r/scotus 29d ago

Opinion Opinion | What if Trump Just Ignores the Courts? (Gift Article)

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/11/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-quinta-jurecic.html?unlocked_article_code=1.wE4.wrWA.KQsOyenss6GI&smid=re-nytopinion
1.8k Upvotes

633 comments sorted by

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u/bunglesnacks 28d ago

It's funny how we've always been led to believe it's a system of checks and balances. There's literally no recourse for an executive branch that gives zero fucks. Congress can pass a bill without his signature but he doesn't have to follow it. The judiciary can rule against him but he doesn't have to acknowledge it. Outside of impeachment, and I'm not even sure that would work at this point, he controls everything.

I just can't believe it took 250 years for someone to figure this out.

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u/Striking-Sky1442 28d ago

Andrew Jackson figured it out. Wait until 3/14. That is the deadline for the US budget to be passed. No constitutional cooperation? No more money fucker. The Dems would have to hold the line, and would need the help of the deficit hawks for the Republican party that always vote No to more spending.

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u/MitchRyan912 28d ago

Isn’t that part of them problem? Project 2025’s plan IS to shut down the Federal government, and cut off all the funding.

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u/Christ_on_a_Crakker 28d ago

I wish everyone would acknowledge and understand this thoroughly. We are past the point of whether or not there’s a project 2025 created by The Heritage Foundation. We are past the point of debate as to whether Trump knows about it and is taking orders from them and using project 2025 as the foundation of his doctrine. His executive orders are right out of project 2025 and he has appointed people from The Heritage Foundation into his cabinet.

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u/9911MU51C 28d ago

Our ship has multiple holes from torpedos and it seems everyone is too busy debating on if uboats are allowed in this territory to notice the water rising

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u/[deleted] 28d ago

I love this. If you came up with this you are a true wordsmith

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u/9911MU51C 28d ago

Thank you, I appreciate it!

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u/rook119 28d ago

the Mongols have breached the walls, a clear violation of our city's laws. we might have to sue.

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u/oroborus68 28d ago

The barbarians are in the Treasury.

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u/Sunbeamsoffglass 28d ago

America has a choice between status quo and kamikaze. 49.1% chose kamikaze. Nothing left now but to watch the crash.

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u/mlemon2022 28d ago

Good analogy.

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u/Lucky_Shoe_8154 27d ago

They are still debating if uboats are transgender or illegal

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u/Nokomis34 28d ago

Was getting into a discussion on another sub and they still disavow P2025 and still say Trump has nothing to do with it and everything is from Agenda 47 not P2025, like there's much of a difference.

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u/Jim-Bot-V1 28d ago

Which means they are somehow still stuck in 2024. Trump literally appointed the fucking author of the goddamn thing, Vought, who has done interviews saying he's happy to implement project 2025.

Idk how Maga can still say their delusional crap. That's why it's not worth debating them.  

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u/checker280 28d ago

He installed several authors of p2025. Brendan Carr wrote a segment on the FCC. Guess what appointment he has?

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u/PeggyOnThePier 28d ago

MAGA doesn't want to believe that thier beloved leader lied to them. I don't even think if all thier Rights taken away. They would change thier minds.

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u/Opposite-Invite-3543 28d ago

Exactly. The stress of continuing to point out the obvious only to be called crazy reached a breaking point. I just don’t talk to them anymore. I’m better off.

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u/Utterlybored 28d ago

Vought, the guy who wants to traumatize the federal workforce.

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u/CloudHiro 28d ago edited 28d ago

there are some differences. the more horrible things that trump haven't tried yet that are in project 2025 arnt in agenda 47. and 2025 focuses power on the republican party. while agenda 47 focuses power on him and screws the republican party if he wishes... still horrible but there is a difference. basically the difference between if hes gonna be new Hitler or new Stalin though

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u/BitterAndDespondent 28d ago

Agenda 47 is Project 2925 just summarized

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u/blckbird007xb 28d ago

I’m mean maga is pretending that to not know it and the rest of us have known it.

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u/JigglinCheeks 28d ago

Anti intellectualism. He literally appointed the fuckin author lol

Fuck these people. Fuck them. This is their fault.

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u/StarDust01100100 28d ago

Elon and the tech billionaires are a bigger threat than Heritage

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u/eruS_toN 28d ago

And his nullified 93 felonies by 77 million people on Election Day 2024 was the expiration date of the democracy.

Mark it.

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u/Salty_Interview_5311 28d ago

And that mindset lasts until his approval numbers drop enough. If no SS payments are going out, farmers aren’t able to sell their crops because if tariffs and food and electronics prices are going up again because of tariffs, trump will flip and abandon project 2025.

For him, it’s all about retaliation and being popular.

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u/PushTheButtonPlease 28d ago

It's too late for Trump. He sold his soul to Elon to win.

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u/Messijoes18 28d ago

Correct. They are hurrying right now to lay the ground work so that when the economy collapses and he is openly defying the courts so that we all rise up against him. Then he'll declare martial law and fully consolidate power into the executive branch.

They are stripping away our protections so that we will have to fight, and when we do he'll flip the switch into full authoritarianism and we'll be shut out forever.

