Category: JohnRoberts

Pelosi serves well-deserved shade on McConnell, Chief Justice Roberts over sham impeachment

Posted on by Joan McCarter

No one can twist a political knife quite like House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Think of the now-legendary clapback at impeached president Donald Trump at last year's State of the Union address. She's the queen of shade, and you just knew that Mitch McConnell was going to be on the receiving end of some of that. It hit Saturday morning in a brutal tweet that cast a wide penumbra, taking in the potted plant who presided over last week's sham impeachment trial.

"It is a sad day for America to see Senator McConnell humiliate the Chief Justice of the United States into presiding over a vote which rejected our nation's judicial norms, precedents and institutions which uphold the Constitution and the rule of law," she wrote. Ouch. That's all she said. That's all she needed to say. Chief Justice John Roberts is going to come out of this thing looking like a tool, and it's because of McConnell's machinations. It's because there was no way McConnell was going to let this impeachment trial be anything but a travesty.

History is not going to look kindly on either of those men.

It's time to end McConnell's destructive stranglehold on the republic. Please give $1 to our nominee fund to help Democrats and end McConnell's career as Senate majority leader.

Collins, Alexander prove that fix has been in all along on Trump’s impeachment trial

Posted on by Joan McCarter

There will almost certainly not be a 50-50 tie in the Senate impeachment trial on whether to have additional witnesses and documents. Sen. Susan Collins, almost immediately following the closing of Thursday night's session, showed that she'd been given the "hall pass" from McConnell to vote "yes" on witnesses. In a three-paragraph statement that was probably written before the trial even began.

Moments after Collins’ statement, as if it were totally choreographed to try to make her look like the hero, Sen. Lamar Alexander announced that he is a "no" because "there is no need for more evidence to prove something that has already been proven and that does not meet the U.S. Constitution’s high bar for an impeachable offense." He goes on to say essentially, yes Trump definitely did it, but we don't need to impeach him over it.

If, as expected, Sen. Mitt Romney votes for witnesses, that leaves just Sen. Lisa Murkowski as an unknown. She’s said she's thinking on it. That's most likely false, because the main thing has been trying to give Collins cover, and McConnell is not going to allow Chief Justice Roberts being in the position of having to decide whether or not to break a tie.

We have to end their hold on the Senate. Please give $1 to our nominee fund to help Democrats and end McConnell's career as majority leader.

Elizabeth Warren asks killer trial question on Supreme Court legitimacy. Chief Justice Roberts wilts

Posted on by Kerry Eleveld

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren clearly wanted Chief Justice John Roberts to ponder his place in history Thursday when she sent this doozy to him to read aloud at the Senate impeachment trial: “At a time when large majorities of Americans have lost faith in government, does the fact that the Chief Justice is presiding over an impeachment trial in which Republican senators have thus far refused to allow witnesses or evidence contribute to the loss of legitimacy of the Chief Justice, the Supreme Court, and the Constitution?” 

In other words: Hey, we all know this is a sham trial, the American people know this is a sham trial. Any chance you’ll do the right thing and protect the integrity of the court and your legacy by casting your vote for witnesses in the event of a 50-50 tie? Kapowie!

Do yourself a favor and watch Roberts read it below.

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Rand Paul continues his efforts to get the Ukraine whistleblower killed

Posted on by Joan McCarter

Sen. Rand Paul has not been getting enough attention during this impeachment process, so he executed his predictable and promised stunt on the Senate floor Thursday afternoon, submitting a question to Chief Justice John Roberts during the Q&A session that presumably contained the name of the whistleblower. Roberts refused to read the question, so Paul left the floor to have an "impromptu" press conference (and probably hit the send button on a fundraising email).

CNN's Manu Raju reports, "At press conference, Paul says: 'I can tell you my question made no reference to any whistleblower.' Then Paul reads aloud his question which names a Schiff's staff member and names the individual who has been reported as possible whistleblower—and asks about their contacts." This was an apparent effort to get the press to publish the name, since he seems intent on getting the whistleblower killed.

