Last Call For Supreme Protection

As expected, the US Supreme Court has tossed the Democratic party's anti-corruption lawsuit against Donald Trump, proclaiming absolute executive immunity to the courts eliminates any standing that Democrats may have had, and that impeachment, removal under the 25th Amendment, or being voted out of office are the only options for a corrupt president like Trump.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday put an end to a lawsuit brought by congressional Democrats that accused President Donald Trump of violating anti-corruption provisions in the U.S. Constitution with his business dealings.

The justices refused to hear an appeal by 215 Senate and House of Representatives Democrats of a lower court ruling that found that the lawmakers lacked the necessary legal standing to bring the case that focused on the Republican president’s ownership of the Trump International Hotel in Washington.

The lawmakers accused Trump of violating the Constitution’s rarely tested “emoluments” clauses that bar presidents from taking gifts or payments from foreign and state governments without congressional approval. The lead plaintiff in the case is U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut.

 

The appeals court said the country is bound by a SCOTUS precedent established in a 1997 ruling, Raines v. Byrd.

Facts of the case

Several individual members of the 104th Congress, who voted against the passage of the Line Item Veto Act (Act) giving the President authority to veto individual tax and spending measures after having signed them into law, sued to challenge the Act's constitutionality. After granting them standing, the District Court ruled in the congressmen's favor as it found the Act unconstitutional. Direct appeal was granted to the Supreme Court.

Question

Did the congressmen have Article III standing to challenge the Line Item Veto Act as a violation of the Presentment Clause in Article I?
 

Conclusion

No. In a 7-to-2 decision, which avoided the question of the Act's constitutionality, the Court held that the individual congressmen lacked proper Article III standing to maintain their suit. The Court explained that the congressmen failed to show how the allegedly unconstitutional Act resulted in their personal injury, since it applied to the entire institution of Congress. Moreover, the congressmen based their claim on a loss of political power rather than a demonstration of how the Act violated one of their particularized legally protected interests. The Court concluded that, having failed to meet both of these standing requirements, the congressmen did not present the Court with a case-or-controversy over which it had jurisdiction.

 

And SCOTUS refusing to hear the case means it's done, not that anyone really expected this to go anywhere.

But state cases remain...