Special counsel Jack Smith told a federal judge Wednesday that a recent Supreme Court ruling limiting the scope of an obstruction charge used in Jan. 6 cases does not apply to former President Donald Trump’s election subversion case, arguing the justices “did not invalidate” the statute being used against Trump.
Smith argued the obstruction counts of the superseding indictment should be sustained because Trump is accused of creating false evidence in a plan to insert alternate electors into the certification process, unlike in the Fischer v. United States case involving a Jan. 6 rioter who succeeded in getting the obstruction charge invalidated at the Supreme Court. Trump said in an Oct. 3 filing that the entire case should be thrown out and has called Smith’s continued prosecution of him in the final weeks before the election a form of interference.
“[Trump] and his co-conspirators sought to create and use false evidence — fraudulent electoral certificates — as a means of obstructing the certification proceeding, which Fischer expressly held falls within Section 1512(c)(2),” Smith wrote in a nine-page filing, referring to the decision from the last Supreme Court term that narrowed the scope of the federal statute.
The filing comes one day before a deadline set by U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who has repeatedly ruled against Trump during pretrial proceedings, to respond to the former president’s previous argument that a pair of recent high court decisions should invalidate the entire four-count criminal case. Trump faces multiple charges related to his alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election, including conspiracy to defraud the United States and obstruction.
Smith and Chutkan have been met with criticism for the release of a massive amount of evidence against Trump in the month before the election, while key questions about the legality of the underlying charges remain unanswered.
According to the special counsel, Trump’s alleged actions involved more than just the obstruction of physical documents. They were part of a broader plan to corrupt the certification of the 2020 election results.
Smith further pointed to Trump’s pressure campaign against former Vice President Mike Pence. Smith emphasized that the link between Trump’s actions and his effort to obstruct the election certification proceeding is crucial to upholding the charges against him.
Earlier this year, the Supreme Court had ruled that obstruction charges, which can carry a maximum of 20 years in prison, could only stand if direct actions such as impairing physical documents were involved. The ruling resulted in Justice Department revisions in more than 100 cases against Jan. 6 defendants, though many still face months and years in prison.
Trump’s legal team is using this ruling in their argument to dismiss the charges, as well as a July 1 decision in Trump v. United States that found former presidents are entitled to some immunity from prosecution over actions they took while in office.
Smith also dismissed Trump’s claims of presidential immunity as irrelevant to the case, stating they should be addressed in separate filings.
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Chutkan will soon consider whether the Supreme Court ruling affects the charges against Trump, a decision that could have significant implications for the former president’s legal battles. Before the case can head to trial, legal experts have said Trump could appeal any of her decisions regarding immunity one more time to the high court to check whether her analysis conforms to the new standard the justices set.
Trump’s renewed motion to dismiss the case based on his immunity argument is due by the end of the day Thursday.