Donald Trump would have been convicted of attempting to overturn the 2020 election results if he had not been elected, says special prosecutor Jack Smith in his final report released Tuesday.
The federal prosecutor had recommended — and obtained — a halt to the prosecution in the election results case, as well as in another proceeding concerning the retention of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago residence after his departure from the White House . He justified dropping the charges by recalling a policy adopted by the Justice Department more than 50 years ago, in the wake of the Watergate scandal, of not prosecuting a sitting president.
A report on these two cases was sent to outgoing Justice Minister Merrick Garland on January 7. A few days later, Special Prosecutor Smith left the Justice Department. The document released Tuesday concerns only the classified documents affair. In the other case of the withholding of classified documents at Mr. Trump’s Florida residence, the Justice Department indicated that it would not publish the special prosecutor’s findings so as not to “prejudice” both personal assistants, who remain prosecuted in this case.
“The results of the election have for the first time raised the question of the legal course of action when a private citizen who has already been indicted is elected president,” read the prosecutor’s final report. Jack Smith says he is convinced that “without the election of Mr. Trump and his imminent return to the presidency, the admissible evidence was sufficient to obtain a conviction at trial.”
The former and next president of the United States was notably charged with “conspiracy against American institutions” and “undermining the right to vote” of voters for his pressure on the local authorities of seven states that he had narrowly lost in order to invalidate the official results in the 2020 election, which brought Joe Biden to power.
Four years protected from prosecution
If the evidence necessary to secure a conviction exists, would it be possible to reopen the case in four years, at the end of Mr. Trump’s presidency, which protects him from prosecution while in office? “The theoretical answer is “maybe”. The practical answer seems to me to be “probably not”,” says Rafael Jacob, associate researcher at the Observatory on the United States of the Raoul-Dandurand Chair.
He mentions in passing the “theoretical” power of the future president to “self-pardon” for federal crimes, an avenue that has not yet been seen. But one thing seems certain for the moment: “he will not be prosecuted for at least the next four years”.
On his Truth Social network, Donald Trump, who regularly attacks Jack Smith, called him “crazy” for the umpteenth time after the publication of his “false conclusions”. “The time has come to put an end to this instrumentalization of the judicial system,” write the president-elect’s lawyers in a letter attached to the report.
-A criminal in the White House
Only one trial was held in the four criminal proceedings against Donald Trump. A New York state court convicted him on May 30 of making hidden payments to porn actress Stormy Daniels to “pervert the 2016 election.”
Mr. Trump was sentenced to unconditional release on January 10 so as not to harm his future office. Despite this exemption from punishment, the sentence grants him the status of criminal, a first for an American president.
Donald Trump also remains prosecuted in the key state of Georgia with 14 other people for facts similar to those in his federal electoral interference case in 2020. The state’s appeals court, however, ordered the prosecutor to relinquish the case due to an intimate relationship she had with an investigator, which should lead to further delays.
Furthermore, last July, the American Supreme Court recognized that presidents have immunity from prosecution for the official acts they have committed. It will be up to the lower courts to determine, on a case-by-case basis, what constitutes an act of an “official” nature.
With Agence France-Presse
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