To the Editor:

Can the president of the United States send Seal Team 6 on a mission to kill his political rival? This should not be a serious question. The whole darned point of this American experiment is that we are not to be ruled by a king. Two hundred and forty plus years ago, thousands of American colonists fought and died to win this freedom from the British crown. And yet the Supreme Court has now decided to treat presidential immunity from the law as a legitimate question. There’s a greater than zero chance that the Supreme Court will say a president is de jure, not just de facto, above the law. 

And I mean A president, not THE president. Because this current Supreme Court did not permit sitting President Biden to forgive student loans, yet it just said on February 28th that it is willing to hear former President Trump’s argument that his previous presidency grants him immunity from criminal prosecution for trying to overturn the 2020 election and install himself as an unelected dictator. 

Three years later, Donald Trump is finally facing consequences for his lifetime perfidy. He owes well over $400 million dollars across two civil cases for defaming his rape victim and financially defrauding New York State, and is currently facing 91 felony charges across four criminal cases related to various aspects of election interference and/or abuses of presidential power. 

Trump is running for president again, this time for that apparently not so elusive “get out of jail free” card. A victory in November will allow him to dismiss the two federal cases if ongoing or, if completed, pardon himself, while daring New York or Georgia officials to detain a sitting president after a state conviction. 

An appeals court already rightly ruled that, no, a president does not have legal immunity to assassinate his political rival or overturn an election, but the Supreme Court granted cert to Trump’s appeal of the lower court decision, thus further delaying the D.C. election interference trial, which cannot begin until the immunity question is answered. Even if SCOTUS ultimately upholds the appeals court decision, which is no guarantee, the D.C. case could be delayed long enough for Trump to dismiss it if he’s president again. Which would be immaterial anyway if SCOTUS rules in his favor and makes him God King Trump. 

Sean Pidgeon
Morristown