On July 1, 2024, the Supreme Court handed down its 6-3 ruling in the landmark case Trump v. United States, finding that the president is entitled to presumptive immunity from prosecution for all official acts, but not for unofficial acts. In this episode, Sai Prakash of the University of Virginia Law School and Michael McConnell of Stanford Law School join Jeffrey Rosen to delve into the Supreme Court’s immunity decision and explore the history of presidential power and immunity from the founding to present day, and whether the Court’s decision comports with the original understanding of the Constitution.
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Today’s episode was produced by Lana Ulrich, Samson Mostashari, and Bill Pollock. It was engineered by Bill Pollock. Research was provided by Cooper Smith, and Yara Daraiseh.
Participants
Michael McConnell is the Richard and Frances Mallery Professor and director of the Constitutional Law Center at Stanford Law School, and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. His most recent book, is The President Who Would Not Be King: Executive Power Under the Constitution (2020).
Sai Prakash is a James Monroe Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Virginia School of Law. His most recent book is The Living Presidency: An Originalist Argument Against Its Ever-Expanding Powers (2020).
Jeffrey Rosen is the president and CEO of the National Constitution Center. Rosen is also a professor of law at The George Washington University Law School and a contributing editor of The Atlantic. His most recent book is The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America.
Additional Resources:
- Trump v. United States (2024)
- Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo (2024)
- Michael McConnell, The President Who Would Not Be King: Executive Power Under the Constitution (2020)
- “Former Federal Judge Michael McConnell Discusses Presidential Immunity and Trump Cases with Pam Karlan,” Stanford Legal podcast
- Sai Prakash, Imperial from the Beginning: The Constitution of the Original Executive (2015)
- Sai Prakash, The Living Presidency: An Originalist Argument Against Its Ever-Expanding Powers (2020)
- "Does the Supreme Court ruling make the president a king? Not quite, says this Virginia law professor,” WTOP News (July 2, 2024)
- Sai Prakash, Prosecuting and Punishing Our Presidents, Texas Law Review (Nov. 2021)
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