{"id":680,"date":"2024-02-07T00:08:59","date_gmt":"2024-02-07T00:08:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/2024\/02\/07\/trump-has-no-immunity-from-jan-6-prosecution-appeals-court-rules\/"},"modified":"2024-02-07T00:08:59","modified_gmt":"2024-02-07T00:08:59","slug":"trump-has-no-immunity-from-jan-6-prosecution-appeals-court-rules","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/2024\/02\/07\/trump-has-no-immunity-from-jan-6-prosecution-appeals-court-rules\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump has no immunity from Jan. 6 prosecution, appeals court rules"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A federal appeals court has unanimously ruled that Donald Trump can be put on trial for trying to stay in power after losing the 2020 election, rejecting Trump\u2019s sweeping claim of presidential immunity as dangerous and unsupported by the Constitution.<\/p>\n

At public arguments in January, the three judges expressed concern over the most extreme implications of Trump\u2019s view, with one suggesting it would allow a future president to order the assassination of a political rival. But in their opinion Tuesday, they said it is Trump\u2019s own alleged crimes \u2014 \u201can unprecedented assault on the structure of our government\u201d \u2014 that threaten democracy if left beyond the reach of criminal prosecution.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe cannot accept former President Trump\u2019s claim that a President has unbounded authority to commit crimes that would neutralize the most fundamental check on executive power \u2014 the recognition and implementation of election results,\u201d the judges wrote. \u201cNor can we sanction his apparent contention that the Executive has carte blanche to violate the rights of individual citizens to vote and to have their votes count.\u201d<\/p>\n

The ruling is one of several expected this spring that could determine whether Trump will campaign for president this fall from behind bars \u2014 and whether he is able to compete for reelection at all. It comes days before the Supreme Court considers another untested question raised by Trump\u2019s candidacy: whether the former president is an insurrectionist prohibited by the Constitution from returning to the White House because of his actions around Jan. 6.<\/p>\n

Trump was appealing a decision made by Tanya S. Chutkan, the judge overseeing his trial in D.C., and has made clear that he plans to keep pressing his case in higher courts. The D.C. Circuit panel set tight deadlines for that review, saying it would give Trump only until Feb. 12 to ask the Supreme Court to intervene. That would make it hard for Trump to ask the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to review the ruling first. While his legal arguments keep failing in court, even rulings against him increase his chances of delaying any federal trial in D.C. until after the presidential election, in which he is the Republican front-runner.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s trial had been scheduled for March 4 \u2014 one of four criminal prosecutions Trump faces while simultaneously campaigning to regain the White House. But it was postponed indefinitely last week for the appeals process on the immunity issue to continue.<\/p>\n

The panel wrote \u201cper curiam,\u201d meaning they are \u201cspeaking with one voice,\u201d in a 57-page opinion addressing all of the arguments Trump\u2019s attorneys made during arguments before the appellate court in January. \u201cThis opinion is as strong an argument against Supreme Court intervention as there could have been,\u201d said Steve Vladeck, a professor at the University of Texas School of Law. \u201cWhether it\u2019s strong enough is up to the justices.\u201d<\/p>\n

Five justices would have to agree to keep the trial on hold for Trump\u2019s appeal. Vladeck predicted that the court would either take the case quickly and decide it before the term ends in late June or early July, or not take it at all. \u201cThey don\u2019t want to be seen as running out the clock,\u201d he said. \u201cIf they want to step in, I think they would want to step in this term.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Justice Department has long held that a current president cannot be prosecuted. But Trump raised the novel claim that former presidents cannot either, at least for actions related to their official duties, unless impeached and convicted by Congress first. Having been acquitted by the Senate of inciting the deadly attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, Trump said that to try him in federal court would be a double-jeopardy violation.<\/p>\n

