The Supreme Court’s decision on Monday in former President Donald Trump’s 2020 election interference case all but ensures that the Republican will face trial in Washington ahead of the November election.
The Supreme Court did not dismiss the indictment, as Trump had hoped, accusing him of illegally plotting to cling to power after his loss to President Joe Biden, but the decision represents a major victory for the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, who has been focused on delaying legal proceedings until after the election.
The timing of the trial is important because if Trump wins against Biden, he could appoint an attorney general who would seek to dismiss the case and other federal charges he faces. Or Trump could order a pardon for himself.
Shortly after the verdict was announced, President Trump posted in capital letters on social media networks:This is a huge victory for our Constitution and democracy. I’m proud to be an American!”
In remarks Monday night, Biden said the Supreme Court had done a “terrible disservice” to the American people, who had a right to know the outcome of the case before heading to the polls.
“The American people must pass judgment on Donald Trump’s actions,” Biden said. “The American people must decide that his attack on our democracy on January 6th makes him unfit to hold public office.”
The ruling and future developments are as follows:
opinion
The Supreme Court’s conservative majority said former presidents have absolute immunity from prosecution for official acts that fall within the “exclusive scope of constitutional powers” and are entitled to presumptive immunity for all official acts. They do not enjoy immunity for unofficial or personal acts.
The ruling means that Special Prosecutor Jack Smith cannot pursue key charges in the indictment, or at least must defend the use of those charges in a future hearing before a judge.
For example, the Supreme Court rejected Smith’s argument that Trump sought to use the Justice Department’s investigative powers to overturn the election results, finding that his communications with Justice Department officials were clearly protected from prosecution.
The Supreme Court remanded the case to U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who must now “carefully analyze” whether other allegations involve official conduct that would give the president immunity from prosecution. Among the issues requiring further analysis is Trump’s persistent pressure on then-Vice President Mike Pence not to certify the electoral votes on January 6, 2021. The Supreme Court said it was “ultimately the government’s responsibility to rebut the presumption of immunity” in Trump and Pence’s interactions.
The order also directed additional analysis of various posts by Trump on Twitter, then known as Twitter, and speeches to supporters that preceded the riot at the U.S. Capitol. Determining whether those communications were official or unofficial conduct “may depend on their respective content and context,” and therefore requires further scrutiny, the justices said.
The False Electoral Scheme
The Supreme Court required new fact-finding into one of the indictment’s most shocking charges – that Trump participated in a plot by allies to create fraudulent electoral rolls in battleground states won by Biden and falsely claim that Trump had won those states.
The Trump campaign argued that the selection of replacement electors was in keeping with President Trump’s interest in the integrity and proper administration of federal elections, and cited as precedent what allegedly happened in a contested election in 1876. In contrast, Smith’s campaign argued that the plan was an entirely private act that did not hold the president accountable.
In their majority opinion, the conservative justices did not answer the question of which side was right, but said “determining whose depiction is correct as to which conduct requires a thorough analysis of the indictment’s broad and interrelated allegations.”
The Supreme Court said that unlike Trump’s interactions with the Justice Department, “the alleged conduct does not neatly fall into the specific duties of the President. Rather, the required analysis is fact-specific and requires evaluating numerous alleged interactions with a wide variety of Government officials and private citizens.”
Opponents
Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson harshly criticized the majority’s opinion in a scathing dissent. In a dramatic speech reading her dissent from the court, Justice Sotomayor shook her head and gritted her teeth as she said the conservative majority had wrongly isolated the U.S. president as a “king above the law.” “The irony is this: the very person charged with enforcing the law can now break it,” she said. The dissenting justices said the majority’s decision would allow a president to avoid prosecution for ordering Navy SEALs to assassinate a political opponent, orchestrating a military coup to stay in power or accepting bribes in exchange for a pardon.
“Even if these nightmare scenarios do not come true — and I pray that they never will — the damage has already been done: The president’s relationship with the American people has been irrevocably altered. In every exercise of his civil power, the president is now a king above the law,” Sotomayor wrote.
In a separate dissent, Justice Jackson said the majority’s decision “breaks new and dangerous ground.” “Simply put, the Supreme Court has declared for the first time in its history that the most powerful official in the United States may make the law for himself (under circumstances that have yet to be fully determined),” he wrote.
The majority opinion accused the liberal justices of “fear-mongering” and said they had spoken in “horrifying and devastating tones that are totally out of proportion to what the Court currently does in practice.”
What’s next?
The case is now back in Chutkan’s hands. The trial was supposed to begin in March, but has been on hold since December to allow Trump to appeal. Chutkan indicated at the time that he would give both sides at least three months to prepare for trial once the case returns to his court. That could have meant a trial before the election if the Supreme Court ruled that Trump was not immune from prosecution, as lower courts had done. But the Supreme Court’s decision that Chutkan needed to conduct further analysis means the case is expected to be stalled for months in a legal battle over whether the conduct in the indictment was official or unofficial.
Trump’s other cases
Trump was convicted of 34 felony counts in a hush money trial in New York in May and is scheduled to be sentenced on July 11. The charge of falsifying business records carries a possible prison sentence of up to four years, but there is no guarantee that Trump will receive any prison time. Other possibilities include fines or probation. Trump’s other two criminal cases will almost certainly not go to trial before the election. The appeals court is reviewing a lower court decision that recently suspended Trump’s Georgia 2020 election interference case, allowing Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis to continue to preside over the case. No trial date has been set for the case. Trump’s defense team has argued for presidential immunity in the case, but no ruling has been issued.
In another lawsuit filed by Smith, Trump was scheduled to go on trial in May over classified documents found at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s vacation home, after he left the White House. But U.S. District Judge Eileen Cannon canceled the trial date after the case became bogged down in legal issues. She has not yet set a new trial date. That case also involves Trump’s immunity claims, which prosecutors are contesting. Last week, Judge Cannon agreed to review another judge’s ruling that allowed key evidence related to Trump’s alleged obstruction of justice to be introduced in the case, causing further delays.
One of Justice Cannon’s arguments – that Justice Smith was illegally appointed and the case should be dismissed – received little acceptance from the Supreme Court, and Justice Clarence Thomas’ separate concurring opinion concluded that Justice Smith was improperly appointed, but the other justices did not agree.
