Jack Smith says Trump is not immune from charges in DC election case

Reported by: Just The News

Special Counsel Jack Smith filed a new filing Wednesday in his D.C. election case against former President Donald Trump, arguing that he is not immune from prosecution in light of the Supreme Court’s recent ruling on presidential immunity.

Smith originally charged Trump with four charges related to his efforts to challenge the 2020 presidential election. Trump had argued that he was immune from prosecution because of presidential immunity. The Supreme Court ruled earlier this year that the president enjoys immunity for constitutional acts and presumptive immunity for official acts. Smith subsequently filed a revised complaint asking the court to find that Trump’s alleged conduct does not fall within the scope of presidential immunity.

“The defendant claims he is immune from prosecution for his criminal scheme to overturn the 2020 presidential election because, he claims, it involved official conduct. Not so,” he claimed. “Although the defendant was the sitting president during the accused conspiracies, his scheme was essentially a private scheme. Working with a team of private co-conspirators, the defendant acted as a candidate when he used multiple criminal means to disrupt, through fraud and deception, the government function that collects and counts votes – a function in which the defendant, as president , had no official role.”

Smith made this argument in a 165-page filing in the US District Court for the District of Columbia. Trump has pleaded not guilty to the revised charges and the case is not expected to go to trial before the election.

The case is separate from Smith’s prosecution of Trump over his handling of classified material, which Judge Aileen Cannon dismissed earlier this year.

Trump has denied wrongdoing in both of his federal criminal cases, insisting they are part of a broader political effort to use the Justice Department to derail his 2024 bid for the White House.