Former President Trump is asking the Supreme Court docket to increase the delay within the trial stemming from Particular Counsel Jack Smith’s 2020 election interference case, arguing that he has presidential immunity to guard him from prosecution.
Trump attorneys on Monday afternoon filed an emergency enchantment with the Supreme Court docket simply days after a D.C. appeals courtroom dominated the previous president and 2024 GOP front-runner will not be immune from prosecution in Smith’s case.
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The request is for momentary aid, to remain or block the appeals courtroom mandate from taking impact, which might give the Trump authorized staff extra time to file an enchantment to the Supreme Court docket on the deserves of whether or not a former president deserves immunity from legal prosecution for actions whereas in workplace.
Former President Trump speaks in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, on Feb. 9, 2024. (Spencer Platt)
The trial stemming from Smith’s case towards Trump is on maintain pending decision of the immunity query.
The Justice Division could ask for expedited consideration of this preliminary emergency enchantment.
“If the prosecution of a President is upheld, such prosecutions will recur and turn into more and more widespread, ushering in harmful cycles of recrimination,” the request states. “Legal prosecution, with its larger stigma and extra extreme penalties, imposes a far larger ‘private vulnerability’ on the President than any civil penalty.”
The request provides, “The specter of future legal prosecution by a politically opposed Administration will overshadow each future President’s official acts — particularly essentially the most politically controversial selections.”
The request states that the president’s “political opponents will search to affect and management his or her selections by way of efficient extortion or blackmail with the menace, express or implicit, of indictment by a future, hostile Administration, for acts that don’t warrant any such prosecution.”
The U.S. Supreme Court docket (AP Picture/Mariam Zuhaib/File)
“This menace will cling like a millstone round each future President’s neck, distorting Presidential decision-making, undermining the President’s independence, and clouding the President’s means ‘to deal fearlessly and impartially with’ the duties of his workplace.'”
Trump’s attorneys added, “With out immunity from legal prosecution, the Presidency as we all know it should stop to exist.”
TRUMP TRIAL DELAYED IN CASE STEMMING FROM SPECIAL COUNSEL JACK SMITH’S JAN. 6 INVESTIGATION
A Trump spokesperson described the submitting as a “powerhouse submitting.”
Particular Counsel Jack Smith (Drew Angerer/Getty Photos/File)
“As President Trump’s powerhouse Supreme Court docket submitting explains, if immunity will not be granted to a President, each future President who leaves workplace will face the prospect of being wrongfully indicted by the opposing occasion,” the spokesperson advised Fox Information Digital. “With out full immunity, the President of the US won’t be able to operate correctly. Even whereas the President remains to be in workplace, his political opponents will use the specter of future prosecution as a weapon, successfully blackmailing and extorting him to affect his most delicate and necessary selections.”
The spokesperson added, “The Supreme Court docket ought to grant the requested keep and put an finish to Deranged Jack Smith’s repeated makes an attempt to corruptly short-circuit the strange and proper functioning of our justice system.”
The submitting comes after Washington, D.C., federal Choose Tanya Chutkan earlier this month formally delayed the trial, which was set to start on March 4– a day earlier than the important Tremendous Tuesday main contests, when Alabama, Alaska, American Samoa, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia and Vermont vote to pick a GOP nominee.
Chutkan stated in December that she doesn’t have jurisdiction over the matter whereas it’s pending earlier than the Supreme Court docket, and she or he put a pause on the case towards the Republican 2024 front-runner till the excessive courtroom determines its involvement.
Smith charged the previous president with conspiracy to defraud the US; conspiracy to hinder an official continuing; obstruction of and try and hinder an official continuing; and conspiracy towards rights. These costs stemmed from Smith’s investigation into whether or not Trump was concerned within the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021, and any alleged interference within the 2020 election outcome.
Trump pleaded not responsible to all costs in August 2023.