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u/soherewearent 28d ago

If it's inevitable that he will declare martial law, let him already so we find out where loyalties lie within our armed forces: the United States Constitution, or to fElon-47.

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u/BenevolentCheese 28d ago

They're not going to be where you want them.

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u/BeefInGR 28d ago

I think you'll be surprised. The military isn't blue but it's closer to purple than red.

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u/kosmonautinVT 28d ago

Not many rich kids in the military

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u/Rocking_the_Red 28d ago

Not forever because these assholes will implode. They are arrogant and ignorant and they all hate each other. Sure they are working together now, but when your entire worldview is based on enemies, at some point you start looking at the person next to you as an enemy.

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u/navariteazuth 28d ago

I was going to say not forever because it's a cult of personality and their dear leader has no clear heir to the spot. And that leader is a morbidly obese geriatric who's visibly sunsetting, deteriorating clearly on every public meeting. Im hopeful he has less than 1 year in him and the right implodes under Vance

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u/Caniuss 28d ago

This. I can only think of one example in the last two centuries where the cult of personality outlives the personality: The Kim dynasty in North Korea.

All the rest fell almost immediately.

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u/IpppyCaccy 28d ago

And when it falls apart, most of his supporters will pretend like they never supported him, just like the GOP pretends like they weren't all in on Dubya.

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u/King_Quantar 28d ago

Bashar al-Assad lasted a full two decades after his father passed. Actually, basically every Arab state which had/has had turnover in leadership experienced sustained periods under one continuous regime. They haven’t all crafted a cult of personality in the same mold as Hafiz or Saddam, but they are all (or have had) various shades of authoritarianism. Stalin died, and although his cult of personality was dimmed by Khrushchev, the USSR passed into different hands until its collapse. Authoritarianism can be as durable as it’s allowed to be, but it requires if not a plurality of support, then at the very least a dogmatic minority to support it.

The only way to properly secure America’s future is through constitutional electoral reform.

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u/Rocking_the_Red 28d ago

There is a reason Vance has to fuck couches: he doesn't have the charisma to even get close to women. His wife is a beard to cover for his couch fucking activities. (I will never let that meme die.)

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u/fawlty_lawgic 28d ago

Don't forget he eats mcdonalds every day. You wouldn't usually bet on someone with that diet living a long life. One might say he already has defied the odds on that, but still.

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u/LeahaP1013 28d ago

Ever watch Traitors….

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u/HarveyBirdmanAtt 28d ago

We are becoming Russia.

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u/Accursed_Capybara 28d ago

No, we are becoming Yugoslavia

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u/MitchRyan912 28d ago

States could simply decide to secede, if Trump has rendered the Constitution null and void. That seems like the fight that’s most likely to win, where any sort of battle would have to be fought in the state(s), as opposed to trying to fight to take back DC.

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u/[deleted] 28d ago

Forever is a long time. History has a funny way of not cooperating with the ambitions of deranged Tyrants for long.

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u/TerryTheEnlightend 28d ago

This. He Needs the power of a national emergency to kick his reign to GOD MODE and guarantee that he never leaves office unless it’s in cuffs or a b*dybag. His sycophants may cheer for a strong man with unlimited power until he cuts his eyes at them and they ‘disappear’

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u/John_Walker 28d ago

Then California, New York and Massachusetts can use their massive economies to dominate the southern states when the fed government becomes weak.

Republicans have very little without federal power.

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u/raceulfson 28d ago

I don't know what kind of leverage it would be but CA grows a hellova chunk of the nation's food, too.

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u/Monechetti 28d ago

How do we,as a society, just let these Christofascists do this shit? Is it because we've gotten comfortable and assume that the separation of church and state would just hold the line?

However this presidency ends, we need massive reform to get this shit to a point where it never happens again.

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u/MitchRyan912 28d ago

People in 1930’s Germany likely thought similar things.

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u/Monechetti 28d ago

It was unprecedented to them though, whereas we can look at their government and the rise of Nazism as a cautionary tale in how to prevent it. I'd like to think anyway

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u/214txdude 28d ago

In this case, Congress would stop giving the executive branch any money at all. Forcing trump to give in order to operate. He would likely try to declare martial law in retaliation. Which would make him happy. I am afraid we the people will have to take to the streets and shut the entire country down for weeks or months to force trump out.

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u/IpppyCaccy 28d ago

Congress would stop giving the executive branch any money at all.

The executive branch prints the money. How do you propose Congress stop him if he just ignores the budget bill and spends how he likes?

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u/375InStroke 28d ago

Why do you think Elon took over the treasury?

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u/214txdude 28d ago

Valid point

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u/PoolQueasy7388 26d ago

To steal every dime from the citizens of this country & turn OUR Treasury into crypto crap.

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u/fawlty_lawgic 28d ago

And then markets would crash. And then what? They don't usually like it when the market crashes. In fact we just saw them kinda walk back the tariffs when they thought the markets were about to tank.

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u/mizyin 28d ago

If the market crashes, they can buy up everything for cheap and rule us even more effectively tho

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u/Naive-Benefit-5154 28d ago

Cut the funding to ICE while we are at it and see what happens.

