The problem is not really with presidential immunity - it's that the check on presidential powers was supposed to be Congress. But Congress is clearly powerless and has slowly been gutted of its power.
America so far has been incredibly lucky - we have the oldest constitution in the world. Yet nearly every government that has tried to copy it has failed. And it's fairly telling that when we successfully rebuilt countries after WWII, we largely pulled from other government models and established parliamentary systems.
Not even remotely.
* the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (1922 - present) carried forward the Constitution of
* the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (1801 - 1922) which itself carried forward the Constitution of
* the Kingdom of Great Britain (1707 - 1801), which carried forward the Constitution of
* the Kingdom of England (and Wales) (1536 - 1707), which carried forward the Constitution of
* the Kingdom of England* (927 - 1707)
The phrase you likely wanted was "the oldest and shortest written constitution still in force."
> Yet nearly every government that has tried to copy it has failed.
Sure. It's flawed. That's why, for example, some countries just picked the servicable parts and went hybrid with (say) "Washminster" systems.
> “The President… is amenable to [the law] in his private character as a citizen, and in his public character by impeachment.”
- James Wilson - one of the drafters and early Supreme Court justice
I'm not arguing that the constitution gives the president broad immunity for all personal crimes. But it was pretty understood at the time and in the text of the constitution that impeachment was to proceed all legal criminal charges.
How so? Please elaborate.
I would point out that there's explicit language in Article I, Section 6 about House and Senate members being immune from prosecution for carrying out their duties:
The Senators and Representatives shall receive a Compensation for their Services, to be ascertained by Law, and paid out of the Treasury of the United States. They shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place.
I could see an argument that the President should probably be protected from arrest during his term, similar to Congressmen, but there's very clearly no mention of such protection in in the Constitution I can find.
However, that's nothing compared to the broad protections the Roberts court handed him in Trump v. United States: protection from investigation, even after his term expires.
The President can "officially" suborn the murder of anyone, and as long as there is insufficient time for an impeachment trial or he leaves office before the act is discovered or he is charged with impeachment, cannot be held accountable for it by any means.
The law doesn't matter if there is no one to enforce it, or if enforcement is selective, etc.
It does seem kind of backwards that this kind of immunity is required - although i think the Supreme Court ruling made something official that was already true in practice. There is a mechanism for prosecuting presidents, impeachment and a trial in the Senate, it's just not very likely to happen...
lol and immediately restored the monarchy with his son
That is not a substitute for prosecution, it is a political process for removing a president. The Constitution's authors likely meant it to be used when a president ignored their duty, violated the Constitution, or lost public support before the end of their term. These are not federal crimes, so they don't go through the federal courts. The impeachment and removal process does imitate indictment and trial, but that's because there's no reason to reinvent the wheel.
The SCOTUS ruling went far beyond historical practice. Historically, officials weren't prosecuted for official acts unless it was shown the act was part of another crime. So if the President delayed a FEMA response because of budget worries or incorrect forecasts, nobody would be prosecuted or open to lawsuits from citizens who suffered. But now, no official investigator can interview an appointed official to find out if the act was done as part of a crime. Worse, if the act was a presidential power enumerated in the Constitution, there is almost no way to investigate its use in an obvious crime. If the President only pardons people after they pay him $20,000 dollars, the President is immune from investigation.
A hypothetical raised in the dissent is still an open question: what could be done if Donald Trump orders a military strike team to kill the next Democratic presidential nominee? Do you expect this Congress to actually impeach him? After he lied to, riled up, directed, and have plenty of time to a mob who invaded Congress and built a gallows to hang the Vice President? And Congress didn't prevent him from ever holding office again?
I am not swayed by any argument along the lines of "But the President will be too worried about vindictive prosecution to make the right choices." If we really need to prevent that, I'd rather have every president thrown in prison for life after their term. No need to worry about prosecution, because you already know what awaits you. The office is more important than any individual holding it.
The ruling was specific to the President, not other officials. Donald Trump is the only president in US history who has been formally charged with committing a crime while in office, so I don't see how the ruling went far beyond historical practice. I do think it went far beyond what some people had assumed would be the case if it were ever tested.
