For legal experts, it was clear from the start that Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey’s (R) pro-Donald Trump attempt in July to sue New York in the United States Supreme Court and stop the former president’s hush-money sentencing would go nowhere — and the justices disposed of the case Monday without offering any reasoning.
In a one-paragraph judgment, the Supreme Court refused the Show Me State’s move for leave to file a bill of complaint in the ill-fated state v. state lawsuit, as well as Bailey’s request for an injunction or a stay of sentencing and the recently upheld relaxed gag order as moot.
According to the judgment, only Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito would have allowed Bailey leave to file the bill of complaint, which is not surprising given what Law&Crime has already detailed. Otherwise, they “would not grant any other relief,” according to the decree.
Bailey had claimed his “one modest request” was to stay “any” Trump sentence in the hush-money case “until after the 2024 election” and to lift a gag order that prohibits the defendant from speaking about lawyers in Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s (D) office, court or DA staffers, and family members of staffers, lawyers, or the court until sentencing.
When Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) requested and was denied leave to file his bill of complaint against swing states to overturn Trump’s 2020 election defeat, just two justices, Thomas and Alito, suggested they would have given it. That is because the two justices believe the Supreme Court must hear original (state v. state) cases whenever they are filed.
When the high court rejected Paxton for a lack of standing, Alito released a comment, which Thomas endorsed, stating: “In my opinion, we do not have the discretion to deny the filing of a bill of complaint in a case that falls within our original jurisdiction.”
But the two justices, as they told Bailey on Monday, stated they would do nothing more than permit Paxton to file the action, expressing “no view on any other issue.” Bailey’s denial did not mention standing or reasons.
Bailey stated that Trump’s hush-money trial was an act of “lawfare” that is “poisonous to American democracy,” and that any penalty — “even probation” — was “likely to interfere with Trump’s ability to freely campaign across the country.”
“Missouri is injured by New York’s attempt to use its coercive state power to interfere with the ability of Missouri electors to fulfill their federal function and of Missourians to receive relevant election-related information,” according to the complaint.
In a thread of posts on X, Bailey also stated that “Right now, Missouri has a huge problem with New York” and that “I will not sit idly by while Soros-backed prosecutors in New York hold Missouri voters hostage in this Presidential election.”
In response, New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) stated that the complaint was brought to advance Trump’s “interests,” not Missouri’s, and that as a result, the case “seriously undermine[d] the integrity of the courts and risk[ed] setting a dangerous precedent that encourages a flood of similar, unjustified litigation.”
“There is no merit to Missouri’s attempts to identify a cognizable sovereign injury distinct from the individual interests of former President Trump,” according to the opponents.
On Monday, Bailey described the top court’s decision as “disappointing.”
“It’s disappointing that the Supreme Court refused to exercise its constitutional responsibility to resolve state v. state disputes,” he wrote in a message to X. “I will continue to prosecute our lawsuit against @KamalaHarris @JoeBiden’s DOJ for coordinating the illicit prosecutions against President Trump.”