The Emoluments Clause Has Teeth. Miami Residents Are Testing Them.
Miami residents have filed suit to block a plan that would convert a presidential library on state-donated land into a hotel benefiting Donald Trump, the New York Times reports. The legal theory is the Constitution's domestic emoluments clause, which bars a sitting president from accepting money or gifts from any state government.
The clause has rarely been litigated to a final judgment, but the factual predicate here — state land, state donation, presidential profit — is about as direct a collision with the constitutional text as courts are likely to see.