Author’s note: In the last article of the Jack Hopkins Now Newsletter I gave you the playbook. Nine moves, three acts, about three weeks. A lot of you wrote back with the same question, in different words: how is any of this possible?
How does a president get to do nine things at once that would have gotten him stopped cold in 2024?
Fair question. And I realized I’d handed you the “what” without the “why.” So this one is the followup…the foundation underneath Friday’s piece. These are the four rulings that turned the playbook from a fantasy into a set of options.
Read them together and the nine moves stop looking reckless and start looking…planned. Because they are.
Two things to hold onto as you read.
First: this is the part that has already happened. It’s in the official reporter, with page numbers.
Second: the nine moves are the part that hasn’t. Not yet. The doors are open…but every one of them is still just a door. Nobody has walked through all four. Whether he does…and whether anyone stands in the frame when he tries…is still being decided. By people. Possibly by you.
Read Friday’s piece first if you missed it. Then read this one. They go together.
The Four Rulings That Explain Everything He’s About to Do
Each one was called a technical correction. Together they describe a presidency that didn’t exist in 2024.
The Jack Hopkins Now Newletter #1,058: Sunday, October 18th, 2026.
Everything he’s about to do between now and January 3 has already been explained to you. Again: in writing…with page numbers.
Over the last two years, the highest court in the country has rewritten, in plain English, what a president is permitted to do. Not through some secret memo. Through published opinions.
Most people haven’t read them. That’s understandable. They’re long, dry, and written for lawyers. So I read them for you, and I’m going to give you the honest tally…the one that matters.
It’s four doors. And every one of them is now open.
Let me walk you through them. I’ll be quick. You. Can. Check. Every. Word.
Door One: Crimes committed “officially” aren’t crimes.
Trump v. United States, July 2024.
Six justices held that a president has absolute immunity for acts within his core constitutional powers and presumptive immunity for everything else that counts as “official.” The Court said prosecutors can’t even use official acts as evidence against him.
Read that again. Not “he’s probably innocent.” Not “the bar is high.” The bar is gone for a whole category of conduct…and…the category is defined by the person doing the conduct.
In 2023, a federal grand jury indicted a former president for trying to overturn an election. By 2025, the case was dead…not because a jury heard it…but because the Court said much of it couldn’t be heard at all.
Felony in 2024. Shrug in 2026. That’s one.
Jack Smith. He brought the case. The Court took away the evidence. Felony in 2024. Shrug in 2026.
Door Two: The people who were supposed to say no now serve at his pleasure.
Trump v. Slaughter, June 29, 2026.
In a 6-3 opinion by Chief Justice Roberts, the Court held that the Constitution lets the president fire anyone who exercises executive authority…and in doing so…overruled Humphrey’s Executor, the 91-year-old precedent that let Congress build independent agencies. Only the Federal Reserve got carved out.
What does that mean in English?
For ninety years, there were commissioners at the FTC, the NLRB, the FCC, and a dozen other agencies who could tell a president “no” and keep their jobs. That was the whole point of them. They were the referees.
Now…the referees work for one team.
Justice Kagan’s dissent said the ruling gives the president a power unknown even to the English Crown the Founders revolted against. Strong words. Also…going forward…the law.
Firing a referee for refusing to throw the game? In 2024 that got you reinstated by a federal judge. In 2026 it gets you a 6-3 opinion in your favor. That’s two.
Door Three: One judge can no longer stop him everywhere.
Trump v. CASA, June 2025.
For decades, when a president did something plainly unlawful…a single federal judge could issue a nationwide injunction and freeze it cold while the courts sorted it out. That’s how a lot of the first term’s worst ideas died in the crib.
The Court killed the universal injunction. Now…relief generally runs only to the people who sued.
Which means an unlawful order isn’t stopped. It’s stopped for the plaintiffs.
Everybody else lives under it until they find a lawyer…file…and wait. In a country of 330 million people, that’s not a legal remedy. That’s a lottery.
The policy that used to die in a week…now takes a year and a class action. That’s three.
Door Four: He gets to touch the elections.
The March 2026 executive order on mail-in voting and voter rolls…
…the one that directed federal agencies to build lists of “eligible” voters and lean on states…went to the Supreme Court in August.
The Court sided with the administration.
Not fully. Not finally. The opinion left room for more challenges…and it’s unclear how much gets implemented before November 3. But…think about the baseline.
In 2020 a president claimed the election was rigged…and the courts threw out sixty-some lawsuits. The Court sided with the administration. The Court let it proceed. For now.
That’s four. And four…is enough.
Now here’s the part you need to hear.
Every one of these rulings was defended, by serious people, as a technical correction.
Unitary executive theory. Stare decisis factors. Remedial scope. Standing.
Taken one at a time…each one has a respectable argument behind it. I’m not going to pretend otherwise. Smart lawyers on the other side believe this stuff.
But…nobody lives under the rulings one at a time.
Stack them. A president who can’t be prosecuted for official acts…who can fire anyone who might refuse an unlawful order…whose unlawful orders can’t be frozen nationwide…and who has been green-lit to shape the mechanics of the vote.
Four rulings. That’s all it took. Together…they describe a job that didn’t exist in this country two years ago.
That’s not me being dramatic. That’s the dissents…written by sitting justices…in the official reporter…under their own names.
So what do you do with this?
Three things.
