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RooLondonSounds's avatar

I think you’re correct, and my example was poorly chosen. I was essentially trying to provide an extreme example of an act that a president may lawfully perform but which, if performed by the general public, would be unlawful.

The U.S. Code often describes laws in the form of “any person who does ABC shall be punished as described in section XYZ”, but does often specifically exclude individuals who fall under various criteria.

So if it’s possible to determine whether particular laws do / don’t apply to presidents, then I agree with your original point :)

I am sceptical though as to the practical application of this given what recently happened in Colorado in which the District and State Supreme Courts arrived at different interpretations of the term “office holder” the definition of which determined whether it applied to a president or not. And that was just a single section of the Fourteenth Amendment…

But overall I think I agree with you now that establishing legality of presidential acts would be the more relevant approach… unless of course SCOTUS torpedoes this entire discussion by ruling that the years a president is in office are forever protected from prosecution :)

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Denis M.'s avatar

I appreciate the discourse here. I am not expert in this area and am open to being proven wildly wrong.

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RooLondonSounds's avatar

Thanks buddy! I enjoy refining my thinking through dialogue too! The huge variation of opinions / interpretations / predictions across just the Bulwark team alone is wild. That’s the nature of being in uncharted territory I guess…. *gulp*

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