Donald Trump has pleaded not guilty in the case, seeking to paint them as politically motivated.
Washington:
The special counsel prosecuting federal criminal charges against Donald Trump filed a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday, urging judges to deny the former president’s immunity on the principle that “no one is above the law.” Application for prosecution. law. “
The case will be argued before a judge on April 25. Trump has appealed a lower court’s rejection of his request to be immune from the criminal case brought by special counsel Jack Smith because he was president at the time of the court’s action. center of the case.
Smith told the judge in his final filing before arguments that Trump’s conduct that led to the charges, if convicted, would represent “an unprecedented attack on the fabric of our government.”
“The effective functioning of the presidency does not require that a former president be immune from liability for these alleged violations of federal criminal law,” Smith wrote. “Rather, a fundamental principle of our constitutional order is that no one is above the law, including the president. “
Trump, the Republican candidate challenging Democratic President Joe Biden in the Nov. 5 U.S. election, is the first former president to be criminally charged. Biden defeated Trump in 2020. Trump has pleaded not guilty in this and three other criminal cases he faces, seeking to paint the cases as politically motivated.
He argued that the former president “enjoys absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for his official actions” and warned that without that immunity, “the threat of future prosecution and imprisonment will affect the most sensitive and controversial presidential decisions.” political cudgel.” “
In August 2023, Smith filed four federal criminal charges against Trump in the election subversion case, including conspiring to defraud the United States, obstructing Congress from certifying Biden’s election victory and conspiring to do so, and conspiring to violate Americans’ voting rights.
Smith’s views were endorsed Monday by 19 retired four-star U.S. military officers and other former senior national security officials, including retired Army generals Peter Chiarelli and George Casey, former CIA Director Michael Hayden and former Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus. In an amicus brief, they called Trump’s assertion of presidential immunity “contrary to the fundamental principles of our democracy.”
“Unless (Trump’s) theory is rejected, we risk jeopardizing America’s standing as the world’s champion of democracy and further fueling the spread of authoritarianism that threatens the national security of the United States and democracies around the world,” the former officials told reporter. Judges.
The Supreme Court’s decision in late April to hear arguments on Trump’s immunity petition delayed his trial, giving Trump momentum to try to delay prosecution as he campaigns to regain the presidency.
Last October, Trump tried to have the charges dismissed, citing his immunity. U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan rejected that claim in December. On appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit rejected Trump’s lawsuit in a 3-0 ruling on February 6.
Trump and his allies falsely claimed that the 2020 election was stolen and hatched a plan to use fake electors to prevent Congress from certifying Biden’s victory. Trump also tried to pressure then-Vice President Mike Pence not to allow the certification to proceed. On January 6, 2021, Trump supporters attacked the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to prevent certification.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
