Monica Lewinsky penned on op-ed Monday calling for a series of constitutional amendments, including age limits for elected officials and a ban on presidential self-pardons. In a piece in Vanity Fai…
Criminals shouldn’t be barred from running though. In fact, there’s precedent for people running for President from prison, and it should be allowed in order to make sure that the state doesn’t imprison people from jailing political opponents.
I don’t understand this line of reasoning and it doesn’t seem like an obvious assumption to me, but am willing to read more about it in order to understand why I might be wrong. Do you have any recommendations for a detailed legal argument for it? My searching is only coming up with opinion articles and none of them seem solid (for either side).
Look up Eugene V. Debs. And yes, this is an opinion, not a legal question. We’re talking about which laws should govern who gets to run for President, and I feel like they’re already too restrictive as they are.
While not a legal argument, look up Alexei Navalny in Russia. He’s been the leader of the country’s opposition party for some time and beyond his attempted assassination, he’s become a political prisoner and has been trying to maintain political status from gaol. He absolutely should be able to run and would objectively be a better president for the average Russian than Putin is.
While it’s not an American example, it’s a general example of why people who are technically criminals (in his case, a political prisoner) should be able to run for office - even from gaol.
It’s one of those situations where a protection needs to be in place that, sadly, can also be abused by bad actors.
Criminals shouldn’t be barred from running though. In fact, there’s precedent for people running for President from prison, and it should be allowed in order to make sure that the state doesn’t imprison people from jailing political opponents.
I don’t understand this line of reasoning and it doesn’t seem like an obvious assumption to me, but am willing to read more about it in order to understand why I might be wrong. Do you have any recommendations for a detailed legal argument for it? My searching is only coming up with opinion articles and none of them seem solid (for either side).
Look up Eugene V. Debs. And yes, this is an opinion, not a legal question. We’re talking about which laws should govern who gets to run for President, and I feel like they’re already too restrictive as they are.
While not a legal argument, look up Alexei Navalny in Russia. He’s been the leader of the country’s opposition party for some time and beyond his attempted assassination, he’s become a political prisoner and has been trying to maintain political status from gaol. He absolutely should be able to run and would objectively be a better president for the average Russian than Putin is.
While it’s not an American example, it’s a general example of why people who are technically criminals (in his case, a political prisoner) should be able to run for office - even from gaol.
It’s one of those situations where a protection needs to be in place that, sadly, can also be abused by bad actors.