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Former President Donald Trump has filed a Supreme Court appeal to his previously rejected claim that presidential immunity should shield him from facing federal election interference charges.
A decision by a Washington, D.C. federal appeals court last week allowed Special Counsel Jack Smith's felony case against the ex-president, which had been paused pending appeal, to move forward.
A filing by Trump's attorneys on Monday asks the nation's highest court to reinstate the pause while arguing that all of the charges against the former president should be dropped.
The filing claims that Trump was indicted for "his official acts as president" and argues that not granting a stay in the case would mean that "irreparable injury to [former] President Trump is inevitable."
"This Court should stay the D.C. Circuit's mandate to forestall, once again, an unprecedented and unacceptable departure from ordinary appellate procedures and allow [former] President Trump's claim of immunity to be decided in the ordinary course of justice," the filing states.
"The reasons to do so are compelling," it continues. "[Former] President Trump's claim that Presidents have absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for their official acts presents a novel, complex, and momentous question that warrants careful consideration on appeal."
Newsweek reached out for comment to Trump's office via email on Monday.
In a unanimous decision by the D.C. Circuit appeals court last Tuesday, a three-judge panel wrote that "any executive immunity that may have protected [Trump] while he served as President no longer protects him against this prosecution."
The judges added that the ex-president had "become citizen Trump, with all of the defenses of any other criminal defendant" and concluded that they could not "accept that the office of the presidency places its former occupants above the law for all time thereafter."
Trump, who has pleaded not guilty to all 91 of the felony counts he is facing across four separate criminal cases, lashed out at the ruling as "nation-destroying" shortly after it was issued, claiming in a Truth Social post that it "would terribly injure not only the Presidency, but the Life, Breath, and Success of our Country" if it is not overturned.
New York University constitutional law Professor Peter Shane told Newsweek last week that Trump was unlikely to succeed in a Supreme Court appeal of the decision, despite the conservative tilt to the court and the fact that three of its justices were appointed by the former president.
"I'd be stunned if a majority on the court disagree with the D.C. Circuit," Shane said. "Whether presidents may be charged with crimes while in office is a difficult question; whether former presidents may be charged is not."
However, the Supreme Court may give Trump a more favorable outcome in his appeal of Colorado's decision to remove his name from the 2024 presidential election ballot, with the justices having signaled that they are likely to side with the ex-president when oral arguments were heard on Thursday.
Update 02/12/24 6:11 p.m. ET: This article was updated with additional information.
About the writer
Aila Slisco is a Newsweek night reporter based in New York. Her focus is on reporting national politics, where she ... Read more