A lot has happened in America since the summer of 2024. It can be hard to navigate our country’s constantly changing political climate. In July 2024, Donald J. Trump was granted Presidential immunity. In November 2024, Mr. Trump won the Presidential election. We’re all wondering what happens next. But before we get to that, let’s rewind to July 1st, 2024, the day that the Supreme Court granted Mr. Trump Presidential immunity in a 6-3 decision.
To make a long story short, Trump recently has had many court dates but the only one that managed to reach the Supreme Court was the involving the January 6th case. In August of 2023, Trump was indicted on four counts of conduct due to “his attempt to reverse the 2020 election results: conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding and conspiracy against rights.” He moved to dismiss on the basis of Presidential immunity.
There is a longstanding policy within the judicial system that entitles sitting presidents to immunity from criminal and civil prosecution pertaining to their official acts as President. The term ‘official acts’ refers to the idea that if a person who is President does an action under the umbrella of their office, then the act is official. But if that person does an action as an individual, then the act is unofficial. For example, if a President takes a call on their personal phone, then the call is an unofficial act. If a President takes a scheduled call (White House verified) to talk about the domestic agenda, that would be an official act. Trump appealed using the claim that Presidential immunity should not only apply to a sitting President but also apply after the Presidency.
The Role of the Supreme Court
Trump moved to dismiss his case until it reached the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court is the highest judicial court in the country and has jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases. Supreme Court justices serve for the length of their life or until they retire. When there is an opening in the Supreme Court, a justice is nominated by the sitting President and then confirmed by the Senate. Presidents tend to nominate Court Justices that can help further their party’s agenda. The President’s decision cannot be undone by future Presidents, Congress, or any other body in government. This is a problem because it implements political bias into the Court. Political bias interferes with the Supreme Court’s role in democracy.
The role of the judicial branch is to interpret laws in a bipartisan manner in order to remove bias from the court and maintain democracy. This might work on paper, but in real life, all individuals are burdened with political biases that bleed into the decisions of the court. Three members of the Supreme Court were appointed by Donald Trump during his last Presidency. Now, there are 6 conservative judges and 3 liberals. These political affiliations are apparent in the court’s rulings.
What Does the Ruling Change?
On July 1st, 2024, in Trump v. United States, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Presidential immunity. When I first found out about the ruling, I was alarmed. I believed that Presidential immunity meant that there would be no guardrails on the President. I was extremely worried that Presidents, namely Trump, would be able to do anything that suits their fancy without checks or balances. I thought our democracy was going to become a dictatorship. However, my perception of the ruling was a much more exaggerated version of what had actually occurred.
In reality, the Supreme Court did not grant unlimited, absolute immunity. The court granted former Presidents different levels of federal immunity depending on the action. The first type of action is acts that fall under the President’s “conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority.” These actions are granted absolute immunity from criminal prosecution. The second type of action is acts that fall under official acts. These actions are granted preclusive immunity from criminal prosecution. The third type of action is acts categorized as unofficial acts. These actions are not granted any immunity from criminal prosecution.
I am not arguing in favor of the Supreme Court’s decision. However, I want you to understand their logic. The Supreme Court’s reasoning behind the ruling was that if a President can, at any point in their life, be subject to criminal prosecution, then the President may hesitate in executing duties critical to their office. This could be problematic because if the President cannot effectively and efficiently execute their duties, then the entire system of democracy could be at stake. This problem was never considered prior to this case because no President had been successfully prosecuted by a federal level criminal court. Now that a new precedent has been set, the Supreme Court feared that if one President can be prosecuted, then every future President will have a constant threat of prosecution looming in the back of their minds. They deduced that being President means having no time to second guess your every move.
You might accept this justification, but the costs of granting more power to Presidents greatly outweigh the consequences of any hesitations that future Presidents might have. This is because the ruling violates the rule of law.
The Impact of Presidential Immunity
Rule of law is the idea that no individual is above the law. The law is the highest power within our government. Historically, rule of law has been the most important check and balance on people in the government and positions of power. It allows for real legal equality and without it, our democracy would be illegitimate.
Now, because of the ruling, former, current, and future Presidents are more powerful than the law, violating the most fundamental basis of democracy. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor said in her dissent, “Today’s decision to grant former Presidents criminal immunity reshapes the institution of the Presidency.” She continued to say that “it makes a mockery of the principle, foundational to our Constitution and system of Government, that no man is above the law.” Indeed, it’s absurd that our system of government can so easily enable the President to step outside the confines of their power. Presidential immunity makes the rule of law look like a joke.
It is clear that Presidential immunity has the potential to be disastrous, but what could have greater effects is its perception. We can’t undo the perception of this granted immunity. It will forever be known that Presidents were above the law at some point in our history. Power in democracy should be held by the people. Therefore, people’s perception gains influence to the point of being just as powerful, if not more powerful than the written law. Even now, clarifying that the immunity is not as paramount as it could be does not make me feel better. No matter the extent of the immunity, I still believe it is a violation of rule of law.
