this appeal largely boils down to whether he’s correct in his interpretation of the impeachment judgment clause? That is, if he’s correct that the impeachment judgment clause, um, includes this impeachment first rule, then he wins. And if he’s wrong, if we think the impeachment judgment clause does not contain an impeachment first rule, then he loses.
JAMES PEARCE: So I think that’s basically right. I mean, the defendant’s theory over the course of this litigation has evolved a bit. And I think now before this court, I understand the arguments to be principally sort of the principal submission to be, as you’ve just described this, what we call in our brief, the condition precedent argument, that there is only liability, criminal liability for a former president if that president has been impeached and convicted and that is wrong for textural text, textual, structural, historical reasons and host of practical ones, one of which I’ll start with.
Again, just to just amplify the point, um, (laughs) it would mean that if a former president engages in (laughs) assassination, selling pardons, these kinds of things, and then isn’t impeached, and convicted, there is no accountability for that, for that individual. And that is frightening.
Watch above via CNN.
