119 Comments
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Stephen Brady's avatar

What to do? The DOJ has been overthrown by a well-heeled batch of sociopath fanatics who are bent on corrupting the system to their own ends. If we survive tRumpism, we need a complete rethink of how governance should work and how we can introduce heuristics into the system to bring the pendulum back into the center and keep it there. edit: fixed 'tRumpism' - damned autocorrect!

Steve 218's avatar

This administration has shown us (very quickly) that conventional thinking needs to be shored up with more well-defined guardrails. For over two centuries, there have been "understandings" that didn not need to be codified. The last nine months have shownt that they clearly do. The rabble that is the current administration has dismantled ethics, morality, decency, and is intent upon dismantling the country as well. This cannot stand.

Stephen Brady's avatar

We need to add big, sharp teeth to the Constitution . This whole concept of ‘presidential immunity’ needs to be eradicated in The Constitution.

Charles's avatar

From my reading of the Constitution (I am not a lawyer), there is nothing that supports presidential immunity. It looks like the conservative Justices made it up out of whole cloth.

Nick's avatar

The Constitution, specifically, gave Congressional members immunity when debating on the floor of the House or Senate. You're correct there's no Presidential immunity in the Constitution. The six Christian Nationalists made up Presidential immunity, the same way they made up the major questions doctrine.

David Gardiner's avatar

Nationalist "Christians" are Nat-Cs of the new age.

Stephen Brady's avatar

Likely pulled it from deep in Alito’s a**.

Charles's avatar

That is a distinct, and very disgusting, possibility.

Jack Jordan's avatar

One way to look at SCOTUS's presidential immunity decision is that it was a lie, a devious deception to attack and undermine our Constitution by six judges whose first, foremost and constant duty is "to support" our "Constitution" (U.S. Constitution Article VI) and "support and defend" our "Constitution" against absolutely "all enemies, foreign and domestic" and "bear true faith and allegiance to" our Constitution (5 U.S.C. Section 3331).

No federal judge or court was delegated any power by our Constitution to grant the president immunity from prosecution for committing any crime defined by Congress. Article I delegated to Congress the power (and assigned the duty) to "make all Laws" that are "necessary and proper for carrying into Execution" absolutely "all [the] Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof." That necessarily means that Congress has not only the power, but also the duty to "make all Laws" that are "necessary and proper" to govern all the president's men and all the president's powers.

Article VI emphasized that federal law that was "made in Pursuance" of our Constitution is part of the "the supreme Law of the Land" and all "Judges" everywhere under U.S. jurisdiction "shall be bound thereby." Article III emphasized that federal "judicial Power shall extend" no further than permitted "under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties."

The foregoing means that federal judges have the power (and duty) to adjudicate cases regarding claims that a federal law is not "necessary and proper" or not "in Pursuance" of our Constitution. As every SCOTUS justice is very well aware, judges have the power and duty to invalidate an unconstitutional statute, but they have no power to fabricate any exception to any statute that is "necessary and proper" and "in pursuance" of our Constitution.

As a result of the foregoing, another way to look at SCOTUS's presidential immunity decision is that it is essentially irrelevant. SCOTUS said that the president is absolutely protected (has absolute immunity) from prosecution for fulfilling his "core" duties, and he might have some protection (immunity) for performing "official" duties.

The president's "core" and "official" duties are limited to those emphasized by Article II. Article II (and the President's oath of office) prominently emphasized that the first, foremost and constant duty of the President always is (merely) to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States" to "the best of" the President's "Ability." Fulfilling such duty clearly necessarily includes "tak[ing] Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." Clearly, every power of the president is subordinate, first, to the legislative power of the People (our Constitution) and, second, to the legislative power of our representatives in Congress. So if a prosecutor can prove that a president has violated his duties under Article II, then the president clearly can be prosecuted by laws enacted by Congress in pursuance of our Constitution.

Cleo's avatar

Thank you for taking the time for this clarification.

Kathleen Pirquet's avatar

Yes!