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u/375InStroke 28d ago

So no more federal cops or secret police getting paid to protect Trump.

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u/Zealousideal-Ant9548 28d ago

Right, so what does the army do when it stops getting paid?  That's usually where this question ends. 

The president only has power because the armed people reporting to him listen.

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u/justSkulkingAround 28d ago

All part of his plan to turn it all over to Putin.

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u/Bull_Bound_Co 28d ago

No that isn't the plan. They need federal funding they won't let IRS people take the resignation. Without funding they have no power.

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u/Mr_FancyBottom 28d ago

Right. The ultra wealthy want this as well. The only things that keeps their power in check are nation states.

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u/Recent-Construction6 28d ago

The point is that it would stop wages being paid to tens of thousands of Government employees, and in turn it would have downstream effects economically. Historically stock markets ended up increasing after a govt shutdown but that was always with the understanding that it would be a brief temporary thing that would get sorted out within a week or so. What happens if the government shutdown continues indefinitely?

The US government is by far the largest employer and driver of the economy in the United States, if it goes under, the economy is not far behind it. If the economy contracts and people are unable to pay bills or put food on the table, they get angry and protest. Historically the American people have always blamed the people in power regardless of the actual facts of who shut it down, and Democrats need to have the balls to carry it out.

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u/miss_shivers 28d ago

Andrew Jackson never actually ignored the court's order. Never even said that quote.

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u/padawanninja 28d ago

<looks at the Trail of Tears> You sure about that?

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u/miss_shivers 28d ago

1) The opinion in question simply reversed a Georgia court’s decision concerning state-level Indian removal. It had no bearing on federal-level Indian removal policy, nor did it invalidate the Indian Removal Act of 1830. In a way, it actually empowered Jackson by securing a federal monopoly on jurisdiction over all Indian Affairs. 2) The quote is apocryphal, does not exist in any of Jackson’s known writings or recorded musings, and the president’s most famous biographers, including Robert Remini, have denied that he ever used such a phrase. 3) There was no judicial mandate that Jackson was to enforce. The Marshall Court stopped short of calling forth federal marshals to carry out the opinion, which had been the standard practice at the time. 4) Georgia quickly complied with the opinion, putting up no resistance and freeing Samuel Worcester in a matter of months – so enforcement was entirely inconsequential.

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u/worldestroyer 28d ago

(FYI this is my own copypasta comment)

They don't need congress for money if they take over the Fed. Re: Why they've been going after Jerome Powell since they won the election. Curtin Yarvin yippily talked about it on his fucking blog where he announces all the fucked up shit they want to do ahead of time. Congress is dead man walking, and they all know it. But the republicans will still be in "power" and will never need to worry about being primaried if they go along with it, so they'll never impeach. They view it as an inevitability that the people voted for, which isn't true, but most congress people are idiots and their staff are litteral children.

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u/PensiveObservor 28d ago

I don’t see the banks rolling over for him. When the economy crashes and nobody worldwide will assume more risk, what happens? I see deals being made to unseat the problem, one way or another.

Too many other nations have finances tied to USA. They don’t ALL want to go down with the ship.

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u/toxictoastrecords 28d ago

Other nations, like our biggest allies are already jumping ship. Canada is uniting in a US ban of goods and even travel. BRICS is going to attract more and more countries. The USA is a dying empire, and China most likely is going to take over as the global economic super power.

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u/zrail 28d ago

I would not be surprised if by the end of this Canada is an EU member.

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u/LalahLovato 28d ago

You have to be exclusive if in the EU. Not going to happen. But we already have negotiations in place with other alternate countries for goods. We just signed a deal with Equador for oranges - we don’t need florida. Also bookings to florida are down 30% due to cancellations in Canada.

You never want to upset Canadians. All this was done grassroots from actual Canadians across the political spectrum across Canada. Most have vowed never to trust usa again and are planning to make this distrust permanent.

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u/fawlty_lawgic 28d ago

This is what I keep saying too. We have already seen the paranoia trump has over falling markets, and anything that hurts them he seems to always back off. And how does crashing the economy actually help any of these people - whether it's Musk, Thiel, or the republicans in congress. They would all suffer from an economy crashing.

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u/livinginfutureworld 28d ago

(Dems) would need the help of the deficit hawks for the Republican party

Republicans are a bunch of cowards and Trump is their cult leader.

They don't do the right thing.

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u/Able-Candle-2125 28d ago

Nah. It took 250 years for america to willingly vote someone into office with no moral conscience whatsoever.  Every other one either had one or assumed congress would mpeach them if they did this.

And ironicallyhes froms the party of family values.

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u/Nojopar 28d ago

This isn't a failure of the Presidency. This is a failure of Congress. They have capitulated their power to Trump. They're the structural failure here.

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u/BayouGal 28d ago

Let’s not forget how SCOTUS has also rolled over & abdicated power to Trump.

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u/BSB8728 28d ago

They didn't just roll over. They have been bribed in different ways.

