Michael Cohen is demanding that the Supreme Court reconsider his lawsuit against Donald Trump, who is being held in solitary confinement for allegedly violating his constitutional rights. Trump has announced plans to publish a book of his memoirs.
An objection stemming from a lawsuit filed by a once-known “handler” who recently testified against Trump in New York’s hush money case asks whether a president and federal officials can be held accountable if they retaliate against their critics.
“No president should be allowed to weaponize the Justice Department through a willing and complicit attorney general, to unconstitutionally imprison a citizen, to send him to solitary confinement, as in my case, because he refuses to give up his constitutional rights under the First Amendment,” Cohen said. Independent Wednesday.
“The actions of Donald J Trump and his administration are contrary to American values and I believe it is time for this case to be taken up by the US Supreme Court,” he said.
The case comes on the heels of a groundswell of the Supreme Court’s decision that affirmed a president’s “absolute” immunity from criminal prosecution for “official” acts while in office, radically expanding the scope of executive power.
Cohen said a decision that could embolden Trump in a possible second term “crosses my mind,” “but I don’t believe anyone could justify this blatant, unconstitutional action as an action that would be afforded immunity under this presidential immunity decision.”
Cohen said a case challenging government reprisals gives the Supreme Court an opportunity to decide whether the United States is “a democratic republic or an autocracy governed by a monarchy, dictator, monarch, supreme leader or führer.”
In January, a panel of federal appeals court judges said they would not revive Cohen’s case after it was dismissed by a lower court.
Cohen argued in his appeal to the nation’s highest court on Wednesday that the case raises important questions about constitutional violations the federal government has committed against its harshest critics.
“The questions presented in this petition are of the utmost importance,” Cohen’s attorney Jon-Michael Dougherty wrote in a court filing.
“The possibility that the federal government would have the authority to punish critics with imprisonment, with no consequences or oversight against officials who engage in such retaliation, is a frightening one,” Dougherty added. “This Court should not avert its eyes from this profound violation of the contract between a limited government and free citizens.”
The filing points to Supreme Court precedent that allows defendants to sue federal officials for constitutional violations and says such lawsuits should deter officials from retaliating against citizens.
Cohen was convicted in 2018 and sentenced to prison on charges of tax evasion, campaign finance charges and lying to Congress at the direction of his former boss.
Cohen, who was placed under house arrest in 2020 to prevent the spread of Covid-19, announced his plans to write a book about Trump.
Weeks later, and nearly four years before the Supreme Court appeal was due, Cohen was sent back to prison and placed in solitary confinement, where prison officials accused him of violating restrictions on his public communications.
He was allegedly instructed to sign an agreement preventing him from interacting with the media, including the print media.
Cohen and his lawyers have asked whether the conditions of his release, which were specifically set for him, could be lifted.
Instead, he was “shackled” back to a federal prison in Otisville, New York, and held in solitary confinement for nearly 24 hours a day — “alone in a cell with poor ventilation, no air conditioning and a broken window,” according to his complaint.
In July 2020, after 16 days in solitary confinement and following the intervention of a judge, Cohen was placed under house arrest.
The federal judge who ordered Cohen’s release said sending him back to prison was clearly “retaliation” for Cohen’s plans to “exercise his First Amendment rights to publish a book critical of the President and to discuss the book on social media.”
Cohen has sued Trump, his attorney general Bill Barr and prison officials, arguing that his detention violates his Fourth and Eighth Amendment rights against unreasonable seizure and cruel and unusual punishment.
In 2022, District Judge Lewis Liman granted the government’s request to dismiss the case, but said he was troubled that his order could inflict “profound violence” on Cohen’s constitutional rights, signaling that the issue should be resolved by the higher court.
“The Supreme Court’s precedents provide at best a partial remedy for the abuses of power and rights violations against those who perpetrate these wrongs,” Judge Liman wrote.
He argued that a “proper investigation” should be conducted to determine whether the drafters of the constitution “intended such a solution.”
“There are strong reasons to believe that in many cases the answer to that question will be yes,” he added. “When someone’s rights are violated by law enforcement officials, the courts provide a legal remedy for that violation.”
Trump’s 2024 campaign is fueled by the idea of “retribution” for “those wronged and betrayed,” and his allies and architects of the second Trump administration have vowed to prosecute their opponents.
The former president continued to attack Cohen as a “liar” throughout his criminal trial in Manhattan. Cohen’s damning testimony, spanning four days, took jurors through dozens of pages of evidence, including each of the fake business records at the center of the case.
Trump’s trial also revealed that Cohen’s allies pressured him to swear loyalty to him while he was under federal investigation.