Even if everything the Associated Press has reported so far about the link between donations to the Clinton Foundation and access to then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is confirmed—including the most damning allegations—nothing that has been revealed to date is likely ever to be prosecuted. That is because the current Supreme Court seems to think selling access is not illegal. This is not to say that the actions of Hillary Clinton or the functionaries she surrounded herself with are on the level. Rather, it is because the Court has all-but-legalized what most people consider to be corruption, especially in the form of pay-to-play.

So even if Clinton’s team put meetings at the State Department on the auction block, or arranged for donors to schmooze with world leaders, or pressed for policy changes that favored donors, at least so far there do not appear to be violations of current anti- corruption laws as the courts now interprets them. None of what has been reported counts as legally corrupt as far as the out-of-touch Roberts Court is concerned, and thus will likely never be prosecuted.

For decades, political corruption meant what most Americans think it means. The Supreme Court (in Buckley v. Valeo and McConnell v. FEC) embraced this ordinary view of corruption, holding that giving and taking bribes was only the most blatant kind of corruption. Then came a series of cases in which the Supreme Court eviscerated that meaning and replaced it with the free-for-all corruption rules that insulate today’s political candidates. The process began in Citizens United, where the Court significantly narrowed the definition of corruption. Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the majority (and providing no basis for his opinion), asserted that the appearance of influence or access obtained by campaign contributions “will not cause the electorate to lose faith in this democracy.”

Then, in 2014, the Court’s majority in McCutcheon v. FEC decided that corruption only counts if it comes in quid pro quo form. In English, the Court decided that only an explicit agreement of an exchange of money for an official action qualifies—anything else is, by definition, not corruption. According to Chief Justice Roberts and four of his colleagues, “the Government may not seek to limit the appearance of mere influence or access.” He went on:

Government regulation may not target the general gratitude a candidate may feel toward those who support him or his allies, or the political access such support may afford. Ingratiation and access are not corruption.”

In other words, if donors to the Clinton Foundation—or even Clinton’s presidential campaign—were granted meetings with the State Department, nothing in those grants of access would meet the standard of what constitutes illegal corruption according to the Supreme Court. In fact, in their view, such access and influence merits First Amendment protection.

Following McCutcheon, the Court further relaxed corruption laws in McDonnell v. United States. In that case, Governor McDonnell accepted tens of thousands of dollars in