Emoluments lawsuits dismissed by Supreme Court

[lpetrich]

Supreme Court Ends Emoluments Suits Against Trump - The New York Times - "The lawsuits accused the former president of violating the Constitution by doing business with foreign governments. The justices dismissed the suits as moot."

That is, made irrelevant by later events.

The Supreme Court on Monday put an end to two lawsuits that had accused President Donald J. Trump of violating the Constitution’s emoluments clauses by profiting from his hotels and restaurants in New York and Washington.

In brief orders, the court wiped out rulings against Mr. Trump in the two cases and dismissed them as moot. There were no dissents noted.

The move means that there will be no definitive Supreme Court ruling on the meaning of the two provisions of the Constitution concerning emoluments, a term that means compensation for labor or services. One provision, the domestic emoluments clause, bars the president from receiving “any other emolument” from the federal government or the states beyond his official compensation.

The other provision, the foreign emoluments clause, bars anyone holding a federal “office of profit or trust” from accepting “any present, emolument, office, or title, of any kind whatever, from any king, prince, or foreign state” without the consent of Congress.

I think that that is an awful verdict, because Trump was President when he did those things. Seems like anyone can escape justice for misdeeds committed as part of some position, simply by leaving that position.

 

[marc]

Well I heard that the issue is the lawsuit was not looking for any kind of punishment. No fines or criminal prosecution. The lawsuit was filed simply to stop his actions that violated the clause. As he is no longer in office, he can't violate the clause anymore, therefore the lawsuit as is is moot. Now if a different lawsuit was filed that was looking for some kind of punishment for violating the law, that would have a chance of going through and seeing something done.

 

[ideologyhunter]

Trump has made the emoluments clause meaningless, then. If he's acquitted in Impeach II, won't impeachment be utterly impotent? If you can't be impeached and convicted for building up a mob, inviting it to a "wild" time in Washington, telling it that it must fight hard for its country, then sending it howling down the street to confront Congress, what could anyone ever be impeached for? (I'm searching for the right hypothetical crime to insert here, but I got nothin'.)

 

[LoAmmo]

This is like a cop pulling a guy over for speeding and saying, "I stopped you because you were doing 120 mph in a 60 for the last 50 miles or so, but...I see you're doing zero mph now, so...have a nice day!"

 

[lpetrich]

Supreme Court ends Trump emoluments lawsuits

The high court’s action was the first in an expected steady stream of orders and rulings on pending lawsuits involving Trump now that his presidency has ended. Some orders may result in dismissals of cases since Trump is no longer president. In other cases, proceedings that had been delayed because Trump was in the White House could resume and their pace even quicken.

...
Other cases involving Trump remain before the Supreme Court, or in lower courts.

Trump is trying to block the Manhattan district attorney ’s enforcement of a subpoena for his tax returns, part of a criminal investigation into the president and his businesses. Lower courts are weighing congressional subpoenas for Trump’s financial records. And the justices also have before them Trump’s appeal of a decision forbidding him from blocking critics on his Twitter account. Like the emoluments cases, Trump’s appeal would seem to be moot now that he is out of office and also had his Twitter account suspended.

This issue affects the impeachment trial.

Republican senators and some legal scholars have said that Trump’s impeachment trial in the Senate cannot proceed now that he is once again a private citizen. But many scholars have said that Trump’s return to private life poses no impediment to an impeachment trial.

 

[Politesse]

I was dissapointed by this outcome, but not surprised. Expect to see plenty more instances of "kicking the can down the road" from this particular configuration of the Court.

Trump has made the emoluments clause meaningless, then. If he's acquitted in Impeach II, won't impeachment be utterly impotent? If you can't be impeached and convicted for building up a mob, inviting it to a "wild" time in Washington, telling it that it must fight hard for its country, then sending it howling down the street to confront Congress, what could anyone ever be impeached for?

Being in a significantly minority party and doing those things? Impeachment votes have never had anything to do with principles, they're just a numbers game. I think most Americans know that. Certainly our politicians do. Ethical arguments are for decorating speeches, not deciding votes. If, say, the Greens or Libertarians ever got someone into the White House somehow, I think there's a decent chance that person wouldn't finish their term.

 

[Keith&Co.]

This issue affects the impeachment trial.

As marc said, this specific lawsuit just adked for him to stop doing the bad while president. Not punish him. The remedy requested was overcome by events.
The impeachment asks to affect things still in play. Retirement pay, SecServ detail, future term options, and, hopefully, his continued use of the Presidential Seal on fundraising efforts.

 

[Shadowy Man]

This is like a cop pulling a guy over for speeding and saying, "I stopped you because you were doing 120 mph in a 60 for the last 50 miles or so, but...I see you're doing zero mph now, so...have a nice day!"

With all the originalists on the court, this must have been the way the founders wanted it.