Special Counsel Jack Smith is challenging the notion of vast presidential immunity, compiling a list of theoretical misdeeds that could potentially be committed by a president if immunity is upheld.
The case involves a battle between Smith and former President Donald Trump, with Smith aiming to start a trial in March, while Trump seeks to delay it.
Smith’s prosecutors warn that Trump’s immunity theory poses a danger to the republic. (Trending: Obama Judge Issues Shock Ruling Against Democrats)
Legal commentators have scrutinized Smith’s examples of specific scandals, while Trump’s defense team has dismissed them as hypothetical and not rooted in reality.
“In each of these scenarios, the president could assert that he was simply executing the laws; or communicating with the Department of Justice; or discharging his powers as commander-in-chief; or engaging in foreign diplomacy,” prosecutors wrote.
“The implications of the defendant’s broad immunity theory are sobering. In his view, a court should treat a President’s criminal conduct as immune from prosecution as long as it takes the form of correspondence with a state official about a matter in which there is a federal interest, a meeting with a member of the executive branch, or a statement on a matter of public concern,” they wrote.
“Interesting choice of hypotheticals…” attorney George Conway said.
“It took quite an imagination,” he added jokingly.
“Ignoring actual lessons from history, the government provides a list of lurid hypotheticals that have never happened—including treason and murder,” Trump’s attorneys wrote.
“Some or all of these hypotheticals, depending on the facts, would likely involve purely private conduct, rendering them irrelevant here,” they wrote.
The fate of the trial now rests with the appellate judges.
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