Monday, March 4, 2024

POLITICO Nightly: An unusual and revealing unanimous decision



 
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BY ANKUSH KHARDORI

Presented by Feeding America

The U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, D.C.

The U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, D.C. today. | Francis Chung/POLITICO

NINE TO ZERO — The Supreme Court dealt a unanimous and decisive blow today to a long-shot bid to disqualify Donald Trump from running for reelection this year, clearing the way for a rematch with President Joe Biden.

It’s the end of yet another unprecedented chapter in the long and still-unfurling story of Trump’s legal woes. The challenge to Trump’s candidacy was based on the argument that he should be disqualified from holding federal office under a once-obscure section of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that precludes anyone from holding federal office if they “have engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the United States.

In December, the Colorado Supreme Court endorsed that theory , concluding that the actions by Trump in the run-up to Jan. 6, 2021 — which the court described as a campaign “over several months” that was designed “to prevent what he falsely characterized as an alleged fraud on the people of this country” — disqualified him from running for reelection. The decision drew praise from some prominent lawyers and legal analysts, particularly some anti-Trump conservatives who described the Colorado court’s ruling as “unassailable” and self-evidently correct .

All nine Supreme Court justices — including the court’s three liberals — saw things differently.

The justices unanimously held that the 14th Amendment does not allow the states — as opposed to the federal government — to prevent a candidate from holding federal office. Five of the court’s six conservative justices (a majority of the full court) went further to hold that Congress itself must enact detailed legislation in order to implement the broad prohibition set forth in the amendment.

The structure of the decision was unusual, however, and itself revealing.

The court released an unsigned and unanimous “per curiam” decision with the principal holdings. That may have reflected a desire on the part of the justices to project a unified front on this crucial constitutional and electoral question in a particularly volatile time in American political life.

The justices ended up splitting, however, on the question of whether Congress must enact legislation to implement the prohibition or whether other federal actors, including federal judges, should be able to do so under appropriate circumstances. In a separate concurrence, conservative justice Amy Coney Barrett argued that it was unnecessary for the majority to determine whether “federal legislation is the exclusive vehicle through which [the prohibition] can be enforced” and she urged the public to focus on the bottom line.

“All nine Justices agree on the outcome of this case,” Barrett wrote. “That is the message Americans should take home.”

The three liberal justices wrote separately as well. They reiterated their support for the unanimous conclusion that the states should not be able to enforce the disqualification provision. But they took sharp issue with the majority’s further conclusion that Congress must act in order for the provision to be enforceable. The conservative majority, the liberals wrote, reached out “to decide … questions not before us, and to foreclose future efforts to disqualify a Presidential candidate under that provision. In a sensitive case crying out for judicial restraint, it abandons that course.”

Despite all this, the overall result was not surprising to most analysts who had been following the proceedings closely since the beginning — particularly after a law review article authored by two conservative law professors attracted mainstream media coverage last summer and further energized the legal campaign to disqualify Trump. That article was based on a conservative theory of constitutional interpretation known as originalism , but it was far from air-tight even on its own terms, and some obvious obstacles — including the problems that ultimately proved fatal today — were apparent from the outset .

The bid to disqualify Trump resulted in a political dynamic that has become common in his legal cases. For Trump’s most ardent supporters, it was yet another unprecedented and corrupt effort to “weaponize” the law against the former president. For his most dogged opponents, here was an ironclad legal tool that could finally end Trump’s political career; the only thing necessary was for the public and the courts to see the light. Both sides (yes, both) were wrong.

The Supreme Court’s decision today makes clear that Americans should brace themselves for a rematch between the current and former presidents, whether they like it or not .

Welcome to POLITICO Nightly. Reach out with news, tips and ideas at nightly@politico.com . Or contact tonight’s author at akhardori@politico.com .

 

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WHAT'D I MISS?

— Former Trump CFO Allen Weisselberg pleads guilty to perjury in ex-president’s civil fraud case: Allen Weisselberg, the former chief financial officer of Donald Trump’s company, pleaded guilty today in New York to perjury in connection with testimony he gave in the ex-president’s civil fraud case. Weisselberg, 76, pleaded guilty to two counts of perjury and will be sentenced to five months in jail — which would be his second stint behind bars after 100 days last year in an unrelated tax fraud case. The pleas related to testimony he gave at a July 2020 deposition in New York Attorney General Letitia James’ case against Trump, but in court today he also admitted, without pleading guilty, to lying on the witness stand at the former president’s civil fraud trial last fall.

— Massachusetts Air National Guard member Jack Teixeira pleads guilty to leaking military secrets: Massachusetts Air National Guard member Jack Teixeira pleaded guilty today in federal court to leaking highly classified military documents about Russia’s war in Ukraine and other national security secrets. Teixeira pleaded guilty to six counts of willful retention and transmission of national defense information under the Espionage Act nearly a year after he was arrested in the most consequential national security leak in years. 

