President Trump hailed Lou Dobbs on Friday shortly after the Fox Business Channel host claimed the Supreme Court wants to overthrow him by ruling on his financial records.
Mr. Trump touted the “great” Mr. Dobbs on social media in a post hyping the conservative commentator’s upcoming book and encouraging readers to help make it a bestseller.
Hours earlier, Mr. Dobbs ripped the Supreme Court in light of its ruling that the president is not immune from state criminal subpoenas, rejecting Mr. Trump’s bid to block the release of financial documents sought by Cyrus Vance Jr., New York state’s district attorney.
“They’re trying to overthrow the President of the United States,” the host of “Lou Dobbs Tonight” said during the show’s latest episode. “They’re trying to block his very agenda. They are trying to dismiss him as president of the United States with these ridiculous rulings in which they would allow a local District Attorney to prosecute a sitting President of the United States. That is idiotic, absolutely idiotic, and there is no basis whatsoever in either law or reason to have come to that conclusion. Only one reason, and that has everything to do with politics.
“The deep state extends, obviously, to the Supreme Court,” Mr. Dobbs said elsewhere during the episode, referring to the theory that purports the existence of a shadow government compromised of federal bureaucrats supposedly intent on undermining the administration.
The Supreme Court ruled 7-2 in Trump v. Vance earlier Thursday, effectively sending the case back to a lower court for further review. In a similar but separate case, it ruled against letting House Democrats access Mr. Trump’s financial records for now and sent that case back to a lower court as well.
“These decisions today on making available to the DA of Manhattan, Cy Vance, a left-winger in absolute coordination and orchestration with the radical Dems on Capitol Hill can proceed with a subpoena of the accounting firm for the president and get his tax records, and the Supreme Court ruling at the same time Congress cannot. I mean who in the hell do they think they’re kidding? They’re one and the same,” Mr. Dobbs reacted.
Two of the Supreme Court’s nine justices were put on the bench by Mr. Trump. Another three, including Chief Justice John G. Roberts, were picked by fellow Republicans who preceded him.
Ruling in the Vance case, Chief Justice Roberts wrote “we reaffirm that principle today and hold that the President is neither absolutely immune from state criminal subpoenas seeking his private papers nor entitled to a heightened standard of need.”
White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said afterward that Mr. Trump “takes issue with the point that the majority made on absolute immunity.”
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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