April 25, 2024, 9:04 am ET
April 25, 2024, 9:04 am ET“Whatever immunities a sitting president may enjoy, the United States has only one head of government at a time, and that position does not confer a lifetime exemption from prison,” Judge Tanya S. Chutkan wrote.Credit…Haiyun Jiang for The New York Times
If any Supreme Court justice were to adopt Donald J. Trump’s view that he is immune from prosecution for actions he committed as president, it would be a break from the way his argument has fared in the lower courts . So far, all four justices who heard the argument have rejected it.
Mr. Trump first reiterated the idea of presidential immunity in October to defeat federal charges against him for trying to undermine the 2020 election.
He argued that a president’s official actions should be immune and that the actions cited in the indictment were official actions he took as president and not private actions he took as a political candidate.
In December, the judge in the case, Tanya S. Chutkan of the federal district court in Washington, vigorously rejected his claim of immunity, taking a position that meant she did not have to decide whether the acts accused were official or private.
“Whatever immunities a sitting president may enjoy, the United States has only one head of government at a time, and that position does not confer a life-long exemption from prison,” Judge Chutkan wrote. “Former presidents do not enjoy special conditions regarding their criminal liability at the federal level. The defendant may be subject to federal investigation, indictment, prosecution, conviction, and punishment for all criminal acts committed while in office.”
Mr. Trump appealed to a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which heard arguments on the matter in January. The following month, the panel also unanimously rejected Mr. Trump’s claim. Echoing Judge Chutkan’s approach, they said former presidents have no immunity at all, regardless of the nature of their actions.
“We cannot accept former President Trump’s assertion that a president has unfettered authority to commit crimes that would override the most basic check on executive power – the recognition and implementation of election results,” they wrote in an unsigned statement and added emphatically: “We cannot accept that the office of the President will forever place its former holders above the law.”
Three of the justices were appointed by Democratic presidents: Judge Chutkan was appointed to the bench by former President Barack Obama, and two members of the Appellate Body, Judges Florence Y. Pan and J. Michelle Childs, were appointed by President Biden.
The panel’s third member, Judge Karen L. Henderson, was appointed by a Republican – the first President George Bush – and had notably sided with Mr. Trump in several previous legal disputes.
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2024-04-25 14:02:18
www.nytimes.com