— JetBlue calls off merger with Spirit Airlines: JetBlue Airways today announced that it is abandoning its bid to purchase Spirit Airlines , after a judge blocked its plans to merge earlier this year. New York-based JetBlue said that while both companies still believe the merger would benefit passengers by creating an airline that can compete with other larger carriers, ultimately the airline bowed to what has become intractable legal and regulatory approval hurdles, especially considering the Biden administration’s muscular stance against consolidation.

NIGHTLY ROAD TO 2024

CAMPAIGN COST-CUTTING — As former President Donald Trump gears up for a costly general election campaign with President Joe Biden and faces staggering legal expenses of his own, his campaign is actively working to keep costs in check , reports CNN.

One of the driving forces for why the Trump campaign has been so diligent about cost-cutting, the advisers say, is because they fear a repeat of the former president’s 2020 general election financial struggles, when the campaign burned through hundreds of millions of dollars in a matter of months that left Trump’s team facing an alarming cash crunch weeks before the November 2020 election.

In addition to reining in spending on rallies and transportation, the campaign is also keeping a tight leash on the money being spent on hotels, meals and other everyday expenses typically associated with a large political operation, the advisers say. Even the furniture found in Trump’s state headquarters across the country has been meticulously chosen so as not to accrue superfluous costs, one senior adviser noted.

AROUND THE WORLD

French President Emmanuel Macron  attends the inauguration ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympic village on Feb. 29, 2024.

French President Emmanuel Macron attends the inauguration ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympic village on Feb. 29, 2024. | Ludovic Marin, Pool via AP

BURNED IN AMBER — France today became the first country to enshrine the freedom to have an abortion in its constitution , a move which secured support across party lines despite some reservations, reports POLITICO EU.

Prime Minister Gabriel Attal referred to the rollback of abortion rights in the U.S., Poland and Hungary to stress the importance of the French vote. “It takes one generation, one year, one week for things to change drastically,” he said in his opening speech, pointing to “American women who must fight for abortion rights” and “Hungarians and Poles for whom abortion is no longer an enshrined freedom.”

Of the 902 French parliamentarians, 780 voted in favor of the bill — 72 voted against it and 50 abstained, during the extraordinary voting session in Versailles.

By pushing forward the proposal, President Emmanuel Macron looked to send a strong message of support for reproductive rights and, at the same time, score political points at the expense of a resurgent far right.

Abortion rights are widely supported in France, and limiting them was not a publicly debated issue — but Macron’s constitutional amendment exposed divisions within conservative and far right parties and forced them to discuss an issue on which they had long preferred to keep silent.

WORK AROUND — The Biden administration is looking to the sea as it tries to rush more humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza — a development that underscores growing U.S. tensions with Israel, POLITICO reports.

President Joe Biden raised the maritime option in recent days as the U.S. began airdropping food into the tiny territory, a process that allows for only limited deliveries at a time. Today, top U.S. officials discussed what will likely be a challenging effort to establish a corridor via water to increase distribution.

“We are in discussion with a number of partners about this initiative, and while it is still in the development phase, we are optimistic about its potential to supplement our air and land efforts,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters. “It’s a matter that we are exploring with commercial partners as well as other partners in the region.”

 

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NIGHTLY NUMBER

€1.8 billion

The size ($1.95 billion) of the fine European Union regulators levied today against Apple for abusive app store rules that may have hiked prices for music-streaming subscriptions, in the third biggest antitrust penalty from the European Commission to date.

RADAR SWEEP

SOUND UP — When Universal Music Group decided to pull their songs from TikTok after being unable to agree to a licensing deal with the app’s parent company ByteDance in late January, it spelled the beginning of a possible sea change for the app. While music from well known artists played over videos fueled much of TikTok’s rise, now there’s a new phenomenon on the platform: Short clips of easily meme-able content . A strange ditty that goes like “You have been promoted! You are now one of my elite employees!” has lately been all over the app, reaching a viral status as a TikTok-only sound — you can’t find that on Spotify. For WIRED, Reece Rogers digs into what all of this means and how TikTok is evolving.

PARTING IMAGE

On this date in 2012: Russia holds national elections, with Vladimir Putin winning a third term, though the opposition and independent observers said the result was marred by widespread violations. Pictured are supporters of Putin rallying outside the Kremlin.

On this date in 2012: Russia holds national elections, with Vladimir Putin winning a third term, though the opposition and independent observers said the result was marred by widespread violations. Pictured are supporters of Putin rallying outside the Kremlin. | Misha Japaridze/AP

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