The 14th Amendment says if you were involved in an insurrection you can't be president. SCOTUS said they won't allow anyone to enforce that because of reasons they made up.
The Constitution doesn't say the president is immune from criminal law. SCOTUS decided he is because of reasons they made up.
At a minimum it seems like Biden should revisit every decision on e.g. loan forgiveness that any judge has blocked, and just say, nice judgement you made there but this is an official act so I can do it anyway.
Sure Biden is safe but his order is not. He can ignore the court as presidents have done before so nothing new there but the danger is that a new president might say "that was illegal and now anyone who benefited from that illegal act it goes back to status quo ante." Is that an ex post facto law?
I mean... the ruling very explicitly did not rule on the transfer of the orders...
If I tell my Treasury Sec to eliminate all student loan debt in defiance of Supreme Court orders, it's not clear at all that my immunity wouldn't transfer. The court implies it does.
Presidents don't actually DO the work, themselves. They tell other people to do the work. The work getting done is an extension of their will, however, as the court sees it.
While they left the opening there... This court will never allow Bill Barr to be prosecuted for carrying out orders
Interesting. I'm less certain and I don't think the court addressed that did they? I guess if they keep going down the road of "unitary executive" they might get there. But "just following orders" seems a bit thin. Even soldiers can be prosecuted and "orders" is generally not protective.
