Supreme Court hands Trump victory, ruling he has immunity for some acts in his election interference indictment

WASHINGTON The Supreme Court on Monday raised the bar for prosecuting Donald Trump, ruling that he has immunity for some of his conduct as president in his federal election interference case, but perhaps not for further actions, adding another obstacle to special counsel Jack Smith. case at trial.

In a new and potentially consequential case on the limits of presidential power, the justices voted 6-3 along ideological lines to reject Trump's broad claim of immunity, meaning charges related to his attempts to overturn the 2020 election results will not be dismissed but said certain actions closely related to his core duties as president are off-limits to prosecutors.

“A great victory for our Constitution and our democracy. Proud to be an American,” Trump said in an all-caps message on his social media site Truth Social.

Trump's Republican allies welcomed the decision while Democrats strongly condemned it, with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer saying it “allows the former president to weaken our democracy by breaking the law.”

Donald Trump and Jack Smith. Getty Images

Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, said additional proceedings are needed in the lower courts to determine what conduct Trump can be prosecuted for. Among the conduct the court has determined falls within core presidential powers and therefore is subject to immunity are Trump’s contacts with Justice Department officials. Trump is also “presumptively immune” from prosecution for his contacts with Vice President Mike Pence in the weeks before his supporters attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6, Roberts wrote.

The indictment alleged that Trump sought to pressure the Justice Department into investigating unfounded claims of widespread voter fraud as part of a plan to keep him in power despite the election victory of President Joe Biden. Trump also wanted Pence to refuse to certify the election results as part of his ceremonial role during the joint session of Congress on January 6.

“The president is not above the law,” Roberts wrote. “But Congress cannot criminalize the president’s conduct in the exercise of executive branch responsibilities under the Constitution.”

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What this means for the future of the case remains to be seen. Trump’s lawyer admitted during his closing arguments in April that at least some of the allegations in the indictment involved private conduct that would not be protected by any immunity defense. Similarly, the Justice Department lawyer arguing the special counsel’s case said the prosecution could proceed even if some official acts were protected.

At a minimum, District Judge Tanya Chutkan will review other proceedings to determine whether the other conduct alleged in the indictment is protected. Among the acts she will review to determine whether they are covered by immunity are Trump’s contacts with people outside the federal government, including state election officials like Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, whom Trump pushed to reject the results showing Biden’s victory.

Prosecutors will also have a chance to rebut the suggestion that Trump's contacts with Pence were shielded. That decision would hinge on whether prosecuting Trump for these actions “would present dangers of intrusion into the authority and functions of the executive branch,” Roberts wrote.

Discussing contacts with state election officials, Roberts wrote that the president has “broad authority to speak on matters of public concern,” including the conduct of elections. On the other hand, the president “plays no role” in the certification of elections by the states, he added. Chutkan must conduct a “thorough analysis” of the indictment to determine whether Trump’s actions are protected, Roberts said.

In a further blow to Smith, the court ruled that none of the conduct for which Trump is immune can be admitted as evidence at trial in any form.

The Court's three liberal justices vigorously disagreed, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor writing that the decision “mocks the fundamental principle of our Constitution and our system of government that no man is above the law.” .

The Constitution, she added, “does not protect a former president from liability for criminal acts and treason.”

She warned that the decision could have far-reaching consequences by shielding presidents from a wide range of actions.

“That the President is breaking the law, that he is exploiting the trappings of his office for personal gain, that he is using his official power for malign purposes,” Sotomayor wrote. “For if he knew that he might one day be held accountable for breaking the law, he might not be as bold and courageous as we would like him to be. That is the message of the majority today.”

In a separate dissenting opinion, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson described the decision as a “five-alarm fire that threatens to consume democratic self-governance.”

Even if the new procedure does not take long, there is little chance that the trial will end before Election Day. It had previously been suggested that a trial would not begin until at least three months after the Supreme Court decision, which would mean it would potentially not begin until early October at the earliest. The trial itself could last up to 12 weeks.

The case has put the spotlight on the Supreme Court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, including three justices appointed by Trump. The court gave Trump an election-year boost when it ruled in March that Colorado could not exclude him from the ballot.

The justices were also criticized for their delay in considering Trump's appeal, which some see in itself as a victory for him because it meant the trial could not take place in March as originally planned.

Legally speaking, this is an unprecedented case, since no president has ever been prosecuted after leaving office. As a result, the court was grappling with a legal question that had never been brought before it: whether a president enjoys some form of immunity for his essential duties, derived from the constitutional principle of separation of powers, which delineates the powers of the presidency in relation to the other branches of government.

The legal argument focused on Trump's official actions, with both sides agreeing that a former president does not have immunity for his personal conduct.

The Supreme Court intervened after a federal appeals court ruled on February 6 that Trump was not immune from prosecution, saying that once he left office he became a Trump citizen and should be treated like any other criminal defendant. The Justice Department has long maintained that a sitting president cannot be prosecuted.

The appeals court did not analyze which of the behaviors mentioned in the indictment could be considered an official act, a fact that appeared to irritate some judges during the arguments.

Trump's lawyers pointed to a 1982 Supreme Court decision that endorsed presidential immunity from civil lawsuits when the underlying conduct involves actions outside the president's official responsibilities.

Smith's team argued that there is no broad immunity that prevents former presidents from being prosecuted for criminal acts committed while in office.

The federal indictment returned by a grand jury in Washington in August included four counts: conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction and attempted obstruction of due process, and conspiracy against rights, particularly the right to vote.

In another case related to January 6, the court on Friday narrowed the scope of the law criminalizing obstruction of an official procedure. Trump also faces that charge, but legal experts say Friday's ruling may not affect his case.

Trump, according to the indictment, conspired to overturn the legitimate results of the 2020 presidential election by knowingly using false claims of voter fraud to obstruct the government function by which those results are collected, counted and certified.

The indictment focuses on Trump's involvement in a scheme to submit false election certificates to Congress in the hopes that they would overturn President Joe Biden's victory. The chain of events culminated with the riot at the US Capitol on January 6.

Trump, who has pleaded not guilty, has said he was simply expressing concerns, unsupported by evidence, that the election was marred by widespread fraud. The case is one of four criminal charges against Trump now pending.

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