The Supreme Court has put Trump on notice about his 'imperial presidency' claims: biographer
In his column for Bloomberg, Donald Trump biographer Timothy O'Brien explained that the former president's big loss in a D.C. Appeals Court over keeping documents from the National Archives out of the hand of the House committee investigating the Jan 6th insurrection will likely suffer the same fate if and when it gets to the Supreme Court.
In a scathing and deeply researched decision from the unanimous court, the judges left no doubt that the former president has no right to restrict the materials while also noting they observed a direct line between the president and the Jan 6th insurrection.
According to O'Brien, who has written extensively about Trump's financial dealings and courtroom battles, writes the Supreme Court's history with the now-former president indicates he shouldn't expect an outcome that will be favorable to him.
As O'Brien notes about case before the appeals court, "That ferocious tableau, evoking domestic terrorism, informed the court’s perspective on the gravity and necessity of the January 6th Committee’s investigation. The court catalogued the various records the committee has sought, including call and visitor logs, calendars, schedules, and the like, and noted that Trump provided some while recently trying to exclude others by claiming privilege."
"After a tour of relevant case law, the court concluded its ruling by returning to the fundamentals informing its decision," the Bloomberg columnist wrote. "That’s about as clear, blunt and principled as you can get. It’s not clear whether the nation’s highest court will agree, however, or how it might view the novel problem of two presidents disagreeing about the scope of executive privilege."
However, he wrote, if the court's history with Trump is any guide -- and the conservative justices stick to their principles -- the former president is unlikely to expect a win.
"The Supreme Court, dominated by its conservative justices, has already given a clear indication of how it views Trump’s fetish for an imperial presidency unfettered by other branches of government or by the rule of law," O'Brien recalled. "Last year, it ruled that Trump had to turn over his tax returns to local prosecutors in New York investigating him and his company for criminal fraud – despite his claims that presidents should be shielded from such requests."
https://www.rawstory.com/the-supreme-court-has-put-trump-on-notice-about-his-imperial-presidency-claims-biographer/'This is the ballgame': MSNBC's Heilemann says it's all over for Trump after appeals court lossSpeaking with "Morning Joe" co-host Joe Scarborough and Willie Geist on Friday morning, MSNBC contributor John Heilemann claimed the unanimous decision by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit clearing the way for the House riot committee to receive documents from the National Archives is a devastating blow to Donald Trump.
As the Washington Post reported, the court "denied Trump’s request for a preliminary injunction blocking the National Archives and Records Administration from releasing the first roughly 800 pages of disputed Trump papers after President Biden declined to assert executive privilege as requested by his predecessor, setting up the first of its kind constitutional controversy."
With host Scarborough laughing at the legal argument the former president's lawyers have been hoping would sway the courts, Heilemann said it looks like the end of the road for Trump with only the Supreme Court left to appeal to.
"If you read all 68 pages, it's a line by line rebuke of the president and breaks up the guts of any arguments he's been making that day," co-host Willie Geist prompted.
"It's not just black and white," Scarborough agreed. "With that said, John, this three-judge opinion by the D.C. Circuit was about as black and white -- I mean everything I have ever said about -- you just don't get a slam dunk through the legal system. It's just wrong, the words were so historic."
"There is direct link with linkage between the president and the events of that day, unanimous three-judge opinion in the D.C. Circuit," he continued. "That's very compelling as the lawyers trying to figure out what to do next."
"Very compelling and, in some ways, it rhymes with common sense, right?" the MSNBC contributor replied. "You don't have to be a lawyer to figure out claims of the president to executive privilege now that he's no longer president are absurd."
"The relevance is obvious and the claim of privilege is ridiculous,' he continued while laughing before admitting he is not a lawyer and adding, "It's great when you see the court in such emphatic terms come to the same conclusion. And I will say that this is the ball game."
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