'Huge opinion': Legal expert says Trump is in trouble after ruling that he's not a 'king'
Being U.S. president didn't anoint Trump with a crown.
In her retort to former President Donald Trump’s motion to dismiss his election interference charges on grounds of presidential immunity, Judge Tanya Chutkan denied in her Friday filing that his four years as leader of the free world didn’t entitle him to “the divine right of kings to evade the criminal accountability that governs his fellow citizens."
Legal analyst Ryan Goodman on CNN's "Out Front" called the formal rebuke a massive development.
Chutkan added that “former Presidents enjoy no special conditions on their federal criminal liability.”
Her rebuke comes hours after a federal appeals court decided that Trump doesn't have immunity from multiple lawsuits related to his actions on Jan. 6, 2021, leading up to the Capitol Building riot.
The judge determined that Trump, now that he's out of office, can be prosecuted as well.
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"After he's president he could be prosecuted," Goodman said. "Well that is this case."
So in the D.C. criminal subversion case, Goodman says the prosecutor Jack Smith can prosecute.
"And there is one important line: she said, 'Defendant Trump's four year service as commander-in-chief did not bestow on him the divine right of kings to evade the criminal accountability that governs his fellow citizens."
"It's a huge opinion," Goodman said.
Goodman took that to mean Smith can "go forward" unless she's overturned by the court of appeals.