They did. Presidents are NOT kings or emperors.

Trump, thugs, et al, will have to take their deeply loathed place in history, forever reviled and fortified with NO more room to maneuvre.

Steve 218's avatar

This concept was expanded by the Supine Court. This is actually where changes need to be made. A code of ethics that all other courts and federal workers are required to follow must be imposed upon the Court. Add term limits too. Presidential immunity and Citizens United need to be overturned, and all provisions of the Voting Rights Act restored.

Ammending the Constitution with this rabble at the helm would be opening it up to even worse civil rights violations being codified.

Charles G. Masi's avatar

When enough DOJ lawyers get disbarred, Trump will run out of fools to hire, embarrass, and discard.

I AM ANTIFA!

Kathleen Pirquet's avatar

Most decent, loyal Americans are AntiFa. It's a social agreement, not an organization. It's a disposition of loyalty to our democracy and its finest principles.

Charles G. Masi's avatar

Yes, but we've gotta say it, and say it, and say it . . .. Make I AM ANTIFA! a rallying cry. Put it on tee-shirts and wear them. It does no good to just know it. If we own it, MAGA minions will begin to shut up about it. Trump will learn who's an American and who's a fascist loser.

I AM ANTIFA!

Hiro's avatar

"Just Security’s tracker reveals that judges in over 40 cases have found reason to “distrust…government information and representations.” Thank you Jenn for highlighting this important behavior of Trump justice routinely misrepresent the facts. We need two forces working together: judges and the ethics committee of law association disbarring these Trump lawyers. Unfortunately major papers NYT or WP never seem to report on this fundamental flaw of Trump justice.

Jack Jordan's avatar

Stephen, you're so right that we really need to think about systemic solutions. The deluge of lies by Trump and his people shouldn't be seen as an aberration. The misperception that deception by people in power is something new is a dangerous delusion. Tricks and lies, deception and manipulation by people in power always have been and always will be problems and challenges for the people in a republic. The people who wrote and ratified our original Constitution and our Bill of Rights (the first 10 amendments) repeatedly highlighted this self-evident truth.

"We the People" wrote and ratified our Constitution to secure the "Privileges and Immunities of Citizens," in part by requiring the "United States" to "guarantee" us "a Republican Form of Government" (U.S. Constitution Article IV). But having republican government doesn't mean we all get a free ride.

James Madison (rightly regarded as the Father of the Constitution and the Father of the Bill of Rights) emphasized the difficulty of maintaining a republican form of government and the duty of all Americans to help do so:

"A popular Government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or, perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives."

Alexander Hamilton emphasized the same principle with different words in The Federalist No. 70:

“The two greatest securities” that “the people” have “for the faithful exercise of any delegated power” (powers that We the People delegated to our public servants in federal government) are “the restraints” imposed by “public opinion” and the public’s “opportunity of discovering with facility and clearness [official] misconduct” to facilitate officials’ “removal from office” or “punishment.”

Our safety and security, our rights and privileges, depend on the people not foolishly presuming that we can trust any person who is sufficiently ambitious to seek or seize political power.

Susan Iwanisziw's avatar

Oaths of office in the Trump camp are meaningless, along with personal integrity, the public good, and selflessness. Favor and full pockets rule. Thank goodness for all the stalwart souls fighting this pernicious infection of the body politic.

Robot Bender's avatar

Not to mention the USSC. At least four Justices lied like cheap drugs during their confirmation hearings.

Charles's avatar

Susan, those are foreign terms in the Trump regime. Nobody knows what they mean or where they came from. Why would members of the regime follow such foreign ideas?

Scott Whitmire's avatar

True, but violating an oath of office is grounds for disbarment for lawyers, and violates codes of ethics for nearly all licensed professionals.

Niki's avatar

FINALLY!!! I am a simple citizen, retired and of an age to be called elderly, but still apparently of clear mind. I have been asking FOR NOT LESS THAN 6 MONTHS where the Bar Associations are, as too many of their members behave outrageously, lying, defying orders, and persistently trampling on their supposed "code" of conduct.

