Trump may be able to rack up some SCOTUS wins, but his insistence of blanket immunity as president, is doomed to fail. Certainly, the efforts to lean on the high court in a quid pro quo won't sway the justices.
That's the takeaway by former federal prosecutor Barbara McQuade when she appeared on MSNBC's "The Last Word" with Lawrence O'Donnell Thursday night.
"I think there are a number of issues coming before this court, where they might rule in Donald Trump's favor," she said. "For example, the insurrection clause issue attack on the Constitution.
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"But this one, immunity, I think this is in a very weak claim and I can't imagine even this court will accept this challenge by Donald Trump."
In oral arguments before the three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, Trump's attorney Dean John Sauer gave a “qualified yes” that a former president would be immune from prosecution when pressed by Justice Florence Pan about if the chief executive were to sell pardons or order the assassination of a political rival and get away with it.
Trump doubled down in an all-caps Truth Social post claiming that he had "full immunity" even when "events that 'cross the line.'"
As far as the Trump legal strategy to play a card that the 45th president is owed a solid because he shifted the court to a conservative majority, it is a mediocre play, according to McQuade.
In an interview with Fox News' Sean Hannity, Trump attorney Alina Habba made the insinuation that Trump "went through hell" to secure Kavanaugh his bench post.
"It should be a slam dunk in the Supreme Court," she said. "I have faith in them. People like Kavanaugh, who the president fought for, who the president went through hell to get into place, he'll step up," Habba said. "Those people will step up not because they're pro-Trump, but because they're pro-law, because they're pro-fairness, and the law on this is very clear."
McQuade called this comment passive extortion.
"Alina Habba was on television just a week or so ago talking about, you know, 'Remember Brett Kavanaugh, he fought for, you he has you on the court!'
"I think that kind of extortion is going to fall on deaf ears; if anything, I think it's likely to backfire."
