Get the Ricochet app
Ricochet will work fine in a browser on your mobile devices, but for the best experience please download our app.
President Trump’s lawyers have petitioned the US Supreme Court for a stay of sentencing before New York judge Juan Merchan scheduled for Friday, January 10, 2025. The various New York appeals courts have declined. Democrats are eager for Merchan to impose a sentence of any kind, even unconditional release, to preserve their “convicted felon” meme. President Trump and many legal scholars believe he has an excellent chance of overturning the conviction on appeal in some venue and at some point, so a stay would be appropriate.
What will the Court do? My guess is that they will issue the stay. There will be pressure not to do so, of course. But, on balance, I think they will if they see having the seated American president being “convicted” by a suspect process and waving aside the Court's own immunity ruling as being more destabilizing to regular order than not. Note I am not making a legal argument, I am making a stability argument. That is because the current balance on the Court favors stability over the best legal argument.
Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Barrett are definitely “slow as you go” votes. Justice Kavanaugh seems mostly to hang with them as well. Recall Chief Justice Roberts routinely veers away from outcomes that have political moment unless he is in the dissenting minority. For example, Roberts kept Obamacare in place by conjuring a “tax” that none of the parties argued.
If the Court does not grant a stay, no doubt it will be argued that there was some technical failing in the legal argument put forward by the president’s lawyers. But the real reason would be a judgment by the Court that it is better served by not intervening at this point. I find it difficult to believe that would be true, but I am not making that call.
If the Court does not issue a stay, it will give continued strength to lawfare. And that is far worse than the personal interests and treatment of the president.
[Update: SCOTUS denies stay request 5-4 with CJ Roberts and Justice Barrett joining the three progressive justices.]
Discussion (44)
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
It looks as if we can expect the SCOTUS to do the right thing for the wrong reason if I understand you correctly.
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
I agree. This is an important moment for the Court to step in. Otherwise, from my perspective, they are sanctioning lawfare.
MODERATOR
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
Yes. I don’t know what’s going on with the New York appellate courts. Unless the process limited it to a few partisan justices (possible) I would have expected them to issue a stay. That they didn’t is suggestive that Trump’s legal theory on the narrow issues affecting sentencing before appeal may not be rock solid (even though I think he has plentiful grounds for appealing the conviction). Courts generally seem to be unmoved by “the process is the punishment” arguments. So a run of the mill defendant might not get relief from the US Supreme Court in similar facts and circumstances of a state trial. But this is a once and future president with a certified Electoral College and popular vote win.
MODERATOR
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
You're seeing five of 44 comments. Sign in, or join for just $5 per month, to read them all and add your own.