HOLD ACCOUNTABLE THOSE WHO ARE FSILING TO HOLD THE LIARS ACCOUNTABLE. And that includes the lawyers sitting in a house labeled Supreme whose corruption has been exposed more than a year ago.

Nancy W's avatar

Jennifer Rubin, you are a national treasure. Thank you for this concise and well written explanation of what's going on with Trump's lawyers.

pmpmpm's avatar

It is not unethical conduct, it is illegal conduct which at a minimum should result in immediate disbarment, civil penalties and the possibility of criminal penalties. Aren't lawyers supposed to be held to a higher standard , so throw in 1,000 hours of community service.

A country is only as good as our citizenry. What do you want to be???

David Burica's avatar

Exactly. Not doing anything makes the judges and Bar Associations complicit.

Jim Carmichael's avatar

Absolutely correct. The law is slippery enough, but without personal integrity it is nothing.

willoughby's avatar

The law, like democracy itself, can only thrive if everyone agrees to the fundamentals. It's a gentlemen's agreement, and you can't have a gentlemen's agreement if there are no gentlemen. Maga lawyers, like all Magas, are driven by expediency and by a sense of their own entitlement to victory. It may sometimes masquerade as True Belief (this is how the right hatched the bogus theory of "originalism") but it is always at core about just one thing: winning at any cost.

Like the Christian fanatics who believe "it's not a lie if you're lying for the Lord," Maga attorneys seem to be able to persuade themselves that lying under oath, manufacturing evidence, making laughably false accusations, intimidating witnesses, conducting smear campaigns in the press, even threatening opposing counsel and judges, are all legitimate means to a necessary end: their own triumph.

There were lawyers like these in Stalin's USSR and Hitler's Germany. They didn't have any sense of shame either.

patricia's avatar

like traffic laws...they work because everyone agrees to stop at a red light,drive on the right side of the road etc.

Judy Robinson's avatar

If people consider themselves to be Christian, and believe they can include lying with the described self-allowed permission, they surely know where their final destination will be, according to their beliefs. Or do they believe they can lie as much as they want and then ask for forgiveness each time? However it is considered, they are harming people, courts, our country, the world, and their own souls.

Further, I do not understand how anyone in Congress could have voted to accept any known liar into the judiciary branch of our government, yet some of them did.

David Burica's avatar

Fine. Let them lie for their religion. Then jail and disbar them. For their religion.

Robot Bender's avatar

Yes, the Jesuits came up with "holy deception."

Judy Robinson's avatar

I did not remember that. if I ever knew it at all.

Joyce Hamel's avatar

Judges should be able to act sua sponte EVERY time a DOJ lawyer is found lying and simply dismiss the government's case.

David Betts's avatar

That's a good start, then put the liars in jail.

Tracy Kohlbeck's avatar

And the ones who do show integrity get fired. The lawyers are in a no-win situation, not that that's an excuse.

Kim E Jones's avatar

Of course they can be in a winning situation. They move on to another law firm or open their own practices. There is no excuse for illegal and unethical behavior. Same with spineless congressional Republicans. Lose your seat if you must do so to save your soul.

Celia Ludi's avatar

I wonder how many disbarred lawyers from his first administration are now lobbyists...

Tracy Kohlbeck's avatar

Solid points, I concur.

Cyndi's avatar

They could quit, if they really wanted to.

kathleen mary's avatar

Thank you Jennifer, for your ongoing tireless efforts. HCR’s interview yesterday with Substack’s Jim Acosta was illuminating!:

https://substack.com/@jimacosta/note/p-177915482?r=1kncci&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=notes-share-action

donna woodward's avatar

These were excellent discussions. Thanks for the reference.

Dr. Judith Schlesinger's avatar

I read "legal ethics" and immediately thought, "oxymoron." It's long been obvious that Rump's lawyers couldn't even spell the words, let alone consider them, and that the Supreme Court - back in the day, the most admired people in the land - had become a spineless joke. Companies and universities are collapsing their traditions of equality and inclusion, not for any principle, but for pure greed. We depend now on the lower courts to make things right, to hold the line, to remind us of what is legally right and wrong, as so many of our classic guardrails are gone.