The lone Republican appointee on the panel, Karen L. Henderson, has historically been sympathetic to broad presidential power. But during the oral argument she called it \u201cparadoxical\u201d that a president\u2019s duty to faithfully execute the laws would allow him to violate them. That characterization is reflected in the final opinion, which calls Trump\u2019s position \u201ca striking paradox.\u201d It also suggests that some fear of future prosecution serves an important purpose: \u201cto deter possible abuses of power and criminal behavior.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The court quoted Chutkan\u2019s earlier ruling: \u201cEvery President will face difficult decisions; whether to intentionally commit a federal crime should not be one of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Having already promised if reelected to use the Justice Department to \u201cgo after\u201d Biden, Trump said after arguments in the D.C. Circuit that a ruling against him would mean \u201cbedlam in the country.\u201d In a statement Tuesday, on the conservative site Truth Social, Trump posted that without \u201cFull immunity \u2026 A President will be afraid to act for fear of the opposite Party\u2019s Vicious Retribution after leaving Office.\u201d<\/p>\n

The D.C. Circuit dismissed that warning as \u201cunsupported by history,\u201d as \u201cthis is the first time since the Founding that a former President has been federally indicted.\u201d The judges also pointed out that other ex-presidents believed themselves vulnerable to prosecution. Richard Nixon accepted a pardon \u201cfor all offenses\u201d he \u201ccommitted or may have committed\u201d in office. Bill Clinton agreed to the suspension of his law license and a fine to avoid a possible indictment over the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Prosecutorial ethics and the grand jury process would \u201cprevent baseless indictments,\u201d the judges said.<\/p>\n

The ruling also echoes an assessment made by Judge Florence Y. Pan during the arguments \u2014 that Trump\u2019s claim he could be prosecuted as long as he was first impeached and convicted by Congress undermines rather than strengthens his argument. He \u201cimplicitly concedes that there is no absolute\u201d immunity, the court wrote, and complains only about the process.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s impeachment claim relied on a single line in the Constitution saying that while Congress can only remove a person from office, \u201cthe party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to indictment.\u201d Trump, who was impeached by the House but acquitted by the Senate, argued that that must mean the opposite is also true, as he put it in his filings: \u201cA president who is not convicted may not be subject to criminal prosecution.\u201d<\/p>\n

At oral argument, when asked whether Trump\u2019s view would allow a president to order the assassination of a political rival, defense attorney D. John Sauer did not disagree. He only suggested that such an action would \u201cspeedily\u201d result in impeachment.<\/p>\n

The court called that \u201cirrational\u201d and \u201cimplausibl[e].\u201d The argument that prosecution after an impeachment acquittal would violate the principle of double jeopardy was not serious, the court said \u2014 \u201cimpeachment is a political process,\u2019 and most of the senators who voted against Trump\u2019s impeachment said they did so for reasons \u201cunrelated to factual innocence.\u201d Moreover, the court said, the single impeachment count of inciting an insurrection did not overlap completely with the charges against Trump in D.C. of conspiring to subvert the election results.<\/p>\n

Even if presidents should be protected from prosecution for some acts, the court said, it is \u201cdoubtful\u201d that Trump\u2019s efforts to remain in office would qualify: \u201cHe allegedly injected himself into a process in which the President has no role.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Supreme Court in 1982 declared that presidents cannot be sued in civil court over official decisions. A different panel of the D.C. Circuit ruled late last year that lawsuits against Trump could go forward because campaigning for reelection is not an \u201cofficial act.\u201d Trump has indicated he plans to appeal that ruling as well.<\/p>\n

The D.C. Circuit ruling is not binding in any other jurisdiction where Trump is accused of a crime. He is making similar arguments in Georgia, where he is accused of interfering specifically in that state\u2019s 2020 election. But in that case, Trump is also arguing that the Constitution\u2019s \u201csupremacy clause\u201d bars state prosecutors from indicting a former president. The special counsel has declined to address that issue, saying in court filings that \u201cprosecution by a state or local entity would raise separate questions.\u201d In New York State Court and Florida federal court, Trump faces trial for actions he took before or after his presidency.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe do not address policy considerations implicated in the prosecution of a sitting President or in a state prosecution of a President, sitting or former,\u201d the D.C. Circuit said in a footnote to its ruling.<\/p>\n

Spencer S. Hsu, Ann E. Marimow and Perry Stein contributed to this report.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

This post appeared first on The Washington Post<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A federal appeals court has unanimously ruled that Donald Trump can be put on trial for trying to stay in power after losing the 2020 election, rejecting Trump\u2019s sweeping claim of presidential immunity as dangerous and unsupported by the Constitution. At public arguments in January, the three judges expressed concern over the most extreme implications […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":681,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-680","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/680","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=680"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/680\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/681"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=680"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}