“Haste makes waste,” Trump lawyer tells justices in opposing review of immunity issue now

Attorneys for former President Donald Trump urged the Supreme Court docket on Wednesday afternoon to show down a request from Particular Counsel Jack Smith to resolve now whether or not Trump will be tried on prison prices that he conspired to overturn the outcomes of the 2020 election.

Lawyer D. John Sauer acknowledged that an “inaccurate denial of a declare of presidential immunity from prison prosecution unquestionably warrants” Supreme Court docket evaluation. However that query, Sauer posited, ought to “be resolved in a cautious, deliberative method,” Sauer emphasised, “not at breakneck pace.”

The 34-page submitting on Wednesday afternoon got here in response to a request from Particular Counsel Jack Smith, who final week requested the courtroom to rule on whether or not Trump is entitled to immunity with out ready for the U.S. Court docket of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to weigh in.

Earlier this month, U.S. District Choose Tanya Chutkan rejected Trump’s declare that he can’t be prosecuted as a result of his conduct was a part of his obligations as president or, alternatively, as a result of he had already been impeached, however not convicted, on prices arising from the identical conduct.

Trump has appealed that call to the D.C. Circuit, which has scheduled oral argument within the case for Jan. 9.

However even earlier than the D.C. Circuit agreed to fast-track the case, Smith got here to the Supreme Court docket, telling the justices that except the immunity case leapfrogs over the D.C. Circuit now, “it’s unclear whether or not this Court docket would have the ability to hear and resolve the brink immunity points throughout its present Time period” – and, consequently, earlier than the 2024 elections.

In a separate submitting on the identical day, Smith requested the justices to expedite their consideration of his petition. The justices rapidly signaled that they’d accomplish that: In an order issued a number of hours later, they directed Trump to file his response in simply 9 days – three weeks in need of the conventional deadline for such briefs.

However within the temporary that he filed on Trump’s behalf on Wednesday, Sauer pushed again sharply towards the concept that the Supreme Court docket must step in now. If something, he urged, they should transfer cautiously, relatively than rapidly. And any delay from ready for the courtroom of appeals to behave first, because the Supreme Court docket usually prefers to do, might be minimal, Sauer wrote, when the D.C. Circuit has already “dramatically expedited proceedings on attraction.”

Sauer attributed Smith’s need to have the immunity problem resolved rapidly to partisan motives – particularly, to “be sure that President Trump—the main Republican candidate for President, and the best electoral risk to President Biden—will face a months-long prison trial on the top of his presidential marketing campaign.” And Sauer cautioned that Smith’s “request threatens to tarnish this Court docket’s procedures with the identical look of partisanship.”

Sauer additionally argued that the Supreme Court docket doesn’t have the authority to contemplate the case in any respect as a result of Smith prevailed within the decrease courtroom. The chance that Trump’s trial could possibly be delayed isn’t attributable to Chutkan’s ruling, Sauer stated, and subsequently the federal government has not suffered the sort of damage that might permit Smith to file an attraction.

Trump’s trial is at the moment scheduled to start on March 4, 2024. However that date is probably going in jeopardy, for 2 causes. First, Chutkan not too long ago agreed with Trump that his attraction to the D.C. Circuit largely placed on maintain all pretrial proceedings and discovery, making it more durable for prosecutors to maintain the case transferring ahead.

Second, the Supreme Court docket introduced on Dec. 13 that it’ll resolve whether or not the identical federal regulation at problem in Trump’s case can be utilized to prosecute a participant within the Jan. 6 assaults on the U.S. Capitol. As a result of the courtroom’s ruling in that case, Fischer v. United States, may have an effect on the costs towards Trump even when the justices finally rule that he’s not immune from prosecution, it too may delay the March 4 trial date.