The U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling that presidents, including Donald Trump, have immunity from prosecution for “official” acts taken while in office will require U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutken, overseeing Special Counsel Jack Smith’s prosecution of the ex-president’s January 6 case, to determine which actions were official acts, and which were private.
That could provide the Special Counsel with the opportunity to hold “a trial before the trial,” even if the trial will not be able to take place before the election.
So says Tristan Snell, the former prosecutor who helped the State of New York win its $25 million judgment against Trump University.
“Donald Trump needs to be careful what he wished for — the Supreme Court’s decision now means Judge Chutkan will hold proceedings on whether Trump’s actions were ‘official acts’ of the presidency,” Snell wrote Monday afternoon.
“This could be a trial before the trial, potentially RUINING Trump politically.”
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In his Substack newsletter last week, before the Court’s immunity ruling Monday, Snell wrote:
“The former president of the United States has been indicted for attempting to stage a coup to stay in power — and our system seems unable to bring him to trial before the next election, in which he’s attempting to seize power again.”
Finding a “silver lining in all of this,” he says, “Yes, Trump won his delay. Yes, the trial will have to wait until all this ‘official act’ absurdity is decided. But the devil is in the details — namely, the details of what Trump did, how he did it, when he did it, where he did it, who he did it with, and why he did it.”
Now, “Judge Chutkan will ask the lawyers to submit their evidence and arguments via a briefing schedule, and then she will likely hold a hearing. And given the volume of evidence and witnesses, this ‘hearing’ could last weeks. If not months,” Snell believes. “It would be tantamount to a trial, before the actual trial.”
He’s in good company.
Professor of law Jed Shugerman is writing “two books on the history of executive power and prosecution in America.” One “is tentatively titled ‘A Faithful President: The Founders v. Royalist Originalism,’ questioning the Robert Court’s evidence for its theory of unchecked and unbalanced presidential power.”
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He writes on social media, “I agree that a Jan 6 trial cannot happen before the election (That was almost certain when the Court took this case)”
“But a great idea is floating: Jack Smith can use evidentiary hearings as a mini-trial.”
After a lengthy legal examination, Shugerman says, “Readers are asking for more specifics about what Jack Smith could still pursue in DC trial court and in evidentiary hearings in Aug-Sept-Oct.
The answer: Almost everything is still on the table.”
All of this means the American people will be able to learn more about Donald Trump’s actions regarding his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, including his actions on January 6, 2021.
And professor of law Randall Eliason, a former federal prosecutor, adds, “There won’t be a trial in the DC case before the election. There could, however, be extensive court hearings on the allegations in the indictment to determine which are immune – which will serve to remind the public of all of Trump’s actions and the events of Jan 6.”
