The conservative-majority U.S. Supreme Court on Monday sent back to lower courts the question of Donald Trump’s criminal immunity as a former president, further delaying his federal trial in Washington.
By a vote of six to three, the six conservative justices against the three progressives, the Court considered that “the president enjoys no immunity for his unofficial acts” but that he “is entitled to at least a presumption of immunity for his official acts.” Donald Trump, campaigning to return to the White House, immediately hailed a “great victory” for democracy.
“We are writing a rule for posterity”
By deciding on February 28 to take up this question, then by scheduling the debates almost three months later, the highest court of the United States had already considerably postponed the federal trial of the former Republican president for attempted illegally reverse the results of the 2020 election won by Joe Biden. The entire procedure for this trial, initially scheduled for March 4, and postponed sine die, had already been suspended for four months.
During the debates, if the judges were generally skeptical of the absolute immunity claimed by the Republican candidate, several, particularly among conservatives, insisted on the long-term repercussions of their decision. “We are writing a rule for posterity,” observed Neil Gorsuch, referring to the unprecedented nature of the question. “This affair has enormous implications for the future of the presidency and the country,” added his colleague Brett Kavanaugh.
Donald Trump’s lawyers have successfully pushed back his trials through numerous appeals
Targeted by four separate criminal proceedings, Donald Trump is pulling out all the stops to go to trial as late as possible, in any case after the presidential election. He was found guilty on May 30 by the New York courts of “aggravated false accounting to conceal a conspiracy to pervert the 2016 election.” He will be sentenced on July 11.
But this first criminal conviction, unprecedented for a former American president, in the least politically heavy of the four procedures, also risks being the only one before the vote.
Through numerous appeals, Donald Trump’s lawyers have managed to postpone until further notice the other trials, at the federal level for withholding classified documents after he left the White House and before the courts of the key state of Georgia for electoral interference in 2020. If he were re-elected, Donald Trump could, once he is inaugurated in January 2025, order the cessation of federal proceedings against him.
