Lawyers for Judge Hannah Dugan – who the Trump administration arrested recently and accused her of aiding the escape of an undocumented person – have used the Supreme Court’s immunity decision for Trump himself against his own administration. The lawyers claim that the ruling obviously protects official acts and bars prosecution for those acts, and that this immunity extends to other members of the government, as well. It is a fairly strong argument, as Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins explains.
Link – https://www.rawstory.com/hannah-dugan-2672020436/
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*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.
This week, the Trump administration officially filed formal charges against Wisconsin Judge Hannah Dugan, for allegedly aiding the escape of an undocumented immigrant that was being sought by federal officials. Now, I've talked to you about the story in case anybody is not familiar with it. Let me give it to you in a nutshell. Judge h Dugan had a man in her court on different charges, not even immigration charges. They believe it was domestic abuse. So he's in the court, he is in the country illegally. Ice agents show up, say, we gotta take this guy. And she's like, absolutely not. We're we're in, we're in the middle of a hearing here. Um, and he's gonna go through due process and we're gonna prosecute him for the horrible things he's done. And she told them, by the way, that the warrant you have is not even the correct warrant to be able to do this.
You need to go talk to the superior judge. Well, ice got mad. They walked outta the courtroom. Then when the hearing finished, she told the guy like, Hey, don't walk out the main doors. Go out the jury door here. You know, and that's what happened. So the Trump administration says, Nope. She tried to let this guy escape even though they got him. Uh, so they've filed formal charges this week after her arrest several weeks ago. Her lawyers, however, have gotten a little creative and they have now submitted a filing to the court asking for all charges to be immediately dismissed. Due to a Supreme Court ruling from last summer, that really seems to suggest that, uh, members of the government in positions of authority actually have some kind of, uh, immunity from prosecution. And yes, they specifically cited the Supreme Court's decision on Donald Trump's immunity that was handed down last summer.
Here's what the lawyers wrote. The problems with this prosecution are legion, but most immediately, the government cannot prosecute Judge Dugan because she is entitled to judicial immunity for her official acts. Immunity is not a defense to the prosecution to be determined later by a jury or court. It is an absolute bar to the prosecution at the outset, which of course is, you know, citing that case. The attorneys focused on the Supreme Court's holding that quote in, in dividing official from unofficial conduct, courts may not inquire into the President's motives because Judge Dugan's instructions within her courtroom constituted official conduct. Judge Dugan therefore has both immunity from conviction and immunity from prosecution. So the Supreme Court says, listen, uh, the courts really don't get to decide what's official, what's not official. We can't pretend to be in a person's head. And we do know that judges cannot be held liable for decisions that they hand down unless you find some kind of corruption involving it like the kids for cash scandal. But that's the same kind of immunity, presidential immunity, judicial immunity, congressional immunity, which they
Also have speech or debate, right? So they're using this ruling that effectively protected Donald Trump against him and his administration. This is hilarious. And by the way, when this ruling came down last summer, I predicted that eventually you're gonna see people on the left or you know, Trump's enemies using it in the same way. And boom, here it is. And for the record, yes, this is a viable, valid legal argument. The judge for anything they say from the bench, they get immunity. So if she's up on the bench and is like, Hey, leave through that door, that's an order from a judge. If you ignore an order from a judge, you can be held in contempt. That seems pretty straightforward to me. That is clever. It's smart, it's valid. I love everything about it.