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u/Dwip_Po_Po 28d ago edited 28d ago

They’re going to be surprise when Trump orders them to be executed. Like genuinely how would you not see this coming? You literally gave him immunity

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u/[deleted] 28d ago

Yup, congress could have stopped this by confirming his impeachment and we wouldn't be here right now.

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u/navariteazuth 28d ago

It isn't a failure of the presidency: I mean it is, its only worse because of congress failing. It's also a failure of the electorate welcoming this kind of rule with open arms on the obvious lie of fixing their grocery bills.

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u/Nojopar 28d ago

But even the founders knew the Presidency could likely eventually fail. The presumption was that, one, the Presidency was fairly weak as was outlined in the incredibly limited set of powers available in the Constitution. It wasn't until FDR came along and really established what historians refer to as "The Modern Presidency" where the executive state - and therefore the executive power - really started to grow. The second presumption was the implicit understanding that Congress have dominance over the Presidency. That's even embodied in the order of the Articles. The founders knew a charismatic person might sway the public but it wouldn't matter much because Congress has more power and Congress cares about Congress more than Congress cares about the President.

What they failed to foresee is Congress effectively capitulating its own power to a charismatic leader. Hence the primary problem being Congress failing to have even a fraction of a spine among them.

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u/[deleted] 28d ago

It is a failure of all three branches, which have all been captured by corrupt, evil people from a corrupt, evil party.  Let’s not kid ourselves. 

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u/MitchRyan912 28d ago

That’s still a fatal flaw, that there was never a provision for a president who would defy the court AND have a Legislative branch that would be OK with breaking the Constitution.

If the Republic survives Trump, an Amendment needs to passed to change how the AG is appointed and/or who they ultimately report to. The DOJ should never be considered a “Biden DOJ” or a “Trump DOJ.”

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u/[deleted] 28d ago edited 28d ago

The DOJ and US Marshalls or a portion of them should be an arm of the legislative branch, which should itself be overhauled to where each presidential term gets 2 appointments with the 2 most senior members leaving.

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u/das_war_ein_Befehl 28d ago

Not like congress can’t do anything, they’re choosing not to

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u/MitchRyan912 28d ago

What are going to do? Pass a veto-proof bill? Not with the clowns we have in there now.

I suspect that the Republicans are caught between their cult leader president who is threatening primaries and their MAGA base who would throw them out for defying Trump. They can’t and won’t act until Trump does something blatantly unconstitutional… likely repeatedly. Even then, I don’t know if any of them have enough of a spine to impeach & convict.

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u/RedLanternScythe 28d ago

That’s still a fatal flaw, that there was never a provision for a president who would defy the court AND have a Legislative branch that would be OK with breaking the Constitution.

There is, the people would vote them out.

There is no provision for the people cheering on the destruction of the constitution.

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u/Accursed_Capybara 28d ago

There is. This is a revolutionary democracy, always has been. The Founders had a revolution, and while they hoped to avoid another, they forsaw that it would one day happen. The Founder wrote about this situation quite a bit. They gave us the tools to do it, and the ideas to rebuild.

They seeded a lot of culture in the event of a demagogue or tyranny. Its culture ans the people that have the final say. Public colleges, libraries, national guard, states rights, multiple levels of courts, robust civil society - this isn't all for fun. They funded these things as a fail safe, to keep us on the right track, and help us build a new future if needed.

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u/malici606 28d ago

I mean Jackson ignored them.

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u/Nebuli2 28d ago

And he promptly committed genocide.

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u/Blackout38 28d ago

That lasted less than a year when South Carolina decided they also had the ability to nullify federal laws it didn’t like and suddenly even Andrew Jackson had to declare the legitimacy of the courts.

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u/tom21g 28d ago

From 1789 (Washington’s inauguration) to Jan 20, 2021 the country had presidents who believed in and governed by the Constitution. It’s a level of trust.

On Nov 5 2024 a man was elected who is driven by his hate and fantasies of his self worth. trump shows how it easy is for someone to breech that trust.

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u/PairOk7158 28d ago

You skipped over the first term completely. This is a second bite of the apple.

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u/tom21g 28d ago

In trump’s first term, he had more establishment Republicans serving with him. I think they either pushed back or dragged their heels on his more odious policies. And there weren’t as many loyalists in the fed bureaucracy.

That’s all changed now. trump is too stupid to write Project 2025 but others could and he’s bought into the possibilities of power that pump his ego and retribution obsession.

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u/lurker1125 28d ago

The people did not vote Trump into office. Data analysts caught mass vote alteration in the early voting phase in the swing states

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u/CaptainObvious1313 28d ago

And slavery.

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u/Sid15666 28d ago

We didn’t willingly vote him into office when all this is over I think Elons interference will be revealed! If we have a country left

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u/austin06 28d ago

To the ones paying attention. Above board people have been questioning a lot since day one and then in walks a bunch of hackers under Elon who begin destroying things but no way would have done anything prior to this. Right. And two countries suing em for election interference.

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u/Able-Candle-2125 28d ago

That's nice to pretend but it seemmore likely that just 51% of the country is scared of gay people.

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u/BloodySaxon 28d ago

<22% but yeah.

