The conservative justices sounded a lot like Trump. Is that a coincidence?

For months, Trump's argued presidents must have immunity or face punishment after they leave office. Yesterday, it eerily seemed like he'd gotten the argument from the justices themselves.

It could be a “chicken or egg” question: Did the conservative justices on the Supreme Court echo Donald Trump’s arguments (which he’s made for months, and they’ve surely heard) on why a former president should have immunity from prosecution, or did Trump have knowledge of what they would say—which gave him the confidence to make his seemingly outlandish claims?

Or were they just all thinking in the same vein, a MAGA melding of minds?

Whatever the case, it is curious that a premise that most legal experts across the political spectrum viewed as bonkers would be even partially shared by Trump and the justices.

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In breathtaking oral arguments on Trump’s immunity claim stemming from Special Counsel Jack Smith’s case in DC federal court, conservative justices seemed not at all concerned about the insurrection and the attempt to overturn the election that happened in 2020, but very concerned about future presidents facing hypothetical retribution from their opponents if they don’t have some form of immunity. This concern for an imagined future was expressed even though presidents haven’t had immunity for over 200 years and retribution has never been a problem.

It was clear that the conservative justices were likely to send the immunity claim regarding the January 6th coup case back down to the district court to separate “official” acts from “private” acts and delay a trial, a goal of Trump’s. The American people would not see Trump tried before the election, helping Trump in his plan, hoping to win in November and then kill the cases against him.

Justice Samuel Alito asked, What if an incumbent president “loses a very close, hotly contested election?” He couldn’t then “go off into a peaceful retirement,” Alito whined, if he didn’t have immunity:

Will that not lead us into a cycle that destabilizes the functioning of our country as a democracy?…. "That may involve great expense, and it may take up a lot of time. And during the trial, the former president may be unable to engage in other activities that the former president would want to engage in and then the outcome is dependent on the jury, the instructions to the jury, and how the jury returns a verdict and then it has to be taken up on appeal.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh admitted, “I’m not focused on the here and now of this case; I’m very concerned about the future.” He fretted that presidential prosecutions would "cycle back" and be used against future presidents.

Justice Neal Gorsuch said the exact same thing: “I’m not concerned about this case, but I am concerned about future uses of the criminal law to target political opponents based on accusations about their motives. We’re writing a rule for the ages.”

Trump’s lawyer, D. John Sauer, pushed arguments that were considered ridiculous “long shots” by legal experts back in January after Trump lost at the DC appeals court—but now he and Trump have three justices wondering if maybe Trump should have immunity after all.

Even if the justices don’t buy Trump’s lawyer’s most extreme arguments and don’t rule for blanket immunity (which seemed to be  the case) they clearly showed they were likely to send the case back to the lower court—helping Trump delay—to parse out private acts from official ones. This is bullshit because, as the government’s lawyer, Michael Dreeben, noted, all of that could be done at the trial.

But Clarence Thomas, sounding like Trump when the former president claimed his focus on “voter fraud” after the 2020 election was part of his job—when, in fact, presidents have no role in elections—focused in on what are official acts. “Are you saying there is no presidential immunity even for official acts?” he asked Dreeben, as if Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally and his urging people to march to the Capitol to disrupt the certification were official acts of a president rather than a losing candidate trying to overturn the election.

Back in January, after the three-judge panel of the Washington DC appeals court unanimously ruled against immunity in what seemed like an airtight rebuke of him, Trump posted a claim on Truth Social that is similar to statements he’s made before and since:

A president of the United States must have full immunity, without which it would be impossible for him/her to properly function. Any mistake, even if well intended, would be met with almost certain indictment by the opposing party at term end.

EVEN EVENTS THAT “CROSS THE LINE” MUST FALL UNDER TOTAL IMMUNITY, OR IT WILL BE YEARS OF TRAUMA TRYING TO DETERMINE GOOD FROM BAD.

ALL PRESIDENTS MUST HAVE COMPLETE & TOTAL PRESIDENTIAL IMMUNITY, OR THE AUTHORITY & DECISIVENESS OF A PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES WILL BE STRIPPED & GONE FOREVER. HOPEFULLY THIS WILL BE AN EASY DECISION. GOD BLESS THE SUPREME COURT!

Again, this sounded completely insane to most legal experts. But Trump seemed very confident that the Supreme Court would buy it, even after the ruling by the appeals court, which was considered solid and ironclad by legal experts across the political spectrum. (Many experts were even confident the Supreme Court was likely to let the appeals court ruling stand, and not take up the case.) And yesterday, those conservative justices indeed sounded a lot like Trump.

It makes you wonder whether the justices were inspired by Trump’s arguments on Truth Social—a man who is less than brilliant about figuring out even bad legal theory—or if he in fact had an idea of what the justices’ take would be when he posted his rants. We know that Ginni Thomas, Clarence Thomas’s wife, was part of the “Stop the Steal” movement, after all, texting with Trump’s chief of staff, Mark Meadows, during those harrowing days after the election and telling him not to give up, something for which Clarence Thomas stunningly saw no reason about which to recuse himself yesterday.

And there are plenty of other people in Trumpworld with a direct line to those in the Supreme Court justices’ orbits. I have no information and am not saying Trump spoke directly with any of the justices, but the Ginni Thomas example gives us reason enough to speculate that those close to the justices could have been talking to those close to Trump.

So perhaps Trump got his political rhetoric on immunity, which he’s stated over and over again for months, from those who had an idea of what the conservative justices thought. Or, like I said, it was just another example of not-so-great minds thinking alike, all deep in the MAGA cult.

Whatever the case, the conservatives on the court are in the tank for Trump. They are interfering in the 2024 election, as New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie notes, by trying to push off the trial. They appear hellbent on helping Trump get elected so they can get more of their own kind appointed to the court—democracy be damned.