It likely won't work. One reporter asked, "With all due respect, shouldn't you be at the impeachment hearing right now?" Of course he should have been, and the sergeant-at-arms should be putting him in the Senate jail right now. He should also be disqualified from sitting as a juror in this impeachment trial and have his vote taken away—if either Roberts or Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell wants to save this trial from being a total farce.

Now is the time for Chief Justice Roberts to rise to the defense of his country

Posted on by Joan McCarter

Assuming that there are three Republican senators who care enough about their country and the rule of law to want witnesses and documents in Donald Trump's impeachment trial (not a given by any means) Chief Justice John Roberts could be put in a difficult position. He would have to break the a 50-50 tie either voting for a sham trial or a real one. Or, do what the conventional wisdom expects and choose not to decide and let entropy win. At a stalemate, the side asking for witnesses would lose.

Thus far, Roberts has been more of a spectator than an umpire, to use his infamous analogy during his confirmation hearing of what his role on the Supreme Court would be—"calling balls and strikes." He's watched while Republican senators made the presentation by House managers a farce, napping through the discussion, playing with toys, standing in the back of the room chatting, reading unrelated books, or just flat out leaving the room for long stretches. That is against the rules of impeachment trials, rules he's there to enforce. That has not impressed the experts. So far, Roberts has been "less of a force than some people expected or hoped for," Michael Gerhardt, a University of North Carolina law professor and impeachment expert told the Washington Post. Few watching this have high hopes that he'll rise to the challenge.

No matter how we get there, the end goal is the same: John Bolton must testify.

The only peep out of him on the proceedings was a "both sides" scolding of Rep. Jerry Nadler spurred on, of course, by Sen. Susan Collins' note tattling on him. He's done something helpful in rebuffing Sen. Rand Paul's efforts to out the person who blew the whistle on Trump's Ukraine extortion. That was done behind the scenes, even before the question and answer period began Wednesday.

So, with his chance to actually do the job, call the balls and strikes, the big question is whether he'll step up to save the institution of the Senate from itself, try to save the republic from Trump, or even try to save his own legacy. One Democrat, Sen. Chris Van Hollen from Maryland, is going to attempt to force the issue by offering a motion putting pressure on Roberts to decide. Republicans will almost certainly defeat it, but that doesn't mean Roberts couldn't be the hero all of his own accord.

Senate Republicans make clear: It’s not about Ukraine. It’s about ending American democracy for good

Posted on by Mark Sumner

On Wednesday, the Senate conducted the first of two days of question-and-answer in the impeachment trial of Donald Trump, with the House managers and Trump’s legal team. Throughout the sessions, Trump’s team made it clear that any attempt to get at the truth of what happened would result in retaliation in the form of asking for an endless stream of witnesses, fighting every request in court, and holding up activity in the Senate “for a very long time.” Meanwhile, the House managers continued to swing for the fences with a number of stirring moments, sharp responses, and ringing calls for the Senate to do its job for the country.

From the start of this session, it was clear that Republicans were not taking the day seriously. Confident that enough of their members had fallen in line to suppress any possibility of subpoenaing a witness, the Republican side indulged in question after question written for no other reason than to promote conspiracy theories and smears by having Chief Justice John Roberts read them aloud. But even that wasn’t the worst damage done during the course of the evening.

As the night wore on, Trump legal team member Alan Dershowitz rose repeatedly to make it very clear what Republicans were authorizing: They were not just embracing foreign interference, but literally allowing Donald Trump to do anything in pursuit of reelection.

Much of the evening seemed to be the Ted Cruz Show. Having abandoned any pretense that they were seeking information, Republicans allowed the Texas assassin to have a hand in at least eight questions, all of them designed to spread ridiculous, corrosive smears against the whistleblower, Rep. Adam Schiff, and former Vice President Joe Biden. Trump’s defense team joined in eagerly, citing information from the worst of right-wing sites as “public information” to justify repeating claims. By the end of the night, Senate Republicans had endorsed every aspect of the conspiracy theory that Trump had tried to extort from Ukraine, and they had gone on to indict the whistleblower as having a hand in the “double bribery.”