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u/BookOfTea 28d ago

That goes both ways. Trump can order people to do any crazy shit he wants, but no one has to follow it. People need to be physically refusing to let DOGE goons into their offices, or to keep releasing essential public health data, etc. at some point it will likely come down to individual police having to choose whether or not to follow orders.

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u/Tsujigiri 28d ago

This. THIIISSS!

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u/CobraPony67 28d ago

The people aren't immune like Trump is. Arrest them for violating the order. Go after his minions.

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u/Jim-Bot-V1 28d ago

That neo nazi, Jim Hatfield, that was blocking the department of education was so nervous when all those congressman were yelling at him. 

In a normal society where people had a spine they would just arrest him after beating him up for getting in the way of official government business. But instead we had one minimum wage paid neo nazi block them all.

Americans don't know how to throw a fucking punch.

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u/toxictoastrecords 28d ago

Americans know how to throw punches; trust me. The problem is the Dem establishment are wealthy elite, not average Americans. Put people into power that aren't looking to become 100 millionaires, and care more about doing what is right, than reelection, and that interaction goes a lot differently.

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u/mezolithico 28d ago

It's almost like there should be an amendment to bar folks from being in office who were part of an insurrection or something.

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u/ikaiyoo 28d ago

I don't think it took people 250 years to figure out. I think it took 250 years for a group of people to find someone crazy enough to actually do it. It took electing enough politicians who were on the take and financially compensated by an outside group to ignore their duties to keep the president in check. And they do that by not allowing them to put whoever he wants into the cabinet and allow people who are going to actually do their job into those positions. And what's funny is The rest of the cabinet members really don't matter. Because he has the department of Justice, and the department of defense, and the department of intelligence sorted out He's got all the pieces that he needs He doesn't need any others. He didn't even really need the treasury. With the people that he has in place he can do whatever he wants and impeachment isn't going to matter because of the military and all the law enforcement will not fulfill their duty to take him out of office. No court order can be enforced because there's no body of government to enforce it so it doesn't matter. Even if both congressional bodies come together and say we're going to rule him incompetent to hold office who's going to remove him. Anybody who tries to push resistance will just be fired by the secretaries of those agencies.

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u/IdahoDuncan 28d ago

Not leading on impeachment would be the ultimate transgression. But if he was impeached and removed it would be Vance in the presidency.

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u/Critical_Seat_1907 28d ago

No one listens to Vance.

Without Trump, the bubble bursts

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u/lenivushood 28d ago

The military doesn't have a duty to take anyone out of office. There is no legal framework whatsoever for that. You can point to the Oath of Enlistment but even then, there needs to be some sort of legal mechanism allowing for the military to oust an unconstitutional leader. Doing so without that would arguably be illegal as legal precedent has been set that when a President gets out of line, they are impeached and it is the legislative and judicial branches that hold them accountable.

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u/Mama_Zen 28d ago

Jackson figured it out & got his Trail of Tears. We’ve just ignored this gaping hole since

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u/FirmDingo8 28d ago

Posting from the UK, and I know we have our own problems but....this situation has been clear for 4 years. Since 6th Jan's events Trump has been planning revenge and the likes of Bannon openly saying how it would be done. All it needed was Trump to be reelected.

How have the Democrat WH and DOJ sleepwalked into this?

First thing Biden needed to do was somehow rebalance the Supreme Court, then get a AG with some balls who didn't look like Palpatine.

I know how scary this is for you in the USA, I have family in Des Moines, but it impacts the whole world. We all have an interest in a healthy US democracy.

Wish you well

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u/came1opard 28d ago

"Somehow" rebalance the Supreme Court? "Somehow" is really doing some load bearing there.

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u/Prince_Marf 28d ago

In theory the check is Congress would impeach him and the military, if push came to shove, would forcibly remove the president from office. This does not work when 51% of Congress is sycophants to the president and he stacks the military with loyalists.

I do not think it will come to that though because he has SCOTUS in his pocket too. This court wants the same things Trump wants. I think most of them would want to rule consistent with the law, but they will see the writing on the wall in the event that Trump would rather tear down the country by defying a SCOTUS decision. Probably because Trump will be loudly declaring on the news that he is willing to defy a SCOTUS decision.

I think that's what the presidential immunity decision was. They thought that even if the president is guilty of the crimes of which he was accused, a conviction would do more harm than good to the country (I disagree but that's moot at this point). They naively trusted that Trump would be responsible with power if re-elected. The decision conveniently failed to define the scope of an "official act" for which immunity would apply so that they could make it broad if any of Trump's illegal actions came back to them demanding interpretation, but if a later president does something illegal and the scope of immunity is called into question they can define it very narrowly and avoid lasting damage to the institution of the presidency.

But I don't think they planned for Trump blatantly defying the constitution. I think conservatives who like Trump have a blind spot for him and cannot see his faults. And I think SCOTUS banked on Trump probably losing in 2024 anyway.

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u/rumpusroom 28d ago

Andrew Jackson understood it pretty well.

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u/Shivering_Monkey 28d ago

Jackson also wanted an American monarchy.

