A Sitting President’s Amenability to Indictment and Criminal Prosecution [PDF]Date of Issuance: Monday, October 16, 2000
Headnotes: The indictment or crinminal prosecution of a sitting President would unconstitutionally undermine the capacity of the executive branch to perform its constitutionally assigned functions.
"The OLC memorandum concluded that all federal civil officers except the President are subject to indictment and criminal prosecution while still in office; the President is uniquely immune from such process...
Thus, in the absence of a specific textual provision withdrawing it, the President would enjoy absolute immunity.
The President is the symbolic head of the Nation. To wound him by a criminal proceeding is to hamstring the operation of the whole governmental apparatus, both in foreign and domestic affairs...
Under our developed constitutional order, the presidential election is the only national election, and there is no effective substitute for it. A criminal trial of a sitting President, however, would confer upon a jury of twelve the power, in effect, to overturn this national election."
A President can pardon himself, thus falsifying the argument. And it’s the office of the President that matters, not the individual currently holding it. The person can be replaced. And until that happens, nothing prevents an indicted President from continuing to perform his Constitutional duties. Were you to argue that a sitting President can’t be jailed or imprisoned, you’d have a case. As it is, you don’t.