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Supreme Court returns Trump Jan. 6 immunity judgment to lower court
(abcnews.go.com)
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this post was submitted on 02 Aug 2024
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My understanding is that if a prosecutor even wants to bring charges against someone who was president when the alleged offense(s) were committed, the prosecutor has to first demonstrate that the offending acts were not "official acts."
Nobody really knows what that looks like, of course, but it definitely opens the door for Judge Chutkan to call for hearings on whether the acts alleged to be criminal were "official" or not. Which would probably look exactly like a trial - presentation of evidence, witnesses, cross examination, defense - just where the only judgment at the end would be "Nope, not official acts."
Then that gets appealed, all the way to SCOTUS, then maybe an actual trial happens. Then they complain that there's no way to get an impartial jury, because everyone already knows all the details of the case, that gets appealed ...
Delay is the point, and SCOTUS is complicit.
Delaying is the point but I think things actually get really interesting as soon as the judge calls for hearings and witnesses show up. If the act is official, and therefore Trump would have immunity, there is no fifth amendment protection for him to avoid answering questions, or to lie about anything. So that means he needs to give a lot of information, some of which might point at people who don't have absolute immunity, and could possibly be locked up for their actions.
So then we have this interesting situation where Trump will be called to testify, and if he does so inaccurately, he could be held in criminal contempt. Remember, he has to stand by the claim that his acts are official, so he can't play fast and loose on the stand and maintain his absolute immunity defense.
Of course we don't know. We have no idea how any of this will play out. But we can imagine how it might play out from absolute immunity defenses with judges and prosecutors. No doubt that's what the judge will rely on as guidelines for this case.