Does Justice Sotomayor's "Seal Team 6" example, in and of itself, explicitly give the President the authority to execute opponents? If not, why not?

Question

This is less a question about the SCOTUS ruling itself, and more about how SCOTUS rulings are interpreted in applying the law.

In the SCOTUS ruling in Trump v. United States (23-939) on July 1st, 2024, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote "Orders the Navy's Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune."

Obviously, this statement is intended to criticize the majority opinion, but in future, could it actually be used to justify the specific actions mentioned? Let's say a sitting President actually did have Seal Team 6 execute their political opponent. In a criminal trial for such an action, couldn't the lawyer say "Here, we have a Supreme Court ruling, and in that ruling, one of the Justices explicitly states that this ruling makes the President immune to criminal actions if that President has Seal Team 6 execute their political opponent."?

This seems absurd, but it isn't clear to me what the problem with this argument would be. A Supreme Court Justice has explicitly stated that this is an outcome of the ruling, so why couldn't that be used as a defense in this situation? Is there a section of the ruling that can't actually be used to set precedent? Was this statement written there? Or is there some other legal principle that would prevent a situation like this?

Answer 1

Independent of whether Sotomayor is right or wrong, the passage you quote is from her dissent. A dissent is not binding law and courts have no obligation to follow it.

In general, what's written in a dissent can be persuasive precedent; an argument that might convince a court to rule in a certain way, or even convince a future court to overturn the original ruling. But they could also be convinced by a law review article, or a blog post they read that morning.

Answer 2

Justice Sonia Sotomayor is correct. The majority's test explicitly allows for Presidential immunity in each of the cases she identifies. This demonstrates that it is a poor choice of a legal standard.

is there some other legal principle that would prevent a situation like this?

No

Answer 3

The President is prevented from using the US military against US citizens on US soil by the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878. When the US military is used on US soil, it is (example, JTF6, now Joint Task Force North) in an observation role, with hand-off to civilian authorities for physical engagement and extremely stringent rules of engagement for emergency situations, like being fired upon (not that US civilians would be engaged, but Mexican nationals/cartels).

This is taught to anyone entering the US military in boot camp, as is the requirement that military members are only obligated to follow lawful orders and empowered to disobey unlawful orders, under the UCMJ. Being ordered to violate Posse Comitatus would be an unlawful order.