An Appeals Court Just Delivered Some Very Bad News to Trump: The President ‘Is Not Above the Law’ – Can Be Sued

A New York State appeals court on Thursday delivered some bad news to President Donald Trump, perhaps telegraphing a larger message to Congress and the Dept. of Justice.

In a defamation lawsuit filed by attorneys for Summer Zervos, a former contestant on “The Apprentice,” Judge Dianne Renwick wrote, “the President is still a person, and he is not above the law.”

Attorneys for President Trump argued that as President, he cannot be sued. The majority of the Court clearly rejected that claim, as Buzzfeed News reports. The Court upheld a lower court’s ruling that the case against the President can continue.

One key detail: Trump is being sued in state, not federal court.

Judge Renwick “wrote that the Supremacy Clause of the US Constitution — which generally says that when state and federal law conflict, federal law prevails — did not override a state court’s authority to decide cases under the state’s own constitution,” Buzzfeed’s Zoe Tillman explains. “There is no federal law that conflicts with the defamation claims that Zervos brought against Trump, the judge wrote.”

Read the full article here.