General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: It looks like ex-president has the right to claim executive privilege for conversations they had [View all]onenote
(42,660 posts)in Nixon v. GSA:
"it is argued, such claims may be asserted only by incumbents who are presently responsible to the American people for their action. We reject the argument that only an incumbent President may assert such claims, and hold that appellant, as a former President, may also be heard to assert them."
The Court went on to say:"we think that the Solicitor General states the sounder view, and we adopt it:
"This Court held in United States v. Nixon . . . that the privilege is necessary to provide the confidentiality required for the President's conduct of office. Unless he can give his advisers some assurance of confidentiality, a President could not expect to receive the full and frank submissions of facts and opinions upon which effective discharge of his duties depends. The confidentiality necessary to this exchange cannot be measured by the few months or years between the submission of the information and the end of the President's tenure; the privilege is not for the benefit of the President as an individual, but for the benefit of the Republic. Therefore the privilege survives the individual President's tenure."
Ultimately, as that case makes clear, where the incumbent president disagrees with the former president, the incumbent's views as to whether the privilege is appropriate are entitled to great weight. But it simply is wrong -- clearly -- to say that Trump cannot assert executive privilege. The courts may (and should) reject that claim, but not on the grounds that he has no standing to make it.