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We really (really, really) need to work on this deeply flawed opinion that somehow presidents are not to be prosecuted or indicted. It places them above the law in direct contravention to the Constitution. The theory is based on a couple profoundly wrong-headed ideas.
First, the idea that a prosecution would "distract" the president from his duties is absurd. A president can and must handle many issues simultaneously. And one of his responsibilities is to preserve and protect the Constitution and thereby the rule of law in the country.
It not a distraction for him to deal with the preservation of the rule of law but his duty. Furthermore, the logic creates a slippery slope. What about his family would not that be a distraction? Friends or close political allies?
Next, the idea that the only Constitutional remedy is impeachment and removal is not true. The Constitution does not preclude the president's prosecution in any way, implicitly or explicitly. Further, it does not specify in detail any other aspect of our specific laws.
It just describes guidelines and the prosecution of the president not only falls well within those guidelines, the idea that no individual is above the law is at the center of them, is one of the core rationales of the entire document and the entire American experiment.
Further, if a president could not be prosecuted and impeachment were the only option then that leaves the enforcement of the law to an entirely political process within the House and Senate. As we now see, that means a political party can place its leader(s) above the law.
That is clearly contrary to the intent of the Constitution (which does not, by the way, mention political parties...it is absurd to think entities it does not anticipate would be granted powers in our system greater than the people at large.)
Placing the president above the law by virtue of the strength of his political protectors in Congress is exactly what the framers worried about when they discussed "tyranny of the majority." Little did they anticipate that given the nature of power in the Senate--
where it is distributed along geographic lines, state by state, and not by population, what it could really mean is tyranny of the majority. In our system now, a minority of people representing less populous states can control the Senate.
(And this will only get worse over time with 30 percent of Americans controlling 70 Senate seats by 2030.) So what we are left with is the prospect of enduring tyranny of minority who can block any prosecution of any president of their party, placing him above the law.
This invites not only presidential abuses but a concentration of power in a president who feels he is immunized from the other checks and balances in the Constitution because the one avenue our DoJ leaves for stopping him, impeachment, is closed to us for political reasons.
These are not vague concerns of constitutional theorists. This is happening. Our president feels impeachment can't happen & indictment can't happen and that therefore he can serially ignore the Article 1 powers of the Congress and place his administration beyond their influence.
This is happening now. And it is largely happening because Mueller & Co. were constrained from recommending the actions they would have taken in the case of literally any other American citizen. We won't get this reversed under Attorney General Barr or McConnell.
But we must make it a goal of a regained Democratic majority to do what is right and necessary here rather than to try to take advantage of this twisting of our system for our own benefit. And prior to that we must recognize the toll this perversion of justice is taking.
American democracy is at risk because our president believes he is above the law and his enablers in the executive and legislative branches are advancing that view and enabling the administration to erode the rule of law as has not happened before in our modern history.
The House must stand up to that with robust, aggressive action including in the courts. They must treat it as must right minded thinkers in the judiciary as the threat it is. We must stop the decay. We must reverse this threat.
Because if we do not and the president is empowered and democracy is eroded and the Senate continues its abuses and they fill the judiciary with partisan defenders and Trump is re-elected and this goes on for six years, America as we know it and as our founders imagined it...
is finished. That's not hyperbole. That's not a distant, low-probably what if. That is where we are as a country right now. And candidly, it is not certain which side will win this existential tug-of-war to determine our fate.
