A new filing delivered Thursday means the Supreme Court can issue an order on Donald Trump’s controversial presidential immunity argument “at any time.”
That’s according to Slate journalist Mark Joseph Stern who shared Thursday Trump’s response to special counsel Jack Smith’s filing to the nation’s highest court.
This argument will determine the future of the former president’s federal election interference case as it will decide whether or not Trump can be prosecuted for actions he took while instated in the White House.
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Attorney Robert J. DeNault described the 17-page filing as a “final plea” with some noteworthy holes.
“[It] leans HEAVILY on the argument that a president’s official acts are immune from charges,” DeNault wrote on X. “But he ignores findings from multiple courts (including in the DC case) that Trump’s charged conduct was [not] ‘official acts.’”
This case has reached the Supreme Court after the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled earlier this month Trump’s presidential immunity argument didn’t pass constitutional muster.
In the filing, attorneys Todd Blanche, John Lauro, and John Sauer criticized both the appellate court’s “ill-considered” decision and Smith.
“There is no mystery about the Special Counsel’s motivation,” they write. “Commentators across the political spectrum point to the obvious—the Special Counsel seeks to bring President Trump to trial and to secure a conviction before the November election in which President Trump is the leading candidate against President Biden.”
For his part, Smith argued Trump's argument threatens to “strike at the heart of our democracy.”