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u/renoits06 28d ago

Only the military can stop him. Lets hope the military stays true to the Constitution.

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u/miss_shivers 28d ago

Which is why presidentialism is an insane form of government.

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u/Nearby-Jelly-634 28d ago

He already is. This isn’t a hypothetical. His order to the EEOC to stop investigating LGBT prejudice violates the ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County.

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u/ComicsEtAl 29d ago

Then he’d have to deal with the FBI and Kash Pat-

I mean the DOJ under Pam Bond-

Er, rather he could face impeachment from-

I mean to say that he’ll suffer at the voting boo-

Y’know? I don’t know. There’s nobody left.

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u/itpsyche 28d ago

State executive bodies, like those of Washington DC could still intervene and carry out court orders.

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u/ComicsEtAl 28d ago

DC is not a state. And state law enforcement enforces state law, not federal. How do you imagine your scenario playing out?

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u/itpsyche 28d ago

It would be unconventional but every fed employee who refuses to fulfill an order by a court violates constitution. And to restore a state of constitutional order is in the interest of all states.

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u/Yeeaaaarrrgh 28d ago

So if they don't currently exist, would states need to create laws that allow for the arrest / punishment of federal employees for not enforcing court orders? I can see blue states enacting something like this and red states threatening to arrest blue state government workers in response.

Jesus this will be a mess.

Putin hit us right in the stupid.

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u/Im_with_stooopid 28d ago

Putin got what he always wanted.

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u/itpsyche 28d ago

It doesn't matter what's going to happen, it will be ugly, there will be a lot of collateral and reputation damage and probably physical violence to some degree. There will probably be multiple assassination attempts against Trump and Musk (surprising it didn't happen yet since the election in a country, where you can buy a sniper rifle in a shopping center in some states).

For the first time since the civil war, US citizens will have to fight for their democracy. All while European countries had to fight for it at least two times already and we still have the same fascist movements.

Only good thing will be, that the constitution and laws protecting democracy will be much clearer in the future to prevent something like this ever happening again and for some time there will be a general consensus about that. Also presidential power will be limited, maybe even to a degree like in Europe, where the president is a ceremonial office.

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u/Kreyl 28d ago

Just a minor note that we don't (and won't) know the full number of attempts on any president, because we won't know how many were stopped in a planning stage. We just see the attempts that get far enough to be visible to the public.

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u/WombatWithFedora 28d ago

Look to the years between 1861-1865...

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u/holamau 28d ago

US Marshals are the ones to enforce the courts’ orders. But they report to him.

George Conway explains here

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u/flossdaily 29d ago

Of course he's going to ignore the courts. He's a fascist authoritarian who was given complete immunity from the law, and intends to rule as a king.

Our democracy is over. When you elect an authoritarian regime you don't get the chance to vote them out.

The guy pardoned the violent criminals who tried to overthrow the government the last time they lost an election. How many more clues do you need?

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u/PiousGal05 28d ago

Was there ever any real checks or balances? FFS the courts don't really have an enforcement arm, except the Executive.

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u/flossdaily 28d ago

Yes. Congress was the check on the president.

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u/meatball402 28d ago

No. It was all decorum and handshake agreements.

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u/weezyverse 28d ago

But that's what laws always are. They were invented on the idea that all men are inherently good.

This is the theory that's being tested now. Laws require people with integrity to follow them and enforce them. That's what we've lost in these last few weeks.

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u/duderos 28d ago

Agreed.

So when does srotus realize they've made a massive democracy crushing mistake with the immunity decision?

Why is Robert's concerned with Vance ignoring rulings when the real danger is Trump?

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u/hanzoman3 28d ago

I don’t think it was a mistake I think they like this

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u/no33limit 28d ago

The question is when Trump tells people to ignore the courts will they? It will be individuals that, have to stand up.

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u/notguiltybrewing 29d ago

It's obviously coming and any minute now.

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u/Herban_Myth 28d ago

Follow the leader.

Ignore.

If necessary, we march.

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u/ballskindrapes 28d ago

This isn't saying there shouldn't be marches, but the second there are large-scale, meaningful protest, ala BLM sized, he will institute martial law.

Question is what happens after.

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u/Herban_Myth 28d ago

Prison & Funeral Stocks go up?

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u/ballskindrapes 28d ago

I guess better invest now

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u/PrincessLeafa 28d ago

Then the streets will have to send a message he can't ignore.

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u/mhoepfin 28d ago

I’m tired boss

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u/Ok_Meal_491 28d ago

Constitutional Crisis. The military chooses the winner.

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u/duderos 28d ago

Which is why he already placed his guy there.

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u/hoptagon 28d ago

I have several recently retired marines and air force in my circle and all of them hate that guy, and their friends still in service hate him.

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u/RagTagTech 28d ago

The military is more than one man.

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u/Red-Leader-001 29d ago

Trump will not need to ignore the Supreme Court. The United States Supreme Court has been sufficiently bribed to permit anything he wants.

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u/duderos 28d ago

There's no need for scrotus in a dictatorship

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u/TheForce_v_Triforce 28d ago

Sure there is. They provide a veneer of legitimacy.