More power to them!!

Ivan Tufaart's avatar

It used to be said that one reason it's hard to win a medical malpractice suit or a petition to the state medical board to sanction a physician is because doctors stick together and are reluctant to punish another doctor.

I suspect that the same holds true for attorneys. And since essentially all judges are attorneys, they're probably reluctant to refer miscreants to their bar associations' disciplinary committees, and even if they do, the committees are reluctant to lower the boom.

Maybe the serious threat of a fine, a license suspension, or even a revocation would get those DOJ mouthpieces to clean up their act.

Cyndi's avatar

If there were repercussions for some portion of the egregious malpractice, I suspect it would thin the ranks of the willfully ignorant useful idiots.

Let's start with Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh. By the time they run out of ways to push back, we would be staring down the 2029 inauguration and hopefully a Democratic President and Democratic Congress.

Steve 218's avatar

"If “legal ethics” has become an oxymoron, we are in deep trouble."

From this read, it is not only oxymoronic; it has become so flexibly ignored by government lawyers that judges have their hands full attempting to eke out the truth in presented cases. The time is now for state bar associations to show their teeth and rid us of these lying bastards. Democratic policy should stress a return to the truth. It will be difficult, as there is (and has been) so much doubt sowed. It will be hard to restore trust.

Michelle Jordan's avatar

As we all know here, the DOJ is not the president’s personal law firm. Though he treats it if it is. Checks and balances hardly exist in this government. The Supreme Court has allowed this president to get away with just about anything. Congress has essentially abdicated their responsibility in keeping the executive branch in check. The lower courts are the only ones that are really doing their jobs. Who besides these other branches keep this regime in check? That was just answered by a concept known as legal ethics. That’s why we have the great Norm Eisen doing his legal and ethical duty of bringing lawsuits against this regime in order to protect and defend the rule of law as well as honor the constitution. Other lawyers must do the same until congress can get it. It is congress that must keep Trump walking the legal line. But we see their failures clearly.

Daniel Solomon's avatar

Will Contrarian come to DC Nov 18?

I keep posting. According to Congressman Eric Swalwell (D-CA) Trumpepstein may cause an "Epstein bomb" causing over 100 Republican members to "jailbreak" from Trump.

Massive Congressional visits November 18.

https://www.instagram.com/flare.usa/p/DP_mdOyjdiG/

Visit CongressionalRepublicans.

https://www.mobilize.us/indivisible/event/851451/

I continue to be exasperated by the parties and lawyers with cases when justices and judges who have dispositive records of bribery and prejudice are not challenged. At SCOTUS, Roberts opened the door in November, 2023. https://www.supremecourt.gov/about/Code-of-Conduct-for-Justices_November_13_2023.pdf

Anca Vlasopolos's avatar

Why does not the American Bar Association disbar drumpf's lawyers who have misled judges? We know the courts have no enforcement power since they don't have a police force or ICE agents or Border Patrol agents or the National Guard or military troops at their command. But professionally these liars and tramplers on their oaths and the ethics of their profession should be thrown out, as on occasion are physicians for malpractice.

Celia Ludi's avatar

The American Bar Association is a professional association, it does not license lawyers. Lawyers are licensed by the Bar in each state. Each state is slightly different, but they all have a process for submitting a complaint, a ("due") process for determining its validity, and penalties up to and including disbarment. So immediate professional accountability isn't possible, no matter how frustrating it is for the rest of us. Apparently, only DoJ lawyers can be fired on the spot. I was heartened by the mention that a long line of lawyers from his previous administration had been disbarred or otherwise sanctioned.

Anca Vlasopolos's avatar

We can only hope to see the same fate awaits the present toadies. The Rules of Professional Conduct drafted by the ABA should serve as ways to disbar the lawyers in the states in which they passed the bar.