I brought my concerns about Presidential immunity to Samantha Jewett, a former civil litigator of over 20 years. Ms. Jewett is the only fifth generation attorney in the state of New Hampshire. I had the pleasure of interviewing her both before and after the election. Before the election, Ms. Jewett held the opinion that in the long run, the immunity ruling will not have that large of an impact. She said, “This is a black mark in our history. It was bound to happen sooner or later. However, I think we have enough safety nets in place so that this never happens again” She continued stating, “our democracy will be stronger than ever.” She believed that the ruling was just a momentary lapse in democracy. Perhaps Ms. Jewett is correct and the immunity ruling will eventually be overturned once new leaders come into power. In this future, the damage can be erased.
The Effect of the Election
In order to understand the impact of Presidential immunity, you need to understand recent political events and a basic idea of how our government works. The government is split into three branches: the legislative, which writes the law; the judicial, which interprets the law; and the executive, which enforces it. Because of Presidential immunity, the judicial branch no longer has power over Mr. Trump. The legislative branch is divided between the House and the Senate. Both the Senate and House just held elections. The Republicans won a majority in the Senate, meaning that they now control it until the next election. Likewise, the Republicans won the house. This means that the entire legislative body will be dominated by Republicans. The final branch is the executive which is headed by the President. President-elect Donald Trump will begin his Presidency on January 20th, 2025. In essence, all three branches of government will be heavily under the influence of Donald Trump.
In short, the election changed everything. Before the election, I interviewed lawyer Stephen Barnes. When I described Ms. Jewett’s predictions for the future, he said, “that is potentially the case, but it’s equally likely that it will go the other way and swing further. We are going through an election right now where, if Donald Trump is elected a second time, he could easily take that [immunity] to an even further degree. He could interpret that as he can do whatever he wants, including limiting or changing statutory limitations and term limits. There’s a lot of things he could take and run with it.” Now that the election has occurred, we must take Mr. Barnes’ worries into account. If Mr. Barnes’ predictions are correct, we could potentially see the office of the presidency obtain unprecedented power.
In 2016, we saw a similar situation in which Republicans won the House, Senate, and Presidency. This is called a “governing trifecta.” A trifecta can allow a party to pass the policies they favor without much resistance. Both Trump and Biden had trifectas during the first two years of their terms. However, a trifecta does not guarantee unilateral support. Currently, key leaders of the Republican party are quietly pushing back against Trump and his political agenda.
While the trifecta is the same as it was in 2016, Presidential immunity changes the game. Trump can now take larger risks as President because even after his term, he will maintain immunity. After the election, Ms. Jewett explained to me that “the three branches of government, the judicial, the legislative and the executive, have always been three separate entities. With Trump, they are all combined. It’s like he has control of all of them.”
What Does This Mean for Our Future?
Without much opposition in congress, President Trump can make good on his campaign promises. Ms. Jewett was especially concerned with what this could mean for women’s rights. She broke it down for me by stating, “If you’re fourteen now, your mom had more rights than you do now at the age of fourteen. She had more rights at fourteen than you do today. She had a right over her body. She had a right over decisions that affected her autonomy. You do not have those rights.” This reality is shocking to think about. Now with President Trump back in power, we could see even more of our rights infringed upon.
Not only this, but Mr. Trump’s agenda could include mass deportation, large tax cuts, tariffs, repealing the Affordable Care Act, expanding fossil fuel production, and decreasing transgender rights and diversity initiatives.
There has never been a time before now in which all of these conditions have existed. There is a Republican governing trifecta, the Supreme Court favors the Republican Party, the President-elect is a convicted felon, and the President-elect has more legal immunity than any past President. These events set a new precedent for what is possible in law and the government. The Presidential immunity ruling could be just one of many future laws that give more power to the President.
I interviewed a Bronx Science student who wishes to remain anonymous both before and after the election about her thoughts on the future. Before the election she thought that, “the ruling definitely has corrupt aspects behind it, but isn’t a threat to democracy. Although this is a legal loophole, most politicians and government people can maneuver through the legal system regardless. People already are basically above the law — this is just on paper.”
However, the election changed her mind. She said that, “I feel like because one party has control over the House, the Senate, and the Executive branch, it makes the Presidential immunity ruling have bigger risks. Now, not only can the President do whatever he wants, but also everyone in his administration can kind of do what they want to, since they now have the majority.” This student continued by stating, “I do think it’s a threat to democracy.”
These recent events have set a new precedent in our democracy in which the President has an increased amount of power. As time goes on, we could see the power of the Presidency expanded as well as other changes to the rule of law.
Despite this possibility, Ms. Jewett still holds firm in her faith in our country. When I interviewed her after the election she said, “Call me an optimist, but I still believe in our democracy. I still believe that we just haven’t hit rock bottom yet. I believe in the next two years we will see that democracy will survive.”
“Call me an optimist, but I still believe in our democracy. I still believe that we just haven’t hit rock bottom yet. I believe in the next two years we will see that democracy will survive,” said Samantha Jewett, a former litigator.