Favorite in the polls for the 2024 US elections, Donald Trump could see his bid for the White House stopped by the US Supreme Court. For the first time since the famous legal tussle of 2000 that brought George Bush to the White House, the supreme judges find themselves having a crucial role in the outcome of presidential elections. And if in December 24 years ago the Court, with a 5-4 majority vote, decided to block the recount in Florida, thus giving the Republican victory over Al Gore, in this case the supreme judges are called to intervene on the same possibility that Trump could participate in the elections.
Today the hearing on ineligibility
In fact, there is great anticipation for the hearing in which today, February 8, the Supreme Court will hear arguments regarding the possibility that the former president will be considered ineligible due to his role “in the insurrection” of January 6, 2021, when his supporters stormed Congress to prevent the official certification of Joe Biden's victory.
Trump has appealed the ruling of the Colorado Supreme Court which accepted the arguments of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (Crew), a group that presented the case against Trump's eligibility in several states, dusting off section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which bars public officials who have participated in “insurrection or rebellion” from running for office again.
Passed after the Civil War in 1868 to prevent former Confederate leaders from running for office, the section was never enforced again for more than a century. But this does not mean that its provisions are unclear and automatically disqualify those who have participated in an insurrection, say supporters of the legal initiative to ban Trump from the elections. And in doing so they play on the legal terrain of originalism, that is, the literal interpretation of the original text of the Constitution, dear to several of the judges who form the conservative majority – 6 against 3 – of the Court, which for this formation is considered in principle inclined to a decision favorable to the tycoon.
The issue of immunity and processes
The Supreme Court will then be called to express its opinion on another case that could be crucial for the future of Trump's candidacy, that of the immunity that he invokes from the accusations that were formulated against him by special prosecutor Jack Smith for the attempts to overthrow the 2020 election results, culminating in the assault on Congress. The three judges of the Washington Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday in fact ruled unanimously that the former president's request is unfounded.
“As to this criminal case, President Trump has become Citizen Trump, with all the defenses of any other defendant, but none of the executive immunity that could protect him when he was president now protects him from prosecution,” reads the ruling against which Trump has already announced the appeal also with the aim of further postponing the start of the trial, after the date that had been set for March 4, the day before Super Tuesday, was suspended.
In recent days, important decisions are expected on other of the many judicial fronts open for Trump, namely the ruling by Judge Arthur Engoron regarding the amount of damages that the tycoon and his Trump Organization will have to pay for having defrauded the state of New York by manipulating the value of their assets to have tax, insurance and banking advantages. In the civil trial, the New York prosecutor's office asked for 370 million dollars. The judge will then have to decide whether and to what extent to prohibit Trump, his children and his company from continuing to do business in New York, a decision that could seriously jeopardize the stability of his financial and real estate empire.
News, and this time favorable to Trump, have also been recorded in recent days regarding the criminal trial in Georgia in which the former president faces 13 charges for trying to subvert the election results. Four of his 18 co-defendants have already pleaded guilty. But the future of the trial is now put in doubt by the scandal that erupted after it emerged that the district attorney who handled the case, Fani Willis, is having an affair with a lawyer she called to work on Trump's case.
After weeks of allegations of conflict of interest and other improper actions, Willis in recent days admitted to the affair with prosecutor Nathan Wade, but denied any improper behavior and called requests that the case be taken off her “baseless.” Now it is up to the judge to decide how to proceed.
The start of the other federal trial instructed by special prosecutor Smith is set for May 20th, the one in which Trump must answer to 40 charges for having taken away dozens of classified documents from the White House, hiding them in Mar a Lago and opposing the government's various attempts to get them back, up to the famous FBI raid on the former president's residence.
Finally, there is another criminal trial awaiting Trump. the one, which is scheduled to begin on March 25, in which he must answer to 34 charges before a New York judge in connection with the affair of the money he made to pay the porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016 to pay for her silence about an extramarital affair she had with the tycoon.
For legal experts, this is the weakest case against Trump, but with the postponement of the trial in Washington over election interference, it will most likely be the first of four criminal trials against him to begin, if confirmed on February 15th. the opening hearing for the end of March.
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