Not The Onion

12200 readers

520 users here now

Welcome

We're not The Onion! Not affiliated with them in any way! Not operated by them in any way! All the news here is real!

The Rules

Posts must be:

Links to news stories from...
...credible sources, with...
...their original headlines, that...
...would make people who see the headline think, “That has got to be a story from The Onion, America’s Finest News Source.”

Comments must abide by the server rules for Lemmy.world and generally abstain from trollish, bigoted, or otherwise disruptive behavior that makes this community less fun for everyone.

And that’s basically it!

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

kescusay

410

Trump Lawyer Argues He Could Legally Order Assassination Of Political Rival (www.huffpost.com)

submitted 6 months ago by [email protected] to c/nottheonion

44 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Former President Donald Trump’s attorney on Thursday argued that a president could order the assassination of his political rival and stage a military coup without being prosecuted for it.

Jack Sauer, Trump’s lawyer, made the “absolute immunity” argument in a Supreme Court hearing in the Department of Justice election interference case against the former president. Trump’s team has repeatedly claimed that the ex-president can’t be prosecuted for “official acts” he did while in office.

Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor asked Sauer, “If the president decides that his rival is a corrupt person and he orders the military to assassinate him, is that within his official acts to which he has immunity?”

“That could well be an official act,” Sauer responded.

Sotomayor seemed taken aback at that line of reasoning.

...

“How about if the president orders the military to stage a coup?” Kagan asked.

“I think it would depend on the circumstances,” Sauer said.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] [email protected] 98 points 6 months ago (1 children)

They should have asked if the president can order the assassination of a Supreme Court Judge or a senator. Would love the justification.

[–] radix 101 points 6 months ago (1 children)

And don't even frame it as a nameless hypothetical. Get specific.

"Are you arguing that Joe Biden could order the assassination of Clarence Thomas and Donald Trump, and if the Democratic Senate doesn't convict on impeachment, he gets away with it?"

[–] [email protected] 47 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I would pay good money for one of them to ask that exact question, but sadly, I'm a little too poor to buy my own SCOTUS justice. Maybe we could start a gofundme and crowdsource it?

[–] Duit 10 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I got 5 on it

[–] [email protected] 11 points 6 months ago

I'd put in the remaining $5 needed for Thomas to be bought