Special counsel Jack Smith on Tuesday filed a new indictment against former US president Donald Trump over his efforts to undo the 2020 US presidential election that keeps the same criminal charges, but narrows the allegations against him following a Supreme Court opinion that conferred broad immunity on former US presidents.
The new indictment removes a section of the indictment that had accused Trump of trying to use the law enforcement powers of the US Department of Justice to overturn his election loss, an area of conduct for which the Supreme Court, in a 6-3 opinion last month, said that Trump was absolutely immune from prosecution.
The stripped-down criminal case represents a first effort by prosecutors to comply with a US Supreme Court opinion that made all but certain the Republican presidential nominee would not face trial before the November election in the case alleging he tried to thwart the peaceful transfer of power.
Photo: AFP
It comes days before prosecutors and defense lawyers are expected to tell the judge overseeing the case how they want to proceed in light of the Supreme Court’s ruling, which said presidents are presumptively immune from prosecution for official White House acts.
The high court sent the case back to US District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who now must analyze which allegations in the indictment were unofficial actions — or those taken in Trump’s private capacity — that can proceed to trial.
Prosecutors and Trump’s legal team would be back in court next week for the first hearing in front of Chutkan in months, given that the case had been effectively frozen since December last year, as Trump’s immunity appeal worked its way through the justice system.
In a statement on his Truth Social platform, Trump called the new indictment “an act of desperation” and an “effort to resurrect a ‘dead’ Witch Hunt.”
He said the new case has “all the problems of the old Indictment, and should be dismissed IMMEDIATELY.”
The special counsel’s office said the updated indictment, filed in federal court in Washington, was issued by a grand jury that had not previously heard evidence in the case. It said in a statement that the indictment “reflects the Government’s efforts to respect and implement the Supreme Court’s holdings and remand instructions.”
The new indictment does away with references to allegations that could be deemed as official acts for which Trump is entitled to immunity in light of the Supreme Court’s ruling. That includes allegations that Trump tried to enlist the US Department of Justice in his failed effort to undo his election loss, including by conducting sham investigations and telling states — incorrectly — that significant fraud had been detected.
In its opinion, the Supreme Court held that a president’s interactions with the department constitute official acts for which he is entitled to immunity.
The original indictment detailed how former US Department of Justice official Jeffrey Clark wanted to send a letter to elected officials in certain states falsely claiming that the department had “identified significant concerns that may have impacted the outcome of the election,” but top department officials refused.
Clark’s support for Trump’s election fraud claims led Trump to openly contemplate naming him as acting attorney general in place of Jeffrey Rosen, who led the department in the final weeks of the Trump administration. Trump ultimately relented in that idea “when he was told it would result in mass resignations at the Justice Department,” according to the original indictment.
Rosen remained on as acting attorney general through the end of Trump’s tenure.
The new case no longer references Clark as a co-conspirator. Trump’s alleged co-conspirators were not named in either indictment, but the details make clear their identities. The new indictment stresses that none of the other co-conspirators “were government officials during the conspiracies and all of whom were acting in a private capacity.”
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