Does becoming a Presidential Candidate Confer any immunity? Donald Trump announced that he will run for president in 2024. Does becoming a Presidential Candidate Confer any immunity from litigation?
A Presidential candidate has no legal immunity for litigation or prosecution different from that of any other political candidate. The First Amendment provides significant protections for expressive conduct of a candidate for political office. Presidential candidates do have a few special privileges, most notably, secret service protection and at a late stage, access to certain intelligence briefings not available to the general public. Judges and prosecutors often seek to avoid the appearance of impropriety interfering with a Presidential election campaign and this may influence, for example, the scheduling of proceeding against a candidate. But there is no actual immunity from either criminal or civil liability for a Presidential candidate that is different from anyone else.
Why has this never been interpreted by SCOTUS? It has never been interpreted by any court, because the interpretation you're advocating is nonsensical, and nobody has ever tried to advance it in any court. Therefore, no court has had an opportunity to rule on it. Congress, however, has (at least implicitly) interpreted this clause to mean that all natural-born citizens are eligible to be president if they also fulfill the other requirements, regardless of when they were born, so that is the prevailing interpretation unless someone manages to challenge the interpretation either before congress or in a court. If such a challenge is made then there will be an explicit ruling.
Only for certain parts of the constitution, and not for the parts you are asking about. Accordingly, the Supreme Court has squarely stated that neither the First Amendment nor the Fifth Amendment "acknowledges any distinction between citizens and resident aliens."13 For more than a century, the Court has recognized that the Equal Protection Clause is "universal in [its] application, to all persons within the territorial jurisdiction, without regard to differences of ... nationality."14 The Court has repeatedly stated that "the Due Process Clause applies to all 'persons' within the United States, including aliens, whether their presence here is lawful, unlawful, temporary, or permanent."15 When noncitizens, no matter what their status, are tried for crimes, they are entitled to all of the rights that attach to the criminal process, without any distinction based on their nationality.16 Are Foreign Nationals Entitled to the Same Constitutional Rights As Citizens? - David Cole, Georgetown University Law Center
The Twelfth Amendment states that "no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice President of the United States." Thus, to serve as vice president, an individual must: Be a natural-born U.S. citizen; Be at least 35 years old. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vice_President_of_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelfth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution Because the age requirement for President is 35 years old, the Vice President must also meet that requirement.
The US Constitution Article II, Section 2 grants sayt that the President "shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment". It does not anywhere say that a pardon can be rescinded. Until a constitutional amendment is added giving the president the power to rescind a pardon (zero chance of that happening), a pardon is permanent. For reference, Ex Parte Grossman, 267 U.S. 87 addresses the question of limiting the presidential pardon power, where the losing side argued that criminal contempt is not an "offense against the United States", and the Supreme Court held that criminal contempt is such an offense. Nothing has legally changed since then.
CNBC's explanation is simply wrong. The law says that a vaccine manufacturer is immune from suit and liability under Federal and State law with respect to all claims for loss caused by, arising out of, relating to, or resulting from the administration to or the use by an individual of a covered countermeasure if a declaration under subsection (b) has been issued and there was a declaration under subsection (b). This immunity is not conditioned either way by being approved, indeed the declaration states To be a Covered Countermeasure, qualified pandemic or epidemic products or security countermeasures also must be approved or cleared under the FD&amp;C Act; licensed under the PHS Act; or authorized for emergency use under Sections 564, 564A, or 564B of the FD&amp;C Act The liability immunity is not perpetual, the declaration says: Liability immunity for Covered Countermeasures administered and used in accordance with the public health and medical response of the Authority Having Jurisdiction begins with a Declaration and lasts through (1) the final day the emergency Declaration is in effect, or (2) October 1, 2024, whichever occurs first. That doesn't mean that there can't be another declaration in the future. Immunity of a manufacturer to liability is not related to a patient being &quot;covered&quot;. There are other ways in which a patient could be &quot;covered&quot;. One of them is the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program and the other is the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, which presently redirects you to CICP.
Yes The rule against prosecuting a sitting President is not a law, it is a Justice Department opinion and policy. The justification for it is that dealing with a criminal case would be severely distracting to the President, and thus harmful to the nation. Besides, the opinion goes on, any serious issue can be dealt with by impeachment. That reasoning obviously does not apply to a former President. Article I, section 3, paragraph 7 of the US constitution says: Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States: but the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law. (emphasis added) This clearly contemplates the criminal prosecution of a former office holder, after such a person was removed by an impeachment. There is no exception for a President. Therefor a President can be criminally charged and prosecuted for actions during the presidency, provided that the evidence to establish probable cause is there, and that a Grand Jury indicts said former President. So far as I know there has never been a case where such a thing was done. President Ford's pardon of President Nixon stopped any Federal prosecution of him. I think there have been cases were former US Judges, after impeachment, were criminally prosecuted. But that is not quite the same thing -- no one claims that sitting judges are immune to criminal charges. To be clear this would not apply just to issues that a President had been impeached for. A former President is no different from anyone else in this respect. Any such person can be prosecuted if there is probable cause, and convicted if there is proof beyond a reasonable doubt of criminal violation of some law, even if the violation occurred while the president was in office.
Count 1: 18 U.S.C. § 371 (Conspiracy to Defraud United States) Here the indictment's introduction alleges that Trump perpetrated: A conspiracy to to defraud the United States by using dishonesty, fraud, and deceit to impair, obstruct, and defeat the lawful federal government function by which the results of the presidential election are collected, counted, and certified by the federal government, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 371. temporary link to indictment pdf pending finding a better version: https://d3i6fh83elv35t.cloudfront.net/static/2023/08/trump-indictment.pdf 18 U.S.C. § 371 (Cornell Law School Legal Information Institute): If two or more persons conspire either to commit any offense against the United States, or to defraud the United States, or any agency thereof in any manner or for any purpose, and one or more of such persons do any act to effect the object of the conspiracy, each shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both. If, however, the offense, the commission of which is the object of the conspiracy, is a misdemeanor only, the punishment for such conspiracy shall not exceed the maximum punishment provided for such misdemeanor.