Assassination plots? Sara Duterte needs what Trump has now – immunity

FILE PHOTOS

OK, I was wrong. The United States is not quite the Philippines yet. Yes, a convicted criminal has been reelected, but we don’t have our country’s leaders threatening to kill each other at news conferences as in the Philippines.

At least not yet.

That’s what happened Saturday when VP Sara Duterte said in an online news conference that she has contracted an assassin to kill the current president, Bongbong Marcos, his wife and the speaker of the Philippine House of Representative if she herself is killed.

And VP Duterte said she wasn’t joking.

“Don’t worry about my security because I’ve talked with somebody. I said “If I’m killed, you’ll kill BBM, Liza Araneta and Martin Romualdez.”

She was referring to the president, his wife and the speaker.

“No joke, no joke,” the vice president added about her conversation with an assassin. “I’ve given my order, “If I die, don’t stop until you’ve killed them all.’”

VP Kamala Harris said she owned a gun, but never said anything remotely that vicious about ordering an assassin over the phone.

Still, Filipinos in America must be relieved? In America, by comparison, we are still a civil democracy. Or at least, “civil enough.”

In the Philippines, where human rights violations and extrajudicial killings have routinely numbered in the thousands for decades – from Marcos’ father to the reign of Duterte’s father – civility is not easy to come by.

The talk is hot between the Philippine president and his veep, mostly from disagreements on how to deal with the aggression of China toward Philippine possessions in the West Philippine Sea.

But Sara Duterte reportedly has tried to walk back the hot talk, saying it was an expression of concern rather than a real threat.

Still, the outburst gives Bongbong the moral upper hand. If that still means anything in the Philippines.

“That criminal plot should not be allowed to pass,” Marcos is reported to have said in a televised statement.

“I’ll fight it,” Marcos said. “As a democratic country, we need to uphold the rule of law.”

This is of course super ironic coming from man whose family ruled the Philippines under martial law, were sent into exile by People Power, then allowed to come back in and be rehabilitated by Sara Duterte’s father, then President Rodrigo Duterte.

Was Sara D. flexing her muscles?

If she was, it’s backfiring.

The Philippines is taking the threat seriously and is investigating Sara Duterte.

How to kill political opponents the American way

Donald Trump wasn’t joking when he famously said he “could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters.”

It was relevant last January, when the issue of immunity for Donald Trump came before a three judge panel in the DC Court of Appeals, the second highest court in the land.

This is where Trump’s attorneys claimed that a former president could not be prosecuted for anything he did as “an official duty.”

It took a probing question from federal circuit judge Florence Y. Pan to make it all crystal clear.

“Could a president order Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? That’s an official act. An order to Seal Team 6,” said Pan in a hypothetical I can’t believe has ever been asked in such a high- level hearing in US history.

Trump lawyer Sauer responded: “He would have to be and would speedily be impeached and convicted before the criminal prosecution.”

Pan pressed on that: “But if he weren’t, there would be no criminal prosecution or criminal liability for that?”

Sauer hemmed and hawed about the chief justice, the Constitution and the impeachment clause.

But Pan wanted to get to the truth and politely but firmly cut to the chase: “I asked you a yes or no question. Could a president who ordered Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival, who was not impeached, could he be subject to criminal prosecution?”

Sauer responded: “If he were impeached and convicted first.”

“So your answer is a no?” Pan asked.

“My answer is a qualified yes,” said Sauer.

What is a “qualified yes”? A shameful way of saying no.

The case went up to the Supreme Court and Trump won.

The presumed immunity for official actions is a part of the reason Special Prosecutor Jack Smith is now withdrawing two federal cases against Trump.

Remember, this ruling means the president when engaged in official acts has immunity and can pretty much get away with ANYTHING.

So Jan. 6? The Mar-a-Lago documents case? Jack Smith is throwing in the towel.

This is in America, land of the free, where in our democracy one man is above the law.

Sorry Philippines. You’ll have to give the president, and in this case, maybe the vice president, immunity on all official acts first.

And then they can plot away and threaten each other in public at will.

Things are changing fast, Philippines. You can’t be left in the colonial dust.

Don’t miss out on the Trump Executive upgrade to democracy.

Immunity for official acts.

Emil Guillermo is a journalist and commentator. He writes a column for the Inquirer.net’s US Channel. Next year, he’ll be bringing his one-man show to Winnipeg and Edmonton. Stay tuned. See his Emil Amok’s Takeout on www.patreon.com/emilamok