The Supreme Court's ruling that former presidents have immunity for official acts while in office was a gut punch to the political prosecutions of Donald Trump orchestrated by President Joe Biden and his Department of Justice, Will Scharf, an attorney for the former president, told Newsmax on Monday.
"We really couldn't have expected any better of a ruling out of the U.S. Supreme Court," Scharf told "Rob Schmitt Tonight." "It really vindicates what our arguments have been all along, which is that a president deserves a broad scope of immunity from prosecution for his official acts while he's in office. Today, that's exactly what the Supreme Court recognized. We're enthused. We're excited to continue litigating all of these cases in courtrooms across America.
"But for the meantime, I think what the Supreme Court did today was deal a serious body blow to the campaign of lawfare against President Trump that's been ginned up by President Biden and his political allies."
The high court ruled for the first time that former presidents have some immunity from prosecution. The 6-3 majority decision by Chief Justice John Roberts returns the federal case regarding allegations of Trump trying to subvert the results of the 2020 election back to trial court in Washington, D.C., to determine what is left of special counsel Jack Smith's indictment. The outcome means Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, likely won't face trial before November's election.
Many Trump supporters believe the D.C. election interference case was built on a shaky house of cards, with little to connect Trump directly to the events of Jan. 6, 2021, at the U.S. Capitol and efforts to overturn the election results. Even in his speech at the Ellipse that day, he encouraged his supporters to march to the Capitol and peacefully protest.
"All of that is precisely the reason that the indictment in this case focuses so heavily on President Trump's official acts in office, things like instructions that he gave to the Department of Justice, communications that he had with the vice president and with members of Congress," Scharf said. "What the Supreme Court said today is that all of those acts, or a large part of those acts, deserve a broad grant of immunity because those are official acts under the president's Article II responsibilities.
"You can't have a prosecutor post hoc [after the fact] attempting to hold the president accountable for things that he did in his official capacity while he's in office. What that would set up is an endless cycle of political recrimination and prosecution. Our founders specifically wanted to avoid that and that's why the constitutional system that they set up, as acknowledged by the Supreme Court today, includes this broad grant of an immunity for presidents for their official acts in office."
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Michael Katz ✉
Michael Katz is a Newsmax reporter with more than 30 years of experience reporting and editing on news, culture, and politics.
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