A single inscrutable sentence in the Supreme Court’s notice that they’ll consider former President Donald Trump’s presidential immunity claim signals their intention to toss it, legal experts said Thursday.
This argument appears in an analysis from NBC filed Thursday from Lawrence Hurley, who set himself the challenge of looking at one 29-word sentence and answering, “What the hell do these words even mean?”
The sentence is also the question the Supreme Court has limited itself to answering: “Whether and if so to what extent does a former President enjoy presidential immunity from criminal prosecution for conduct alleged to involve official acts during his tenure in office.”
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For help, Hurley turned to Norm Eisen, the Obama administration ethics czar who worked for House Democrats during the first Trump impeachment effort.
Eisen believes the language was "extremely carefully crafted" to signal the court would reject Trump’s "crazy absolute immunity idea.”
Former federal prosecutor Randall Eliason agreed that the legalese did not bode well for Trump, arguing the court did not want to suggest the nation’s commander-in-chief enjoys unbridled power.
"My best guess is that they don't want to leave the impression that there's never any presidential immunity under any circumstances,” Eliason told Hurley. “They want to write something more nuanced.”
Hurley also notes that while Trump’s lawyers did not make a distinction between current and former presidents, Smith, and the Supreme Court, did.
Harvard Law School Professor Jack Goldsmith told Hurley this was suggestive.
“That would suggest the court might conclude that a president cannot be prosecuted for acts central to his role such as ordering military actions, issuing pardons or firing officials," Goldsmith said.
Finally, Hurley notes the Supreme Court refused to consider Trump’s argument that a president cannot be prosecuted if he was acquitted by the Senate after an impeachment.
Eliason told Hurley, "They have taken that off the table.”
