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US prosecutors told a federal judge that Donald Trump is “not above the law” as they urged the dismissal of the former president’s efforts to have charges of conspiring to subvert the 2020 presidential election rejected.”
Special counsel Jack Smith’s team submitted a 54-page filing after Trump’s legal team moved to request the dismissal of four felony charges against him in Washington, DC, arguing that he should enjoy presidential “immunity”.
“The defendant is not above the law. He is subject to the federal criminal laws like more than 330 million other Americans, including members of Congress, federal judges, and everyday citizens,” wrote assistant special counsel James Pearce.
The filing argued that legal principles, historical eence and compelling policy considerations support the idea that once former presidents exit office, they become liable to federal criminal prosecution just like other Americans.
If defence lawyers fail to persuade US District Judge Tanya Chutkan they will have the opportunity to press their arguments before a federal appeals court or, ultimately, a Supreme Court with a clear conservative majority.
Prosecutors presented eight pages of legal citations to argue the claim that Mr Trump fundamentally misconstrued the laws and inaccurately drew a parallel between Trump’s “fraudulent efforts to overturn the results of an election that he lost and the likes of Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address and George Washington’s Farewell Address”.
“The indictment alleges that the defendant acted deceitfully or corruptly to secure a personal benefit to himself as a presidential candidate, not to carry out constitutional obligations entrusted to the presidency,” prosecutors said.
“Immunity should not foreclose the Government from shouldering the burden to prove those demanding standards beyond a reasonable doubt at trial,” it added.
It comes as lawyer Sidney Powell pleaded guilty to lesser charges relating to attempts to reverse Mr Trump’s defeat in the 2020 US election in Georgia. She became the second defendant to strike an agreement with prosecutors.
She was charged alongside Mr Trump and 17 others with violating the state’s anti-racketeering law but entered the plea a day before jury selection was set to start in her trial.
Mr Trump has pleaded not guilty to four-count indictment in federal court in Washington with scheming to overturn the election that he lost to Democrat Joe Biden in the run-up to 6 January 2021, when pro-Trump rioters stormed the US Capitol in a violent but failed effort to halt the transfer of power.
The Supreme Court has held that presidents enjoy immunity from civil lawsuits regarding actions tied to their official responsibilities. However, the question of whether this immunity extends to protect a president from criminal prosecution remains unaddressed by the court.
Trump’s defence attorneys have seized on the lack of definitive rulings to argue that he should be regarded as immune from prosecution. They assert that the actions he’s accused of fall within the scope of presidential duties.
Scheduled for trial on 4 March next year, this case is one of four criminal prosecutions that the former president is currently confronting.
Additional reporting by agencies
