Presidents are only immune for their official acts – NBC4 Washington

The Supreme Court has rejected former President Donald Trump's request for absolute immunity from prosecution, ruling that while a former president is immune from prosecution for his official acts, he is not immune from unofficial acts.

Monday’s landmark 6-3 decision does not answer the question of what constitutes an official or unofficial act. Instead, the court sends the question back to lower courts to determine precisely how to apply the decision to Trump’s case.

Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that “Trump claims a far broader immunity than the limited one we have recognized.”

Roberts was joined by the five other conservative justices. The three liberal justices issued a dissenting opinion.

The decision to grant former presidents criminal immunity reshapes the institution of the presidency. It violates the fundamental principle of our Constitution and our system of government that no one is above the law, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in a scathing dissent.

Sotomayor, who read aloud a summary of her dissent in the courtroom, said the court's protection of presidents “is as bad as it sounds, and it is without merit.”

The outcome means an additional delay before Trump can be tried in the case brought by special counsel Jack Smith, effectively ending the former president's prospects of being tried before the November election.

If Trump's trial in Washington does not take place before the 2024 election and he is not granted four more years in the White House, he will likely be tried shortly thereafter.

But if he wins, he could appoint an attorney general who would seek to have this case and other federal charges he faces dismissed. He could also seek a pardon if he wins the White House.

The case stems from Trump's attempts to get charges against him dropped. Lower courts have ruled that he cannot claim immunity for actions that prosecutors say were illegally aimed at interfering with the election results.

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee has been charged in federal court in Washington with conspiring to overturn the 2020 election, one of three criminal charges he still faces. Earlier this month, Trump was convicted in New York on 34 counts of falsifying business records stemming from what prosecutors said was an attempt to cover up a payment to porn actress Stormy Daniels just before the 2016 presidential election.

In oral arguments earlier this year, the majority of the justices did not appear to accept the claim of absolute immunity that would prevent special counsel Jack Smith from prosecuting Trump for conspiring to overturn his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden. However, several conservative justices indicated they might limit the instances in which former presidents could be prosecuted, suggesting the case could be sent back to lower courts before any trial could begin.

Trump Supporters and Critics React to Supreme Court Immunity Ruling

After the Supreme Court ruled that Donald Trump is not completely immune from charges in his election interference case, News4's Megan McGrath speaks with his supporters and critics live outside the courthouse.

Trump attorney D. John Sauer argued that former presidents are entitled to absolute immunity for their official actions. Otherwise, he said, politically motivated prosecutions of former Oval Office occupants would become commonplace and presidents would be unable to serve as commander in chief if they had to worry about criminal prosecution.

Lower courts have rejected those arguments, including a unanimous three-judge panel of an appeals court in Washington, D.C.

Several judges have attempted to define what constitutes an official act and whether charges based on such an act should be dismissed.

Justice Elena Kagan at one point questioned whether a former president could escape prosecution even if he ordered a coup or sold nuclear secrets. Justice Sauer said prosecutions might not be allowed if those were official acts.

Roberts raised the idea of ​​a president accused of taking a bribe in exchange for an ambassadorial appointment.

How could the indictment be pursued if prosecutors were to suppress the official act, the appointment? It's like a one-legged stool, isn't it? Roberts asked.

Smith's team argues that the men who wrote the Constitution never intended for presidents to be above the law and that, in any case, the acts Trump is accused of, including his participation in a scheme to enlist fake voters in key states won by Biden, are in no way part of the official duties of a president.

Nearly four years ago, the nine-judge panel rejected Trump’s request for absolute immunity from a district attorney’s subpoena for his financial records. That case unfolded during Trump’s presidency and led to a criminal investigation, but no charges were filed.

Among the controversies surrounding the case is the presence of Justice Clarence Thomas, who ignored calls to step down from the case because his wife, Ginni Thomas, called for the 2020 election results to be overturned and later attended the rally that preceded the Capitol riot.

Justice Samuel Alito said he had no reason to recuse himself from the cases after The New York Times reported that flags similar to those carried by the Jan. 6 rioters were flying over his homes in Virginia and on the Jersey Shore. His wife, Martha-Ann Alito, was responsible for displaying the inverted American flag in January 2021 and the Appeal to Heaven banner in the summer of 2023, he said in letters to Democratic lawmakers responding to their requests for his recusal.

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