Donald Trump is underscoring the profound choice that voters could face next year with expansive claims of unchecked presidential power alongside increasingly unapologetic anti-democratic rhetoric.
The Republican front-runner is arguing in multiple courts that by virtue of his role as a former president, he is immune from the laws and precedents under which other Americans are judged. This has huge consequences not simply for the courtroom accounting that is yet to take place over his first turbulent term. Given that he has a good chance of winning the presidency again – he’s narrowly leading President Joe Biden in some swing-state polling – it also raises grave constitutional questions over the limits on presidential power.
This is why the 2024 election will represent such a momentous episode in American history. The entire constitutional premise of US governance could be on the line.
Trump’s concept of the untamable presidency sheds light on how he would behave in a second term given his apparent belief that any action a president might take is, by definition, legal. He has already promised he’d use four more years in the White House to enact personal “retribution” against his political foes. If the twice-impeached former president wins the Republican nomination and the presidency, it is already clear that a second term would risk destroying the principle that presidents do not hold monarchial power.
The courts may end up being the only institution standing in the way of the ex-president, who faces four criminal trials – two of them over alleged election interference related to his false claims of fraud in the 2020 contest that he lost. He’s pleaded not guilty in all of the cases against him and maintains no wrongdoing.
In a blow to Trump’s strategy, his power grab was rejected last week in a landmark opinion by US District Judge Tanya…
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