Posted on 08/30/2017 11:55:43 AM PDT by Seizethecarp
After President Trump’s pardon of ex-sheriff Joe Arpaio, who had been convicted of criminal contempt for violating a court order designed to stop the violation of the constitutional rights of suspected illegal immigrants, conventional wisdom — and certainly the Trump administration — would have us believe that Trump’s pardon powers are unlimited. However, never before has someone stretched the pardon power so beyond its original intent. Trump has now drawn scrutiny not simply from critics of his racist rhetoric but from the court itself.
The Arizona Republic Reports:
U.S. District Court Judge Susan Bolton canceled former Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s upcoming sentencing hearing for his criminal contempt-of-court conviction, telling attorneys not to file replies to motions that were pending before his recent presidential pardon.
However, Bolton on Tuesday stopped short of throwing out the conviction based solely on Arpaio’s request. Instead she ordered Arpaio and the U.S. Department of Justice, which is prosecuting the case, to file briefs on why she should or shouldn’t grant Arpaio’s request.
In other words, this is no slam dunk.
Lurking in the background is the potential for Trump to pardon associates involved in the probe of possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian officials and the possible obstruction of justice that followed. The Arpaio pardon may well have been an attempt to signal to those officials and ex-officials that they can resist inquiries with the assurance that Trump will pardon them.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Pardon power is the law of the land. Period. Anything else is revolution. Time to tell leftist judges to follow the Constitution or get the hell out.
If there is one single group of people that better hope to God there is never a breakdown of law and order in this country, it is Judges.
If it ever does happen, NO FLIGHTS OUT, because that is where these judges plan to be.
> > > [The Arpaio pardon may well have been an attempt to signal to those officials and ex-officials that they can resist inquiries with the assurance that Trump will pardon them.] < < <
I LIKE that idea.
“If we had an aggressive DOJ that supported the President, they would be looking at options to remove judges who have stopped enforcing the law and are engaged in personnel vendettas or making up the law”
And it was Jeff’s US Attorneys who were prosecuting Joe.
Jennifer Rubin tosses out that claim without even attempting to justify it, because it is absurd on its face.
How about this for turnaround?
Never before has someone stretched the 'conservative' appellation so far beyond its original intent and meaning as the crypto-Communist Jennifer Rubin.
See how easy that is? No need whatsoever for me to back up that assertion - I simply claim that it is true, because, well, because I'm never wrong and I always tell the truth.
No intellectual honesty or consideration of alternate viewpoints is necessary, whether in Jennifer's world or in my counterpoint. If I'm feeling especially frisky, just as Jennifer does in her articles, I can lard my writing with plenty of meaningless sound-bite-sized quotes or unsupported assertions from others who share my low opinion of Jennifer to 'sex up' the narrative (to borrow a term from some British tabloids).
So there - take that, Jennifer...
“Jennifer Rubin is the house “conservative” at the execrable Washington Post.”
She doesn’t even try to pretend that anymore.
Exactly right...Joe Arpaio’s pardon is a done deal and this judge can do nothing about it.
We can bet this sorry excuse for a judge doesn’t want to dismiss the case though.
POLL: How do you feel about President Trump pardoning Sheriff Joe Arpaio?
We the people of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
Sheriff Arpaio clearly understood his duty to the included "Posterity." There is no suggestion of an equivalent duty to those here illegally. No Court decision can alter the clear intent of the Constitution--at least not if the rule of law has any meaning.
If we had an aggressive DOJ that supported the President, they would be looking at options to remove judges who have stopped enforcing the law and are engaged in personnel vendettas or making up the law.
—
Yes. Hugely disappointing DOJ. Do these people do anything to earn their paychecks?
So Sheriff Joe is found guilty of violating a court order (misdemeanor) and this hag is now trying to violate the Constitution and the Presidents authority to pardon!
It won’t do any good to say anything about impeaching judges until the Senate takes it’s duties seriously and actually puts all judges on notice that this type of activism will be met with severe consequences.
Way past time to remove this hack judge.
Hey, it has happened to me in 2 seconds.
It will happen to both of us again.
5.56mm
Judge should be charged for over stepping the Executive Branch’s authority under the Constitution.
Yes, it is a great danger to the Republic when the Judiciary abandons the principle of the Rule of Law and decide cases based on what they want the outcome to be. An adherence to the Rule of Law created the certainty and sense of fairness that set our society aside from most of the other ones in the world. That certainty of law allowed us to prosper economically, as opposed to corrupt central and south American “Republics.”
It is sad to see it go; the result is people will just do what they want and the law be damned. The federal government is already doing this. Eventually, the people will all follow.
The problem is many people believe anything that they see in writing.
There is no legal challenge to a pardon. It is final. Tough.
OK, so let’s rescind bammy’s traitorous pardons!
1. Arpaio is convicted of contempt of court by the judge.
2. While he is awaiting sentencing, his legal team files a motion -- complete with all kinds of legal arguments -- to vacate the conviction.
3. The U.S. Justice Department -- which prosecuted the Federal case in this judge's courtroom -- has apparently not filed any response to the motion to vacate the conviction.
4. President Trump issues a formal pardon to Arpaio.
Arpaio is a free man and will never have to answer for anything related to the case against him, but the judge still has this case on the docket and has to go through a formal process to end it. In effect, she's telling the U.S. Justice Department (remember, they prosecuted the original case) that it has to do something to close out the case ... even if it means filing paperwork saying that they will not respond to Arpaio's motion because the case is moot.
President Trump actually threw a monkeywrench into the whole process with the timing of his pardon. LOL.
Most of the DOJ is still working for the other side and Sessions doesn't seem to be gaining control. This pattern is all too common. The FBI, for instance, is still fighting release of Clinton emails, and no investigations are underway about the Clinton Corruption and ties to Russia.
“Article III federal judges” (as opposed to judges of some courts with special jurisdictions) serve “during good behavior” (often paraphrased as appointed “for life”). Judges hold their seats until they resign, die, or are removed from office. Although the legal orthodoxy is that judges cannot be removed from office except by impeachment by the House of Representatives followed by conviction by the Senate, several legal scholars, including William Rehnquist, Saikrishna Prakash and Steven D. Smith, have argued that the Good Behaviour Clause may, in theory, permit removal by way of a writ of scire facias filed before a federal court, without resort to impeachment.[1]
Since the impeachment process requires a trial by the United States Senate, and since the constitutional provision concerning federal judges’ tenure cannot be changed without the ratifications of three-fourths of the states, federal judges have perhaps the best job security available in the United States. Moreover, the Constitution forbids Congress to diminish a federal judge’s salary. Twentieth-century experience suggests that Congress is generally unwilling to take time out of its busy schedule to impeach and try a federal judge until, after criminal conviction, he or she is already in prison and still drawing a salary, which cannot otherwise be taken away (see Nixon v. United States, a key Supreme Court case about Congress’s discretion in impeaching and trying federal judges).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_judge
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