Trump and Immunity — Supreme Court’s Ruling Explained: QuickTake

The Supreme Court, voting 6-3 along ideological lines, gave Donald Trump apartial victoryin determining that he is immune from criminal charges for some actions taken while he was president.

The issue, the justices said, isn’t as simple as whether Trump enjoyed a legal shield when prosecutors say he illegally tried to overturn the 2020 presidential election he lost. The question, they said, was whether in committing his alleged crimes he was conducting official business as president — in which case he’s immune — or acting as a private citizen — in which case he’s not. The Supreme Court kicked the case back to a lower court to sort that out.

Former President Donald Trump

Photographer: Hannah Beier/Bloomberg

What happens now?

The court told Tanya Chutkan, the US district judge overseeing the federal election fraud case against Trump, she essentially has to go through much of the conduct alleged in the indictment and determine whether each act was official business or not.

The indictment against Trump brought by Special Counsel Jack Smith does not make a distinction between private and official acts. Trump’s attorney, John Sauer, acknowledged during the April Supreme Court arguments that some alleged actions cited in the indictment sound like private business and could be prosecuted.

What’s this mean for the case?

It’s highly unlikely the case will go to trial much less wrap up before Election Day Nov. 5 so that voters are informed by the outcome. Previously, Chutkan indicated she would give the two sides three months to prepare for a trial that could last two to three months.

If Trump wins reelection and is sworn in as president before the case reaches a verdict, he could order his attorney general to file a court motion to dismiss the prosecution.

Demonstrators outside of the US Supreme Court in Washington, DC, on July 1.

Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg

In an additional blow to the prosecution, the court said Smith couldn’t use evidence of Trump’s official acts in making his case.

The case is one of three prosecutions still hanging over Trump; none of them are likely to be resolved before the presidential election. He was convicted in New York in May on 34 felony counts over over hush-money payments to a porn star; his sentencing is scheduled for July 11.

What are private acts?

In the majority opinion, the Supreme Court said that Trump is immune from prosecution over his interactions with the Justice Department to allegedly pressure states to replace legitimate electors with fraudulent Trump electors, and his threat to replace his acting attorney general, who wouldn’t tell states that the department was investigating election fraud. The court said that those actions fall under the president’s constitutional authority.

The lower court is to determine the nature of a host of other allegations in the indictment, including Trump’s effort to enlist Vice President Mike Pence to alter the election results he was certifying on Jan. 6 when rioters disrupted the proceedings with an assault on the US Capitol.

The Reference Shelf

• Keep up with Trump’s trials using Bloomberg’s tracker.
• Related QuickTakes on the hush money case against Trump and how a reelected Trump could evade prosecutors.
• Bloomberg Opinion’s Noah Feldman explores Jack Smith’s options.

To contact the reporters on this story:
Erik Larson in New York at elarson4@bloomberg.net;
Chris Strohm in Washington at cstrohm1@bloomberg.net;
Greg Stohr in Washington at gstohr@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Elizabeth Wasserman at ewasserman2@bloomberg.net

Lisa Beyer

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