Quinn LiPuma is a junior majoring in Political Theory and Constitutional Democracy in MSU’s James Madison College. During his summer internship with WCDP, Quinn will write short explanatory pieces for us about the Heritage Foundation’s terrifying but little-understood blueprint for American fascism, titled Project 2025. This is the fifth and final piece in Quinn’s series.

It is becoming increasingly evident that showing the absurdity in the abstract promises of Project 2025 should be compounded by relevant news as to why it matters. What happened on July 1st at the nation’s highest court is a great example for why. On July 1st, the Supreme Court of the United States published their opinion on one of the most important cases that has ever appeared before it: Trump vs. USA. This appeal to the Supreme Court was Trump’s desperate bid to keep himself immune from prosecution due to presidential executive privilege. He argued that immunity was necessary by citing that no previous president had ever faced criminal prosecution. Therefore, according to Trump’s logic, that must mean that he is the subject of an unfair attack by the Democratic Party, necessitating a legal shield for presidents charged with criminal conduct. If that sounds facetious on Trump’s part, that is because it is. This case, despite being one of the most important decisions before the Supreme Court, was also one of the most logically simplistic for a judge committed to protecting the rule of law to get right. Judge Tanya Chutken, who oversaw this case at the appellate level, wrote that, “former President Trump has become citizen Trump, with all the defenses of any other criminal defendant.” The Supreme Court however, made up mostly of judges who do not possess that vital commitment to the rule of law, decided that “at least for core presidential actions…immunity must be absolute.” Core presidential actions, according to SCOTUS, include being the commander in chief of the military. In other words, any American president is now fully immune from criminal prosecution as long as they can make a case that an action in legal question was a “core presidential action” and can use the military however they desire. This is not the rule of law. This is martial law. In addition, the Court also added that for non-core official acts, defined by SCOTUS as acts that are in the “outer perimeter” of the president’s duty, there must be presumptive immunity, unless it is shown that prosecuting the president poses no “dangers of intrusion on the authority and functions of the Executive Branch.” If you are wondering what, exactly, constitutes intrusion or the outer perimeter of the president’s duties, the Court has written no standard for how to determine what intrusion is. However, they wrote that “outer perimeter” means any act that is taken that is “not manifestly or palpably beyond [the president’s] authority.” And so, the fact that the courts can not intrude on the Executive Branch is made nearly universal because they refuse to define the limits of a president’s authority. 

Therefore, the only thing that now matters in this election is who voters trust with absolute unchecked authority to control the government as they desire. A 91 time indicted, pathological liar with dictatorial aspirations, or a woman who has made her entire career centered around protecting justice and the rule of law? The legal system has now failed, and it’s up to us to ensure that people who aspire to be dictators can not get anywhere near the sweeping power that this Supreme Court has given the Executive Branch.

Return to Part 1 to read the whole series.