South Korea | Impeachment of PM Overturned

nycfan said:
SCOTUS might argue that SK is acting consistently with their recent decision since Yoon was first impeached and now is being arrested.
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Agree. While the immunity decision is indefensible and spectacularly dangerous, that's not the risk factor if someone like Trump were to pull a Yoon and declare martial law. The risk factor here is that unlike SK, where almost all legislators opposed Yoon, huge percentages of the GOP would cheer Trump on. I'm skeptical the GOP would vote to impeach him even for something like that.
 
nycfan said:
SCOTUS might argue that SK is acting consistently with their recent decision since Yoon was first impeached and now is being arrested.
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I didn’t want to write book but I was thinking about how an impeachment conviction is virtually impossible here when I wrote n my previous post. I also recognize that arrest while still in office has pretty much always been impossible. Yes, that did not change.

But I think there are a few points that are relevant here.

1. Nothing in the scotus ruling opened the door to criminal charges after impeachment and removal from office. I am pretty sure they all but ruled out a criminal charges after impeachment. They said removal from office is the way to handle it but that is the extent of our abilities.

2. Even if removal from office ever had a chance, that isn’t a sufficient punishment to offset the feeling of invulnerability the court gave the president. Now a president of SK knows if he pulls this crap he might not only be removed from office but may face jail.

3. Finally Roberts may argue that not every single thing a president could do has immunity but they did nothing to define the guardrails and left the impression that anything that can in any way be argued as an official act has immunity. Even if killing a rival wouldn’t be considered an official act, there isn’t a person who can say for sure it wouldn’t be considered one if the proper language was used to try to justify it. So while the court may argue in some future day that they didn’t intend for it to provide immunity in such a case, they’ve left the impression that it would and the impression is really all you need to usher in an age of authoritarian.

I am not saying I know Trump will do such a thing but I am confident that he feels that a future criminal prosecution is an impossibility. Whether SCOTUS meant to give him such confidence is immaterial. They have and the will bear some blame if that leads to abuses of power that we have never seen before.

Roberts can’t come back and say, well, I didn’t think our ruling was going to be interpreted that way if a president decided to pull a Hussein and escort congressmen out of the State of th Union to be executed. Leaving it unclear whether such I thing could result in criminal charges because you made a bad ruling and left the impression that there are no guardrails is enough to qualify as a dangerous and historically bad decision.

I used the Hussein example as an extreme situation to make a point. I am in no way predicting that that will happen. But it isn’t unreasonable to believe a president would feel that he might be able to do such a thing - especially when combining that ruling with pardon powers including self pardon powers. I don’t think any legal scholar would now argue that self pardon isn’t valid after the immunity ruling. The “can’t be your own judge” argument pretty much went out the window after the immunity ruling. There is a 0% chance that this court would rule against a self pardoned.
 
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nycfan said:
SCOTUS might argue that SK is acting consistently with their recent decision since Yoon was first impeached and now is being arrested.
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no, no, no. scotus said that impeachment was of no relevance to immunity. even if trump had been impeach and removed for j6, he would still have had all the immunities he does today.

i point this out in this manner to illustrate just how radical and ridiculous the scotus decision was. what you've attributed to scotus was actually trump's argument to scotus. and that didn't go far enough for roberts. he gave trump more than trump asked for. he crafted a nonsense position that EVEN DONALD TRUMP WAS TOO EMBARRASSED TO MAKE.
 
ChapelHillSooner said:
I didn’t want to write book but I was thinking about how an impeachment conviction is virtually impossible here when I wrote n my previous post. I also recognize that arrest while still in office has pretty much always been impossible. Yes, that did not change.

But I think there are a few points that are relevant here.

1. Nothing in the scotus ruling opened the door to criminal charges after impeachment and removal from office. I am pretty sure they all but ruled out a criminal charges after impeachment. They said removal from office is the way to handle it but that is the extent of our abilities.

2. Even if removal from office ever had a chance, that isn’t a sufficient punishment to offset the feeling of invulnerability the court gave the president. Now a president of SK knows if he pulls this crap he might not only be removed from office but may face jail.

3. Finally Roberts may argue that not every single thing a president could do has immunity but they did nothing to define the guardrails and left the impression that anything that can in any way be argued as an official act has immunity. Even if killing a rival wouldn’t be considered an official act, there isn’t a person who can say for sure it wouldn’t be considered one if the proper language was used to try to justify it. So while the court may argue in some future day that they didn’t intend for it to provide immunity in such a case, they’ve left the impression that it would and the impression is really all you need to usher in an age of authoritarian.

I am not saying I know Trump will do such a thing but I am confident that he feels that a future criminal prosecution is an impossibility. Whether SCOTUS meant to give him such confidence is immaterial. They have and the will bear some blame if that leads to abuses of power that we have never seen before.

Roberts can’t come back and say, well, I didn’t think our ruling was going to be interpreted that way if a president decided to pull a Hussein and escort congressmen out of the State of th Union to be executed. Leaving it unclear whether such I thing could result in criminal charges because you made a bad ruling and left the impression that there are no guardrails is enough to qualify as a dangerous and historically bad decision.

I used the Hussein example as an extreme situation to make a point. I am in no way predicting that that will happen. But it isn’t unreasonable to believe a president would feel that he might be able to do such a thing - especially when combining that ruling with pardon powers including self pardon powers. I don’t think any legal scholar would now argue that self pardon isn’t valid after the immunity ruling. The “can’t be your own judge” argument pretty much went out the window after the immunity ruling. There is a 0% chance that this court would rule against a self pardoned.
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1. south korea has impeached three presidents since 2004. the one impeached in 2017 is serving 25 years for her corruption. so the president of sk knows that s/he will face criminal charges for criminal activity. one wonders if the martial law was an attempt to evade accountability for similar corruption.