Again and again, Republicans such as Cruz and Josh Hawley demonstrated that they were laughing up their sleeves, playing the “Roberts will repeat anything” game. That included using questions to make statements that Adam Schiff had collaborated with the whistleblower, long after Schiff had explained—again—that he had not met the whistleblower, that he did not know the whistleblower, and that no member of his staff was involved in preparing the whistleblower’s complaint. It didn’t matter, because for Cruz, getting out the facts was never the point of the exercise.

A special award goes to Kentucky Republican Rand Paul. At one point in the late afternoon, he managed to concoct a question so vile that Roberts refused to read it—the only time that happened, even though some of the questions from Cruz included recitations of multiple false charges.

Trump’s team leaned into the chance to spread unfounded information. Despite hours and days of chest-beating over “hearsay” or “second-hand information,” Trump’s attorneys relished every word of the beyond-Q conspiracies that came their way (including a rare appearance from benchwarmer Pam Bondi so bad that it’s already gathered more than two million views). And when not rolling in vile claims with absolutely no foundation, they used much of their time to directly threaten the Senate, stating again and again that any attempt to call a witness would be met with an unending string of requests, privilege claims, and court fights. 

In the middle of the evening, Schiff made a major play and said that, to expedite the process, the House managers would agree to be bound by decisions from Roberts when it came to validating subpoenas, authorizing witnesses, and requesting documents. Citing the way that the House had taken as many as five depositions in a week, Schiff made it clear that there was no reason that a process involving witnesses had to be lengthy. But Trump’s legal team said that it would not agree. Instead, it continued its threat to respond to any call for witnesses by wrecking the Senate, drowning the trial in frivolous requests, and demanding a string of witnesses (including every member of the Biden family, every House manager, the whistleblower, people cited in right-wing media … an unending parade). And Republicans on both sides of the table pretended that this threat wasn’t simply an argument that any legal process can be crushed by the power of the White House.

But it wasn’t the cudgel of delay, or the giggling efforts of Cruz, Hawley, Paul, and others to place their hands under Robert’s robe and make him talk that did the most damage. The worst damage to the evening, the trial, and America’s future came from doddering Alan Dershowitz, who used the evening to expand his previous defense to a degree that didn’t just exonerate Trump in this case, but also exonerated him in any possible case. 

In a pair of appearances, Dershowitz expanded on his theory that abuse of power isn’t a permissible cause for impeachment. Deliberately and directly contradicting the historical sources he cited, Dershowitz called every constitutional expert in America a “never Trumper” for daring to disagree with him. And while claiming to be the only reasonable man in the country, he said he didn’t stand alone … because he had found a single attorney in 1867 whose views were similar. And 1867 is closer to when the Constitution was written, so that view wins. If you ignore all the people involved in the writing of it.

Then, having literally made up dictionary entries to support his redefinition of legal terms, Dershowitz went not just all-in, but completely overboard. According to Trump’s finest legal mind, there is nothing that Trump can’t do in pursuit of reelection. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. So long as Trump believes that his reelection would be good for the nation, he can extort foreign governments for made-up dirt. He can directly threaten an ally. There is no limit.

Along the way, Dershowitz also argued that there is absolutely nothing wrong with launching an investigation into a political opponent. In fact, he asserted that a run for office itself can be justification for investigating an opponent. He directly embraced the idea that a president launching investigations of his political opponents using domestic or foreign sources wasn’t just fine; it was desirable. He argued that daring to run against Trump painted a target on anyone’s back, and that Trump had all the power he needed to shoot at it.

If there was any doubt going into the evening, Dershowitz removed it: voting to acquit Trump means voting not just to dismiss this charge, but to embrace the idea that Trump trumps the law. He didn’t hint that Trump could do anything he wanted in pursuit of reelection; that was the core theme of his whole presentation. That was the point. That was what he said.

The Senate listened to a presentation from Trump’s legal team according to which there is nothing Trump can do in pursuit of reelection that isn’t justified. There is no limit to how Trump can use his power to persecute political opponents. According to the theory that was put forward on the floor of the Senate, Trump could simply lock up every Democratic opponent, or suspend elections indefinitely, and that would be just fine—not only an impeachable offense, but a good thing.

Republicans are going to vote for that. Republicans are going to press the button on not just a step toward autocracy, but a full-on embrace of it. They’re going to do it with a smile.

