Washington: The US Supreme Court will hear arguments on Thursday on whether Donald Trump, as a former president, should be immune from prosecution for acts he committed while in office.
The decision by the nine justices could have far-reaching implications for the scope of America’s executive power — and Trump’s own numerous legal challenges as he seeks the White House again.
And while most constitutional law experts expect Trump to suffer a legal defeat, he may have already scored a political victory.
By agreeing to take over the case, the court delayed – possibly indefinitely – the start of Trump’s trial on charges of conspiring to overturn the results of the 2020.
The question of whether an ex-president is immune from prosecution is untested in US jurisprudence because, until Trump, a former White House resident had never been charged with a crime.
“Richard Nixon was great at breaking the criminal law,” said James Sample, a professor of constitutional law at Hofstra University.
“But because he resigned and (Nixon’s successor) Gerald Ford then pardoned him, we never had to deal directly with the notion of prosecuting a former president.”
Special counsel Jack Smith filed the election conspiracy suit against the 77-year-old Trump in August and pushed hard for a March trial date.
But Trump’s lawyers have filed a blizzard of motions to dismiss the case against the Republican presidential nominee, including claims that the former president enjoys “absolute immunity” from prosecution.
In one ruling, a lower court said Trump’s claim to immunity “is not supported by precedent, history, or the text and structure of the Constitution.”
Sample and other legal scholars said the Supreme Court is unlikely to find that the president enjoys blanket immunity from prosecution.
Steven Schwinn, a law professor at the University of Illinois Chicago, agreed.
Randall Eliason, a former U.S. attorney who teaches law at George Washington University, said the unique circumstances of the case justify a swift decision by the Supreme Court, although the justices may wait until the end of their current terms in June to rule. .
“We’ve never had a situation before where a defendant potentially has the ability to drop his own prosecution if he wins re-election,” Eliason said.
“The people have a right to have these charges tried, and if Trump is reelected, there’s a chance they’ll never be tried.”
Smith rejected that argument in a filing with the Supreme Court.
“The constitutional duty of the president to see that the laws are faithfully executed is not a general right to violate them,” he said.
Trump also faces charges in the 2020 election in Georgia and was indicted in Florida for allegedly mishandling classified information after leaving the White House.
Opening arguments began Monday in his trial in New York on state charges he falsified business records by paying a porn star before the 2016 election.
US Supreme Court to hear high-stakes Trump immunity claim
