MSNBC Legal Analyst Claims Supreme Court’s Trump Immunity Ruling ‘Blueprint for How to End the Rule of Law’
MSNBC legal analyst Neal Katyal called the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling on Monday “constitutionally unfathomable” and a “blueprint for how to end the rule of law.”
The Supreme Court ruled on Monday that presidents have “absolute immunity” for “official acts” taken as president. The ruling has led to a number of questions about the parameters of this immunity, especially as Donald Trump has been arguing he should not be prosecuted for any act taken while he was in office.
Katyal raised alarms about the decision and argued the “official acts” wording provides a “presumption in favor” of the president.
“Here’s what practically this means. A president, like Donald Trump next year or whoever the next president is, can take a blatantly illegal act, slap the label, ‘Hey, this is an official act!’ and write that in the preface to whatever the heck he’s doing and now we’re going to have to have hearings and so on before district judges and then appeals to determine whether it’s truly an official act or not,” he said.
Katyal argued President Joe Biden and other Democrats now need to “run against the Supreme Court,” though he cautioned he was not arguing in favor of packing the court or impeaching any judges.
“If you’re Joe Biden, if you’re a Democrat who is running for president, your path right now is clear, you have to run against the Supreme Court, you have to run against this decision. This is not America. If you want to make America great again, you’ve got to return to the rule of law. This decision today unfortunately is a blueprint on how to end the rule of law,” he said.
In a dissenting opinion, Justice Sonia Sotomayor claimed the majority made the president a “king above the law” and argued a president could even assassinate a political rival. MSNBC contributor Chuck Rosenberg had earlier shut this theory down in a panel discussion with Katyal, arguing the immunity only covers “core constitutional responsibilities.”
Katyal said his colleague was “absolutely right” that cases would need to be ruled on individually, but he argued this does not provide reasonable “protection.”
“We’ve never needed those case-by-case hearings before. We’ve always just assumed that a president is not above the law and in these hearings, these case by case hearings, as Lisa [Rubin] points out, you can’t even introduce any evidence of a president’s motive,” he said.
Watch above via MSNBC.