The fact that Nixon resigned rather than triggering a test of this and then was pardoned by Ford (also avoiding a test of immunity) are indicators that historical practice was closer to immunity than not (i.e. past presidents did whatever was in their power to avoid having immunity scrutinized).
The Final Solution to The Jewish Problem was an official act too. So according to this ruling, you get immunity for genocide. Fun stuff.
OTOH Even if he did send immigrants and liberals to deathcamps there's no way hard core trump voters would turn on him so he never has to worry about getting removed from office through impeachment with a 2/3rds majority after the midterms.
It was a direct quote.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/08/us/politics/trump-intervi...
> The President of the United States is the most powerful person in the country, and possibly the world. When he uses his official powers in any way, under the majority’s reasoning, he now will be insulated from criminal prosecution. Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune.
I think future law philosophers and historians will cite this as an example of how immunity should not work. If the president can break any law as long as he is doing it as the president in an official manner (for example by signing an executive order), nothing can stop him from having all his political enemies arrested, exiled or straight-up murdered. So there is literally only the goodwill of one single person keeping the US from becoming a fascist dictatorship.
Well, not quite. Immunity from prosecution is not immunity from impeachment/removal (which is a political, not judicial, process).
Of course, that has its own problems, but just pointing out that in theory there are more checks than just the one you mention.
At least that is my understanding; I'm not a lawyer or constitutional scholar :)
impeached
This is why there is a general sense that the POTUS is now more or less completely untethered from any possible consequences for his actions.
This is not true.
The framework defines how to interpret the law. If the president were to do as you say, the subesequent criminal case (brought by federal or state authorities) would interpret those actions in the standard judicial process. If a jury were to determine that the president was acting in the interest of himself, then the president does not get immunity.
This is a hyperbolic misreading of the court's decision. The president was only cleared to act with impunity with the DOJ, as the department is part of the executive branch. For the other issues revolving around election interference, the court actually invited the case to be reheard - the prosecutors though must make a case that the illegal interference wasn't related to his duties as a president.
That said, I don't know why there has been a huge failure to re-litigate this issue. The previous administration could have followed up but never did - and I fear it was done out of a terrible political miscalculation.
POTUS is now unstoppable and untethered.
Fixes: for the love of God, fixed terms for Supreme Court nominees. No?
Do the EU Elite and the Democrats still think that its Putin who is the Evil One?
Everyone is spinning this as "total immunity". It's not. At least, it's not worded that way.
What's actually going to happen is that, the first time someone tries to prosecute it, it's going to go all the way to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court, as it is constituted at that time, will judge whether the action in question was an official act under core constitutional powers. Until then, we don't actually know what that line looks like. I suspect it's going to be less blanket than everyone seems to be assuming... but we will see.
You can see a similar play at work with the unprecedented use of the shadow docket to prevent lower courts from restraining the executive branch without having to take credit for positions which are highly dubious from a constitutional standpoint. If the political tides shift, they can quietly unblock the lower court’s ruling and pretend they hadn’t deliberately given this administration a window of opportunity without creating a permanent precedent empowering a future Democratic administration.
Arresting all his political enemies is not a core constitutional power
What he will do is... what he is already doing. What every dictator for hundreds of years has done. His enemies will be persecuted and prosecuted under the guise of legal action: tax fraud, national security, whatever. The sort of compromat that exists, or can be fabricated to exist, for every single person on Earth.
To even have a hope of stopping Trump (or any other POTUS) there would have to be clear proof of malicious intent completely divorced from his job duties, and you'd need a Congress or Supreme Court that gave half a shit about opposing him.
Today, pretty much everyone is citing this as an example of how immunity should not work.
Even Bush/Cheney went through the motions of coming up with a legal reasoning for torture. Even Bush got Congressional approval for military actions.
This president is off the rails not even trying to have even a flimsy cover of legality.
Rather he has a nerve to declare US War powers act illegal and threatened, abused, and yelled at those 5 republican senators who voted with democrats. Wild times!!
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/08/us/politics/trump-intervi...
The problem is Trump but also he's a symptom of a larger problem.
Left and right are so at odds with each other that all the reforms that a modern country would have to undertake in order to have less traumatic and less 'winner take all' elections not only weren't undertaken like they were in other countries, but the odds of actually happening are close to 0% ever since 2016