Trump Asks Justices to Take Their Time Deciding Immunity Question

WASHINGTON — Former President Donald Trump asked the Supreme Court on Wednesday to take its time in deciding whether he is immune from prosecution for his alleged role in fomenting the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

Trump was set to go on trial on March 4 on charges he allegedly engaged in systematic and deliberate efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election and prevent the lawful transfer of power to his successor. 

On Dec. 7, U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan rejected the former president’s motion to toss the election interference case on the grounds that his being an ex-president shields him from the charges.

In denying Trump’s motion, Chutkan concluded that nothing in the Constitution or subsequent history of the United States shields a former president from “federal investigation, indictment, prosecution, conviction and punishment for any criminal acts undertaken while in office.” 

She also rejected Trump’s assertion that his acquittal in impeachment proceedings gave him protection under double-jeopardy principles or the impeachment judgment clause against his criminal prosecution after leaving office. 

Trump immediately filed an appeal of Chutkan’s decision, and special counsel Jack Smith responded by asking the Supreme Court to immediately weigh in on the issue.

In doing so, Smith urged the justices to see the case as one of “national importance” that “should therefore be resolved expeditiously.”

“Given the weighty and consequential character of the constitutional questions at stake, only this court can provide the definitive and final resolution of respondent’s immunity claims that this case demands,” Smith wrote.

But in a motion filed with the court on Wednesday, attorneys for Trump argued that Smith has identified “no compelling reason for the extraordinary haste he proposes. 

“Instead, he vaguely asserts that the ‘public interest’ favors resolution on a dramatically accelerated timetable, to ensure that President Trump may be brought to trial in the next few months,” they said.

“In doing so, he confuses the ‘public interest’ with the manifest partisan interest in ensuring that President Trump will be subjected to a monthslong criminal trial at the height of a presidential campaign where he is the leading candidate and the only serious opponent of the current administration,” they added.

“The combination of an almost three-year wait to bring this case and the special counsel’s current demand for extraordinary expedition, supported by the vaguest of justifications, creates a compelling inference of partisan motivation,” they said.

The Trump legal team also noted that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit has already scheduled a hearing to consider his appeal of Chutkan’s ruling on Jan. 9.

“In 234 years of American history, no president ever faced criminal prosecution for his official acts,” they wrote. “Until 19 days ago, no court had ever addressed whether immunity from such prosecution exists. 

“To this day, no appellate court has addressed it. The question stands among the most complex, intricate and momentous issues that this court will be called on to decide,” they continued.

“This court’s ordinary review procedures will allow the D.C. Circuit to address this appeal in the first instance, thus granting this court the benefit of an appellate court’s prior consideration of these historic topics and performing the traditional winnowing function that this court has long preferred,” they said.

“The special counsel urges this court to bypass those ordinary procedures, including the long-standing preference for prior consideration by at least one court of appeals, and rush to decide the issues with reckless abandon,” they continued, adding later, “Importance does not automatically necessitate speed. If anything, the opposite is usually true. 

“Novel, complex, sensitive and historic issues — such as the existence of presidential immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts — call for more careful deliberation, not less. When a case ‘arouses keen interest,’ ‘courts should respond to that circumstance in a calm, orderly and deliberative fashion in accordance with the best traditions of the law,’” they said.

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