During the first Trump Administration, the federal courts got a crash course in the Emoluments Clauses. Shortly after Trump was sworn in, progressive groups brought suit in New York, Maryland, and the District of Columbia. They argued that foreign and state governments that patronized Trump properties were giving unconstitutional emoluments to President Trump. Seth Barrett Tillman and I filed a host of amicus briefs at the District Court, Circuit Court, and Supreme Court level. However, the plaintiffs never sought a preliminary injunction or any sort of expedited relief. Indeed, despite the fact that they claimed these cases were urgent and the fate of the Republic turned on stoping this foreign influence, the plaintiffs repeatedly requested extensions and continuances. At the end of the day, the clock ran out. By the time the case made it to the Supreme Court's merits docket, Trump was out of office, and the cases ended with a whimper.
Since Trump's second term began, I have waited with bated breath for suits based on the Emoluments Clause, as well as Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment, our other scholarly interest. But nothing came. Zero. Zip. Nada. I suppose the legal resistance has bigger fish to fry with all the strategic litigation in the First Circuit.
Well, the Emoluments Clause is back. The Constitutional Accountability Center, which brought litigation during Trump 1.0, has sued President Trump for violating the Domestic Emoluments Clause. This case, however, does not concern businesses patronizing any current Trump property. Instead, the complaint alleges that the Miami-Dade Community College and the state of Florida granted Trump an unconstitutional emolument by gifting land in Downtown to be used for the Trump Presidential library. President Trump is the defendant, as well as the Trump Presidential Library, Governor DeSantis, Attorney General Uthmeier, and a host of other state officials.
