Radio Recap – BREAKING: Presidential Harassment Case Heads to Supreme Court

On today’s Jay Sekulow Live, we talked about two different cases. The first, being the fight over the President’s taxes likely heading to the Supreme Court. The second, being the ACLJ’s fight for American soldiers before the ICC.

The U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled in favor of Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance who had issued a subpoena for the President’s tax returns. In my role as Counsel to the President, the  constitutional issues here are very significant – everything from the Supremacy Clause to interference with executive function under Article 2 of the U.S. Constitution.

This case is on a short track or a fast track. The petition for writ of certiorari has to be filed by November 12th. Then the other side will respond. That goes into a slower phase when the Court actually reviews it. That case is moving up at an aggressive pace, especially for a Supreme Court case.

The issues here are significant. This really goes to the heart of a constitutional republic. Can you have these kinds of investigations going on against a sitting president when you’ve got 33,000 individual district attorneys, assistant district attorneys, and their staffs? Should any DA who objects to a president be able to open up an investigation? Would that be constitutional? The Founders thought it should not be. The 2nd Circuit came out differently, which is not surprising. But I think the Supreme Court will rule differently than the 2nd Circuit. I expect the Supreme Court to take the case.

At the same time the ACLJ is preparing for a major hearing before an international tribunal at the ICC, located at The Hague. In my role as Chief Counsel of the ACLJ , this is a case I will be arguing along with Jordan which  will take place from December 4th through 6th. As Jordan pointed out, this is the biggest international case we’ve ever taken on. Period.

We will be making the presentation before their highest court, basically the Supreme Court of the ICC, on a huge issue involving America’s military. These are the men and women that protect us. Now we must protect them. The ACLJ is supporting the military.

The ICC prosecutor is trying to gain jurisdiction over our men and women in the military in a court that the United States is not a party to. What they are looking for is called universal jurisdiction.

ACLJ Director of Government Affairs Thann Bennett – who is our designee at the United Nations – described the situation:

This is the beginning of a process, which if it were to proceed poorly, would ultimately result in U.S. service members being subject to the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. It’s almost impossible to overstate the significance of that. The second thing I would add to this is that we know from experience what these international bodies are always after. It’s often a very long, convoluted process but ultimately they are looking for a hook to get jurisdiction over the United States. Make no mistake about it. That is what they are after in this case.

We’re standing with the U.S. military.

Support the work of the ACLJ as we defend America’s heroes, the men and women of the military. This month is a matching challenge month. For every dollar you donate, your donation will be doubled.

You can listen to the entire episode here.