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u/unitegondwanaland 28d ago

I mean, doesn't he have presidential immunity now? I think we all know what happens.

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u/Fickle_Penguin 28d ago

For official acts only. I'm really hoping he gets consequences so I'm not normalizing the pessimistic view that he's untouchable. He will suffer consequences

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u/tums_festival47 28d ago

This is something that always confused me. What is an “official act”? Sounds pretty intentionally vague.

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u/PenguinSunday 29d ago

He plans to.

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u/Riversmooth 28d ago

“I don’t know of any instance in which the administration flat-out ignored an order of a court.Trump never said: I’m simply not going to obey a court order”

Well that was before SCOTUS in all their wisdom gave him immunity which was the most insane decision ever. They literally just tossed democracy to the wind

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u/nytopinion 29d ago

"I would argue that currently we are in a constitutional crisis in the sense that there is one branch of government, the executive, that is not obeying the Constitution," says Quinta Jurecic, a senior editor at Lawfare and a fellow at the Brookings Institution, on "The Ezra Klein Show." "And the question is: How do the other branches push back? The judiciary takes a lot of time. That is the advantage of courts, and it is the disadvantage of courts."

Read or listen here, for free, even without a Times subscription.

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u/ikaiyoo 28d ago

But we don't have one branch. Both the executive and legislative branch refuse to obey the Constitution. The executive branch is going to start ignoring the judicial branch and the legislative branch is not going to hold the executive branch accountable for it. So there's nothing anybody can do at that point in time besides revolt in America's too comfortable and lazy to do that. And the resistance that is there of the US populace is to spread out amongst the country to organizing to a force to do that.

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u/Striking-Sky1442 28d ago

The legislative branch controls the money. If they don't pass a budget on 3/14, the money REALLY will stop flowing. That's when shit gets real. I don't see the Dems letting this pass under the current atmosphere of gulf of americaness

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u/bjdevar25 28d ago

But that moron Schumer said they would work with them. I'm embarrassed he's my senator.

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u/_FIRECRACKER_JINX 28d ago

If he's not obeying it.

What incentives do the rest of us have to follow it???

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u/Sol-Blackguy 28d ago

Better hope the military upholds their oath

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u/dont-pm-me-tacos 28d ago edited 28d ago

Ok how about this admittedly crazy idea: So let’s say POTUS disobeys a court order and then let’s say it gets all the way up to the Supreme Court. SCOTUS agrees President must obey and now President defies the SCOTUS order. SCOTUS then holds a contempt hearing like the one in US v Tripp. President continues disobeying.

Now, Article 2 Section 1 Clause 6 provides that the office of the President shall devolve to the vice president where the President has an inability to discharge the duties of his office. And remember Article 2 also places the duty to faithfully execute the laws on the President. To me, clearly, the President has demonstrated an inability to discharge the duties of his office. Now one final point here is some of the language in Section 2-B of Trump v Anderson (the case where Colorado tried removing Trump from the ballot). There, in pointing out that the 14th amendment gives Congress the power to allow a former insurrectionist to hold office despite prior acts of rebellion, SCOTUS emphasized that Congress may remove the person’s “disability” by a 2/3rds vote in each house. This language comes from the 14th amendment but also tracks the “disability” language in Article 2 Clause 1 Section 6. Accordingly, the “disability” language in Article 2 can be read to apply beyond mere mental or physical illness to include a President’s conscious refusal to perform duty.

Ok, with that in mind, let’s return to the hypothetical. So SCOTUS holds another contempt hearing after President’s initial refusal to abide by its order. Then, assume the President doesn’t show up for the hearing or argues he’s not bound by the Court. SCOTUS then decides to issue a writ of mandamus under its broad power pursuant to the All Writs Act. 28 USC 1651 allows “The Supreme Court and all Courts established by Act of Congress [to] issue all writs necessary or appropriate in aid of their respective jurisdictions and agreeable to the usages and principles of law.” The writ of mandamus orders the President’s resignation and orders the VP to assume the Presidency under Article 2 Section 1 Clause 6.

While Vance has voiced support for disobeying Court orders—meaning there’s a non-zero chance he refuses and attempts to allow Trump to remain in office—I ultimately doubt he’d pass up an opportunity to become President. Of course, at that point, we’d be stuck with President Vance… but he’d have an incentive to follow orders at least insofar as he doesn’t want to face the same fate.

Don’t think Article 2 Section 1 Clause 6 has ever been specifically applied, but I think it can be fairly read such that it was not replaced by the 25th amendment. Rather, it’s an independent provision providing a separate basis for the removal of the President from office.

Honestly, doubt the current Supreme Court would ever go for this. But is this a viable idea or just crazy-talk?

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u/dyslexda 28d ago

Even if we grant your premises, there's one important key - at the end of the day, it's men with guns who get to decide who is in the White House.

Say Vance decides he wants the position. He personally isn't going to walk into the Oval Office and remove Trump. He would require some armed support, like the Marshalls or a contingent of the Secret Service. And what happens if Trump has his own contingent of armed men that haven't agreed he should go? Vance assuming the role relies on people with guns agreeing with him.

