by Mish Shedlock, Mish Talk:
I expect good news for Trump next week, likely a unanimous ruling, on narrow grounds. Then what? That’s a very different subject. Trump has huge legal problems as I explain.
Narrow Grounds Q&A
Q: Will the Supreme Court allow a mess in which states get to decide to knock a president from the ballot? If they did Texas would find an excuse to block Biden.
A: No
TRUTH LIVES on at https://sgtreport.tv/
Q: Does the Supreme Court want to get entangled in whether or not Trump was involved in an insurrection?
A: No
Q: Does the Supreme Court want to stop all this state nonsense in a unanimous or near-unanimous ruling?
A: Yes
Q: What is the easiest way?
A: Confirm the 14th amendment is not self-executing.
The court will not touch the question of whether there was an insurrection. The Supreme Court will not want to go on a fact finding mission. It will shy away from will stay away from that argument like it had an extremely contagious, deadly disease.
Nor will it touch the question of whether the president is a “officer“ as defined in the 14th amendment. There is no need to.
For Colorado to prevail, Trump needs to be guilty of an insurrection, be an officer, and the 14th amendment needs to be self-executing.
But the court will rule the 14th amendment is not “self-executing.“ It requires an act of Congress before any state can do anything. So, unless there is an act of federal Congress, and there won’t be, no state can keep anyone off a ballot on the basis of the insurrection clause.
That’s the easy way out to get everyone on board.
Justice Elena Kagan
In the arguments, Kagan asked Jason Murray, the Colorado attorney, “I think that the question that you have to confront is why a single state should decide who gets to be president of the United States. Why should a single state have the ability to make this determination not only for their own citizens, but for the rest of the nation?“
Kagan gets laughs on her questioning of Jonathan Mitchell, representing Trump. The clip culminates with Kagan announcing “Then I must be right,” also with a bunch of laughs from the watchers.
Please play the video below starting at the 32:12 mark until the 34:15 mark.
To get everyone on board, without opening up a can of other issues, the court is going to rule either 9-0 or 8-1 in favor of Trump.
The only possible holdout is Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
Chief Justice John Roberts has the right to assign the opinion and he often takes controversial ones himself. The only other candidate is Justice Elena Kagan. She is extremely smart, capable, and funny.
Roberts may assign Kagan the opinion in an effort to draw her back into the middle on other testy issues.
Then What?
Anyone who expected the court to get entangled in the definition of insurrection or other grounds of states disallowing candidates was mistaken from the beginning.
This one was a cake walk.
Trump will win this easily, likely unanimously, but that is not the end of Trump’s problems.
Trump’s Real Problems
The big problem for Trump is that the D.C. Circuit has cleared away his immunity defense.
On February 6, a federal appeals court ruled that Donald Trump is not immune from prosecution for alleged crimes he committed during his presidency.
In a 57-page unanimous opinion, the panel of three DC Circuit judges wrote that that the justice system allowed for a former president to face charges for actions he took while in office, and that the public interest in holding a potentially criminal president accountable outweighed any potential “chilling effect” on the presidency.