It’s Chief Justice Roberts’ chance to be apolitical and impartial: Democrats need to make him do it

Posted on by Joan McCarter

Senate Republicans are making it very clear: the John Bolton bombshell that Donald Trump personally told him he was withholding congressionally mandated funds for Ukraine for his own political gain is nothing new. They knew it all already and it doesn't make a difference, so what? So there's no reason at all they need to hear directly from Bolton.

There's one person though, that shouldn't be thinking "so what": Chief Justice John Roberts. After all, he is the chief justice of the United States. He is supposed to be the one guy ultimately in charge of the rule of law for the whole land. He, as law professors Neal K. Katyal and Joshua A. Geltzer and former Republican Rep. Mickey Edwards argue, is the one person who could go over the Republicans' heads and order subpoenas from Bolton or any other witness who should testify. That's if Roberts doesn't want to go down in history as the chief justice who presided over the biggest sham of an impeachment trial for the most criminal president the nation's ever had. House impeachment managers need to put him to that test.

It's pretty simple. The House managers, Rep. Adam Schiff and team, can ask Roberts to issue the subpoenas. The lawyers explain that the impeachment rules in effect "specifically provide for the subpoenas of witnesses, going so far in Rule XXIV as to outline the specific language a subpoena must use—the 'form of subpoena to be issued on the application of the managers of the impeachment, or of the party impeached, or of his counsel.'" Furthermore, the rules provide that "the chief justice, as presiding officer, has the 'power to make and issue, by himself,' subpoenas." It would take a two-thirds vote of the Senate to overturn his decision to subpoena witnesses or documents. Republicans don't have 67 votes.

So far, Roberts has simply sat in the presiding chair and done nothing except to respond to Susan Collins' vapors and tell both sides to be nice to each other. That's just the way he wants it, undoubtedly. But he has a job, one the framers of the Constitution laid out clearly.

"The framers' wisdom in giving this responsibility to a member of the judiciary expected to be apolitical and impartial has never been clearer," write Katyal, Geltzer, and Edwards. The House managers need to make him do that job.

Four Supreme Court justices give Trump a big gift, punt on hearing Obamacare case

Posted on by Joan McCarter

In case anyone is wondering if Chief Justice John Roberts will be assisting in having a fair and transparent impeachment trial of Donald Trump, look to what just happened at the Supreme Court on behalf of Trump: The justices denied a request by House Democrats and Democratic state attorneys general to expedite the Affordable Care Act case, a denial Trump's Department of Justice requested. It takes four justices to deny consideration of a case, and while we don’t know who those four were, it's a pretty safe bet that they looked to Roberts for guidance, if indeed he wasn't leading the conservatives in this.

They could still grant a hearing later in the year, and hear the case in the fall, when they could withhold a decision until next year, well after the election. Don't forget: Trump has argued that the entire law needs to be struck down on the specious grounds that the individual mandate penalty in the law was zeroed out by his tax scam of 2017. The Trump case has been panned by legal scholars left and right, but the extremely partisan Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit agreed with an even more partisan federal district court judge that the mandate was unconstitutional. The 5th Circuit, however, played its own bit of politics in remanding the case to that judge to consider what parts of the law might still stand. Since that judge, Reed O'Connor, already ruled once that the entire law should be tossed, it's not going to be a huge surprise when he decides he was right all along.

But that will likely be months away, now that we're actually in an election year and no Republican wants to rely on Trump to come up with a replacement plan for Obamacare. That's exactly what he'd have to do, and they all know it. Health care is going to be one of the major issues—if not the issue—of the 2020 election. This case is still going to loom over it, with or without a Supreme Court decision, because Trump is arguing that the entire law be tossed. That includes protections for 130 million people with pre-existing conditions. It includes coverage for people up to age 26 on their parents’ plans. It includes no limits on what insurance has to cover in a person’s lifetime in the event of a medical catastrophe. It includes affordable premiums for millions of people who were previously uninsured. And it includes the Medicaid expansion that's covered more millions.

But for now, the denial of consideration takes the worst of the pressure off of Trump, which seems to be what Roberts and crew want most. So don't expect any heroics from Roberts on behalf of the country and Constitution during this impeachment trial.