AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
The Supreme Court returns to the bench this week. And the justices are scheduled to consider some major issues, including the legality of President Trump's tariffs and important disputes about free speech. And casting a shadow over it all? The new standard the court set last term concerning the scope of presidential power. NPR's Carrie Johnson covers justice and the Supreme Court, and she joins us now. Hi, Carrie.
CARRIE JOHNSON, BYLINE: Hey there.
RASCOE: The case last term that brought about this real widening of presidential power - it was the one about immunity from prosecution. Remind us what the justices said there.
JOHNSON: That case revolved around criminal charges that were brought against former and now current President Donald Trump by the special counsel Jack Smith. A conservative majority of the Supreme Court ruled that Trump and future presidents are presumed to be immune from prosecution for their official acts because they need leeway to do their important work. James Burnham worked in the Justice Department in President Trump's first term. He says the whole system is designed to work that way.
JAMES BURNHAM: Article 2 says, which is the part of the Constitution that talks about the presidency - it says that the executive power shall be vested in the president. And so I think the framers clearly intended and, in fact, did create a very energetic and strong presidency in order to guide our nation.
JOHNSON: He says the Supreme Court has multiple justices, Congress has multiple chambers, but the executive branch is really one person - the president.
RASCOE: So fast-forward. Donald Trump is now president again. How might that immunity decision or the reasoning behind it look now?
JOHNSON: Yeah. I reached out to Steve Vladeck. He's a law professor at Georgetown who's been critical of the Supreme Court.
STEVE VLADECK: With every day that passes, the Supreme Court's decision in the immunity case looks increasingly, stunningly, myopically naive and really part of a much broader decline of accountability mechanisms, the consequences of which we are reaping in spades.
JOHNSON: Vladeck says the Supreme Court opinion last year basically left two options to hold a president to account - at the ballot box or in Congress. We're still some ways out from next year's midterm elections, and Congress is not checking what he considers to be excesses by Trump. And one more important point in that immunity decision. It says presidents have absolute control over the Justice Department, including things like prosecutions and investigations. We've seen in the last week or two how President Trump directed the DOJ to hurry up with investigations of some of his political opponents. One of them, the former FBI Director Jim Comey, is now fighting two felony charges. Comey says he's innocent and going to go to trial.
RASCOE: The Supreme Court insulated the president from most criminal jeopardy, but what about the people who work for the president?
JOHNSON: That's still a bit of an open question, since the bulk of last year's immunity decision revolved around the special powers of the president. But the legal experts I interviewed say there are other protections for people inside the government who follow a president's orders. They can rely on opinions from the Justice Department office that interprets the law and can shield federal workers from many prosecutions. And then, again, there's always the president's power to pardon, which is absolute.
RASCOE: Looking ahead to this new term at the high court, what kinds of cases has the court accepted that could further affect presidential power?
JOHNSON: One case involves the president's sweeping tariffs. Two others involve the firing of a Democratic commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission and Trump's attempt to fire Lisa Cook on the Federal Reserve Board. There are a few more cases on the emergency docket now that could get a full hearing from the Supreme Court. A White House spokeswoman, Abigail Jackson, says the Supreme Court has consistently upheld the Trump administration's policies despite an unprecedented number of legal challenges. She says the president will continue to carry out the policy agenda the voters elected him to pursue and that he will be vindicated by higher courts.
RASCOE: NPR justice correspondent Carrie Johnson. Carrie, thank you.
JOHNSON: My pleasure. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
