Trump says DOJ violated its own election rules. Lawyers disagree.
By Curt_Anderson October 3, 2024 5:44 pm Category: Law (0.0 from 0 votes)
Rules of the Post
Just a reminder, this is an ongoing case, not some new investigation. If Trump's lawyers hadn't stalled and delayed, this might already have gone to trial and decided. Trump has only himself to blame if he doesn't like the timing of the release of this filing.
(WaPo)[Jack]Smith’s 165-page filing — his response to a landmark Supreme Court ruling in July that broadened the scope of presidential immunity — and its timing were dictated by the high court’s demands and a judge’s best efforts to carry them out, experts said.
“I do not think you can overemphasize the point that Smith had no choice without abandoning the case,” said Philip Allen Lacovara, the deputy solicitor general during the Nixon administration who later served on the Watergate special prosecutor team. “This is hardly inconsistent with the letter or the spirit of the Justice Department 60-day policy.”
When the Supreme Court issued its ruling, the majority opinion was written in a way that left it up to the lower courts to decide what parts of the federal election interference indictment against Trump were not covered by immunity and could be prosecuted. U.S. District Court Judge Tanya S. Chutkan then decided she should start by seeking a brief from prosecutors, making their best argument about how Trump’s conduct could still be prosecuted in light of the Supreme Court’s decision.
Smith and his team have said in legal filings they had little choice but to publicly explain in detail the evidence collected against Trump, including a striking anecdote in which the former president allegedly said “So what?” when an aide told him that Vice President Mike Pence had been taken to a secure location as violence unfolded at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. The special counsel noted the Supreme Court ordered the lower courts to conduct a “close” and “fact-specific” analysis of what is covered by presidential immunity, which Smith said his filing does.
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Just a reminder, this is an ongoing case, not some new investigation. If Trump's lawyers hadn't stalled and delayed, this might already have gone to trial and decided. Trump has only himself to blame if he doesn't like the timing of the release of this filing.