The Supreme Court‘s ruling one week ago on former President Donald Trump‘s long-awaited claim of presidential immunity from prosecution is already affecting each of his four criminal cases.
Trump was initially slated to be the first former president criminally sentenced this week, but the sentencing date was pushed back to Sept. 18 after the high court ruled on July 1 that former presidents, including Trump, have immunity for official acts they took in office, but not for unofficial or private acts.
Here are the ways this novel immunity test is already prompting more delays in lower court.
More delays in the Jan. 6 case
Trump is facing four charges stemming from an alleged effort to obstruct the results of the 2020 election in one of two cases brought by special counsel Jack Smith.
The case is also the one that brought the recent ruling in Trump v. United States, which set a test that divides presidential acts into three buckets: Official acts that are absolutely immune from prosecution, official acts that are presumptively immune from prosecution and require adequate rebuttals from prosecutors, and unofficial acts that are not immune at all. The high court gave guidance on certain acts that suggested Trump’s communication with his White House staff, for example, could be considered official conduct.
The next steps will require District Judge Tanya Chutkan, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, to conduct hearings to decide which alleged misdeeds Trump may enjoy immunity from in the four-count indictment. The trial was initially scheduled to get underway in early March before the Supreme Court intervened after two lower courts sided against Trump on the immunity dispute.
But the hurdle for getting the case back on schedule in the lower court is now a bit of a waiting game which could last until Aug. 2, according to former Attorney Joyce Vance, who cited the delay period for the high court’s issuance of its final judgment.
Under the Supreme Court’s rules, parties have 25 days to seek rehearing of a decision. The judgment will then be issued seven days following that deadline, meaning “we can expect jurisdiction to be returned to Judge Chutkan 32 days after the Supreme Court issued its decision, which should be on Friday, August 2,” Vance wrote in a Q&A blog post on July 3.
Chutkan has not yet indicated how fast she will move to schedule new hearings after Aug. 2, but the case will likely be returning at the height of campaign season, leading many experts to speculate the case may not head to a trial before Election Day.
Trump’s hush money conviction in jeopardy
Trump was found guilty by a New York jury on May 30 on 34 felony counts connected to a 2016 hush money payment.
Defense lawyers last week requested and obtained a delay in the sentencing, citing the recent immunity ruling, and they suggested in a letter that various pieces of evidence that were presented during the trial should have never been permitted in light of the Supreme Court’s latest decision.
Last week’s letter was signed by Trump Attorney Todd Blanche and pointed to a March 7 defense motion that asked the prosecutors to preclude evidence related to Trump’s “official acts” based on the presidential immunity doctrine. The defense will now object to certain evidence that was presented at trial, including testimony from former campaign press secretary Hope Hicks and ex-attorney Michael Cohen, Trump’s social media posts and public statements, and a 2018 filing from the Office of Government Ethics.
Defense lawyers are slated to file court papers this week related to Trump’s New York conviction, which New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan will have to consider after a briefing from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office later this month. Merchan’s decision over these forthcoming briefs can be appealed to a higher state court, leaving even more room for delay in this post-conviction phase.
Defense wants to freeze the classified documents case
In Florida, Trump faces 40 federal charges in Smith’s second federal indictment, which alleges the former president retained classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort club and sought to impede the government’s efforts to retrieve those records.
Last week, the defense asked District Judge Aileen Cannon, an appointee of Trump, to pause the case following the immunity ruling, arguing the decision’s bar of prosecution for official acts could affect whether certain alleged misdeeds can remain in the indictment.
The Trump-appointed judge agreed Saturday to a request made Friday to impose a two-week delay for three pending deadlines in the case. Trump’s team made the request Friday, arguing that the Supreme Court’s immunity decision had to be considered and they should be allowed to argue the merits before the trial moves forward.
Saturday’s order was only a partial victory for Trump, whose team requested the entire case, except for a pending dispute over a gag order, be put on pause in order to brief Cannon on the effects of the Supreme Court’s decision.
Cannon imposed a July 18 deadline for Smith’s team to respond to the motion to stay and a July 21 deadline for any other reply. She also ruled against co-defendant Walt Nauta’s motion to dismiss the indictment based on claims of selective and vindictive prosecution, and Trump has a similar motion still pending her final decision.
The Georgia case remains in limbo
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has indicted Trump and 18 others for allegedly violating Georgia’s racketeering laws by trying to overturn the 2020 election.
The state case closely resembles the alleged misdeeds featured in the Washington, D.C., indictment.
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While there has not been much movement from either Trump’s attorney, Steve Sadow, or Willis’s office, the overlap between the allegations in the Georgia and D.C. case means it is likely the defense will argue the recent immunity decision significantly impairs the case brought by Fulton County prosecutors. The Fulton County case is presently paused over an unrelated appeal to a judge’s decision to leave Willis in charge of the case despite an alleged conflict of interest.
In all four cases, Trump has pleaded not guilty to the charges he faces in the lead up to the 2024 election.
