Subject: Re: SCOTUS on POTUS immunity
The only case in which reasonable people MIGHT disagree on the justification for limited Presidential immunity involves military decisions as Commander in Chief that impact Americans. The classic case would be drone strikes ordered by a President that kill an American citizen. This issue came up during the Obama Administration when a drone strike aimed at someone else also killed a sixteen year old American born teenager who was in the same area after being taken there by his father who was acting for al-Qaeda and had been taken out two weeks prior in another drone strike.

The legal issue in that scenario is whether the US President can essentially order the killing of an American in a foreign country because they are alleged to be acting with enemies of the US against the US and US forces.

First, the obvious answer is that YES, a US President should have the legal right to direct military actions to eliminate a US citizen actively operating in a foreign country to kill American forces or plan deadly attacks against Americans in America. If you leave the country to plot military style attacks AGAINST the country, the right of the President to protect the rest of us trumps your "rights" as an American to a legal indictment, trial and conviction before receiving a sentence.

Second, in this specific case that was argued, the President DIDN'T order the killing of a sixteen year old by drone strike. The sixteen year-old was literally in the wrong place at the wrong time but he was THERE because his FATHER took him there before HE was killed and made no arrangement to get the son out of harm's way in the event of the father's death, an event the father knew could come at any moment given his choice of actions.

While this type of scenario MIGHT be one warranting at least CONSIDERATION of Presidential immunity, it is easy to argue that it still doesn't meet the bar for an iron-clad grant of immunity. The circumstances under which it might apply SHOULD be rare enough that the benefit of clarity of having NO pre-established Presidential immunity in such circumstances outweighs the "inconvenience" or unfairness of a President being charged with the murder of a US citizen abroad and having to defend against such a charge in a criminal court.

If there is one thing proven by politics over the last decade, it is that there is NO assumption Americans can make about the basic decency and baseline of morals of those elected to office that can be relied upon to keep actions out of gray areas. The assumption that slack can be provided to leaders because SURELY anyone elected to the Presidency wouldn't do THAT no longer applies. In the era of Trump and MAGA politics, it is absolutely clear there are legions of aspiring politicians who would interpret ANY grant of immunity, no matter how narrowly defined, as an outline of how close they can get to the line to accomplish their aims, rather than as a line they should remain MILES away from. That is not a mindset we want to encourage in the White House.


WTH