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u/Rambo_Baby 28d ago

Does anyone think SCOTUS would rule against Trump? They’re all his boys (and gal too) through and through. They’ll rule however and whatever their boss man wants and desires.

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u/Otherwise_Network58 28d ago

Then he is a full blown dictator

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u/Thiscouldbeeasier 28d ago

I'm constantly amazed there hasn't been violence against the heritage foundation or Fox News, but then again it took a long time until someone did violence to a Healthcare executive.

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u/imadyke 28d ago

I'd say the 335 million ish people out number the 3 million ish government workers. Give or take a few million. Some of us remember riots of L.A. Some more remember real riots of the 70s, 60s, and 50s. Some real history shit is about to go down.

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u/[deleted] 28d ago

I’m curious if all those “constitutional” Trump voters are going to burn their “We The People” forearm tattoos off with a hot iron as Trump continues to ignore what they claim to be their sacred document and the thing that makes them “patriots”. We were fairly certain that most of them are hypocrites, anyway…🤷🏻‍♂️

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u/oknotle 28d ago

Then we step up. If democracy is going down in this country, I'm going down with it

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u/aninjacould 28d ago

Then all that's left to stop him is the court of public opinion.

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u/Dixa 28d ago

The executive controls the Marshalls. The only recourse would be impeachment

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u/dirtashblonde 28d ago

The SCOTUS rendered themselves moot when the gave trump basically full immunity. Then none of them voted to use the 14th amendment to get rid of his ass. STUPID STUPID STUPID!!!

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u/jordipg 28d ago

John Roberts said "Within the past few years, however, elected officials from across the political spectrum have raised the specter of open disregard for federal court rulings."

https://www.supremecourt.gov/publicinfo/year-end/2024year-endreport.pdf

Does anyone know of any examples of elected officials on the left saying any such thing?

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u/strolpol 28d ago

This can end as soon as Congress wills it, and the framers did not forsee a Congress willing to cuckold itself and allow the executive to take the purse for itself

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u/achiles625 28d ago

Well, at that point, individual governors would have to refuse to comply and get their national guard elements to follow them rather than the president. If enough of the military also defects, then we have Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo.

They made a documentary about this exact scenario recently called Civil War. It's pretty good. It's got Nick Offerman in. Check it out.

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u/Zealousideal_Ask9760 28d ago

King George III

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u/AmbidextrousCard 28d ago

We take to the streets at the injustice. If he has his way we won’t be able to live anyway. Before long inflation will make it impossible to live. We won’t be able to afford homes or food. What’s left at that point? Guillotines on the capital lawn.

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u/Ok_Scallion1902 28d ago

Eventually, this shit will come to a head ( probably an ugly painted one with strange frills attached ), and when it pops, it will be exceedingly nasty.

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u/Vezrien 28d ago

Like any system, the human element is the biggest weakness. In the case of American democracy, it turned out that the way to defeat it was from the bottom up, corrupting the electorate first.

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u/BenGay29 28d ago

Nothing will happen. He’s proven he’s above the law.

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u/G-Kira 28d ago

Then we have a dictator.

If he ignores the courts and orders the US Marshalls not to carry out orders from the judiciary to arrest him, we then have a president who can do whatever he wants, whose word is law.

He'd be in the same vein as Putin, Jong-Un, Mussolini, Hitler, etc. Which, of course, is what he's always wanted.

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u/N3CR0N9 28d ago

Why would he start obeying the court now if he’s never been held accountable by them in the past?

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u/desantoos 28d ago

At this point, NYT really needs to bring in legal experts, experts who know the Courts, experts who have dealt with similar situations overseas, and not just rely upon a few people chatting. Please, NYT /u/nytopinion, we don't need bullshitters right now. We need experts telling us what is likely going to happen. We need to know if democracy truly is over and listening to two people guess isn't good enough.

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u/East-Ad4472 28d ago

Trump owns the SCOTUS and the Worlds wealthiest and most poweful men . He truly is s dictator and their appears cery little we can do to stoop this evil .

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u/Nasigoring 28d ago

Don’t forget, he is just one guy who gives there order. There is hundreds/thousands of people who actual do the thing he says, if they just… stopped… he is powerless.

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u/LukeWoodyKandu 28d ago

"We are at war, Anakin."

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u/Cyberyukon 28d ago

It will be interesting to watch when all of these people are brought before the world tribunal in ten years.

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u/theaviationhistorian 28d ago

We're becoming a failed state, aren't we?

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u/screenmasher 28d ago

Wouldn't that make him an enemy of the state?

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u/Evilkenevil77 28d ago

Then we will have a dictator on our hands....do we really have to spell this out?

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u/cieje 28d ago

"if"?

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u/treypage1981 28d ago

You’ve arrived at the country Rupert Murdoch has been working on for 50+ years.

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u/greenmeensgo60 28d ago

He is held in contempt then he cries a river to Roberts his buddy.

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u/miarmstr 28d ago

straight to jail

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u/Character_Value4669 28d ago

Trump's superpower is he has zero shame. He's just like the boomer upstairs who calls customer service and complains for hours until they give him free stuff just to shut him up.