One: stop asking “is this legal?”
The answer is increasingly yes, and it was made yes…by people who knew exactly what they were doing. The question that matters is “who stops it anyway?”
Two: understand that the referees are gone, which means the referees are now you.
Clerks, canvassers…judges…state attorneys general…backbench Republicans with a conscience and a primary to survive. The institutions didn’t fail. They got rewritten. What’s left is people.
Three: watch November 3 through January 3 like your life depends on it.
Four open doors…plus a lame-duck Congress…is the most dangerous sixty days this country has faced in my lifetime.
Four doors. Four dates. Four dissents.
He didn’t need to tell you the plan. The Court…already did.
#HoldFast
Back soon.
-Jack
Jack Hopkins
P.S. I know this one landed heavy. So let me say the thing I always say after the hard ones: open doors are not the same as a man walking through them.
Every one of these rulings describes what he’s permitted to do, not what he gets away with. That part still belongs to clerks who certify, judges who rule fast, and voters who show up anyway. The law moved. The people haven’t. Breathe. Then get to work.
P.P.S. Keep an eye on your inbox this weekend. I’m sending something I’ve been building for a while: a new perk for paid subscribers…and one I think you’re going to put to real use between now and January 3.
Details later in the evening, tomorrow…Monday. You’ll know it when you see it.
Sources
Door One — Presidential immunity
Trump v. United States, 603 U.S. ___ (2024), decided July 1, 2024 — full opinion and dissents. supremecourt.gov
Case summary, oral argument audio, and vote breakdown. oyez.org
Door Two — Removal power and the end of Humphrey’s Executor
Trump v. Slaughter, decided June 29, 2026 — Faegre Drinker’s case summary of the 6-3 holding and the overruling of Humphrey’s Executor. faegredrinker.com
National Law Review analysis of the decision and its likely reach to the NLRB and other multimember agencies. natlawreview.com
AP coverage of the ruling, including the Federal Reserve carve-out. fox2detroit.com
Justice Kagan’s dissent, quoted (conservative-leaning source, included deliberately). dailysignal.com
Door Three — Universal injunctions
Trump v. CASA, Inc., 606 U.S. ___ (2025), decided June 27, 2025 — full opinion. supremecourt.gov
Case summary and vote breakdown. oyez.org
Door Four — The election executive order
Scripps News on the August ruling clearing the mail-in ballot order to proceed, and the room it leaves for further challenges. scrippsnews.com
CNN (via KRDO) on administration statements about federal officers and the “nationalize elections” call. krdo.com
Context — Certification and the lame-duck window
Brennan Center, “How State and Local Election Certification Works.” brennancenter.org
Brennan Center / Campaign Legal Center / Protect Democracy, updated 2026 state certification guides. campaignlegal.org
Jack, we’re finishing up prepping us, our home and supplies for the days between now and January 3rd, perhaps a little beyond that date in 2027. We’ve voted, and have received notification from our Secretary of State that our votes have been received and tabulated…now it’s just a waiting game, and a very nerve wracking waiting game!! I don’t believe he will lose/go down without torching everything around him, including our country, that’s what frightens me the most, and there’s not much we can do to stop him!
We were out at our local NO KINGS yesterday and it was very disheartening to see the few of us that actually turned out to protest…now of all times…it was, for the most part, seniors who seemed to be the ones willing to take their time to stand up for our democracy!
I never dreamed this would happen in our country, that this would be how I would be spending my time in my senior years…fighting for our country, to protect our rights, our freedoms and our democracy! To say I am apprehensive is an understatement, and talking with our fellow protestors yesterday, I am not alone in fearing what is coming for us!
#HoldingFast and very worried!
Christie
Jack, I read this twice, and the second time I took notes. The doors are open, and the useful question is who's standing in them. Here's my plan for November 3 to January 3.
Start by winning by too much to steal. Vote early and drag everyone you know with you. A narrow race is a negotiation, and a blowout is a verdict. Every ballot banked in October is one that can't be lost, challenged, or "reviewed" in November.
Then get the lawyers ready before they're needed. Certifying an election is supposed to be routine paperwork: the county counts the votes, signs off, and moves on. If any county refuses to sign, there should already be lawyers ready to file a complaint that same day, because whoever files first sets the pace. Back the groups and state officials who are lining this up now. A single voter filing alone can get lost in the shuffle, but a state, or a big organization with members in every county, gets heard fast.
Make the record while you do it. Video the counts, log the chain of custody, and post copies publicly. A lie dies fast against a timestamp. Fill the canvass meetings as well. They're public, boring, and attended by almost no one, which is exactly why bad actors love them. Pack the room and make every board member say yes or no out loud, on camera, with their name attached. Cowards hate being filmed.
Get ahead of the delay, too. Tell people now that counts take days and early numbers shift. A slow count is a normal count, and nobody gets to call it a crime scene. Then reward the Republicans who certify. Praise the clerks and commissioners who do their jobs, loudly, so the next one finds the nerve. Name the ones who refuse until they're embarrassed enough to reconsider.
Finally, put 866-OUR-VOTE in your phone. You can call or text, and you should report problems the minute they happen, not next week.
By January 3, the paper trail should be so clean and public that there's nothing left to argue about when the new Congress convenes. The referees are gone, so be the referee: clerks, canvassers, lawyers, neighbors with phones. Nobody else is coming.
#HOLDFAST