2. you are correct that scotus did not open the door to prosecution-after-impeachment-and-removal. they didn't exactly rule out criminal charges after impeachment; they held that impeachment didn't affect immunity. so if a president is impeached and removed for shooting someone in the middle of 5th avenue for sport, the president can be tried for that offense. but if the president was removed for conspiring with the attorney general to threaten and prosecute political opponents only for that reason, that can't be charged criminally regardless of impeachment.
 
superrific said:
1. south korea has impeached three presidents since 2004. the one impeached in 2017 is serving 25 years for her corruption. so the president of sk knows that s/he will face criminal charges for criminal activity. one wonders if the martial law was an attempt to evade accountability for similar corruption.

2. you are correct that scotus did not open the door to prosecution-after-impeachment-and-removal. they didn't exactly rule out criminal charges after impeachment; they held that impeachment didn't affect immunity. so if a president is impeached and removed for shooting someone in the middle of 5th avenue for sport, the president can be tried for that offense. but if the president was removed for conspiring with the attorney general to threaten and prosecute political opponents only for that reason, that can't be charged criminally regardless of impeachment.
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I didn’t mean to say that a president could never be prosecuted for any action. Obviously if Trump killed Melania and said he did it because she flirted with Trudeau, that wouldn’t pass the official duty test.

But my understanding is that anything that could be argued as being an act of official duty (even a very flimsy argument) would satisfy the official duty test. (That said, I do think they arguably opened the door for self pardon so if he did that within DC and pardoned himself, he could escape all criminal charges.)

And finally, if a really flimsy argument for a very serious crime wouldn’t satisfy the court, they have not made that clear and because of that someone like Trump might feel entirely unconstrained.
 
ChapelHillSooner said:
I didn’t mean to say that a president could never be prosecuted for any action. Obviously if Trump killed Melania and said he did it because she flirted with Trudeau, that wouldn’t pass the official duty test.

But my understanding is that anything that could be argued as being an act of official duty (even a very flimsy argument) would satisfy the official duty test. (That said, I do think they arguably opened the door for self pardon so if he did that within DC and pardoned himself, he could escape all criminal charges.)

And finally, if a really flimsy argument for a very serious crime wouldn’t satisfy the court, they have not made that clear and because of that someone like Trump might feel entirely unconstrained.
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yes, i was largely if not entirely agreeing with you.

according to the opinion, it's not "anything that can be argued" as official duty. it's anything that is an official duty that isn't per se immune. so the courts would have to determine whether an act is a part of an immunity-granting official duty. you are correct that scotus provided basically no indication about how that would work. is it immunity as a matter of law? a mixed question of law and fact? those matter as to standards of review.

i do not think they opened the door to self-pardon. i might be wrong but i think they mentioned the self-pardon in the footnote and said they aren't deciding that question. it's been a little while and i am not eager to read and re-read that abomination.

as to the practical consideration, you're right that the practice of the court and its doctrine do not always align. so while they say that there is no immunity for non-official duties, will they ever find a duty to be official when it's a GOP president? count me skeptical, at least with this court.
 
superrific said:
no, no, no. scotus said that impeachment was of no relevance to immunity. even if trump had been impeach and removed for j6, he would still have had all the immunities he does today.

i point this out in this manner to illustrate just how radical and ridiculous the scotus decision was. what you've attributed to scotus was actually trump's argument to scotus. and that didn't go far enough for roberts. he gave trump more than trump asked for. he crafted a nonsense position that EVEN DONALD TRUMP WAS TOO EMBARRASSED TO MAKE.
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I am saying they might adopt the Trump argument if faced with such a question about Sotu Korea situation b/c why not.
 
People should pay attention to this issue since I think it may happen here. Think there is a decen chance Trump tries to pull something like this over next four years. He discussed doing so at times during previous aqdministration, i.e. calling out military and imposing ML for certain states and cities. His last three months in office which involved firing senior military and intelligence officials and replacing them with loyal sycophants was somewhat of a trial run, a bumbling one thankfully
 
I’m thinking SCOTUS is going to be pushed to the edge of collective insanity this term of trump. He and his “basket of deplorables" are going to push all the buttons this trip. And, every success will become a precedent. That’s scary!
 
nycfan said:


What the hell is going on in South Korea?

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“South Korea’s Constitutional Court on Monday overturned the impeachment of Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, reinstating the nation’s No. 2 official as acting leader, while not yet ruling on the separate impeachment of President Yoon Suk Yeol.

Han became acting president after Yoon was impeached by the National Assembly over his Dec. 3 imposition of martial law that triggered a massive political crisis. But Han was impeached by the assembly as well in late December following political strife with opposition lawmakers.

The unprecedented, successive impeachments that suspended the country’s top two officials intensified a domestic division and deepened worries about the country’s diplomatic and economic activities. The deputy prime minister and finance minister, Choi Sang-mok, had since serving as acting president.

… They ruled the accusations against him weren’t against the law or weren’t serious enough to remove him from office or his impeachment motion didn’t even met a required quorum when it passed thorough the assembly. One justice upheld Han’s impeachment.

…The court has yet to rule on Yoon’s impeachment. If the court upholds Yoon’s impeachment, South Korea must hold a election for a new president. If it rules for him, Yoon will be restored to office and regain his presidential powers.

Yoon was impeached about two weeks earlier than Han. Observers earlier predicted the Constitutional Court would rule on Yoon’s case in mid-March but it hasn’t done so.

Yoon has been separately arrested and charged with rebellion in connection with his martial law decree. If convicted of that charge, he would face the death penalty or a life sentence. On March 8, Yoon was released from prison, after a Seoul district court allowed him to stand his criminal trial without being detained. …”
 
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