This time, it isn't rumor, speculation or tweet: An American president has been formally accused in court, by his longtime personal attorney, of a felony violation of federal law. As bad timing would have it, the implications right now reach even beyond the presidency to the highest court in the land.
President Donald Trump hasn't been criminally charged, and if he eventually is, he's innocent until proven guilty. But that presumption of innocence doesn't require the Senate to let him seat a Supreme Court nominee while facing an allegation that could put his fate in that nominee's hands. That would add an unacceptable twist to the constitutional crisis toward which the nation already appears to be spinning.
For Senate Republicans, including and perhaps especially Roy Blunt of Missouri, this is a crucial test of whether they can put country over party. This time, they must.
Michael Cohen, Trump's former lawyer and self-described "fixer," pleaded guilty Tuesday to crimes including violating federal campaign finance laws. He admitted that he and Trump arranged payments to silence a porn star and a former Playboy model before the 2016 election to prevent Trump's alleged dalliances from harming his chances.
The alleged lawbreaking here isn't some meaningless technicality. Unreported campaign expenditures are illegal for a reason. The alleged payment scheme prevented the public from learning of two extramarital affairs that voters had a right to weigh in making an informed decision.
Legal scholars are divided on whether a sitting president can be criminally charged. The issue has never been decided by the Supreme Court — though that day could be coming, given not only the Cohen case but Special Counsel Robert Mueller's continuing investigation.
Some writing of Judge Brett Kavanaugh, Trump's nominee to the Supreme Court's current vacancy, suggests he believes a criminal trial for a sitting president would "cripple the federal government." It's not an inherently unreasonable argument, but to allow even the possibility that a future Justice Kavanaugh could apply it to benefit the man who seated him would be an intolerable conflict of interest.
In 2016, the Republican Senate denied President Barack Obama a vote on his Supreme Court nominee and held the seat open for 11 months. If an approaching election is reason enough to do that, surely the real possibility of an approaching presidential criminal case is a better reason.
Blunt has tended to keep his head down through Trump's various outrages, though he has pushed back at the occasional key moment - on Russian election interference, for example. That kind of independence is needed now. As a member of the Senate GOP's leadership team, Blunt's voice would influence others were he to declare the obvious, that no justice should be seated while the president is realistically facing possible criminal charges.
REPRINTED FROM THE ST LOUIS POST DISPATCH
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