Welcome back, Deadline: Legal Newsletter readers. It was an epic week in legal history, centered on two cases that stem from the same poisonous root: a president who tried to overturn an election loss.
On immunity, former President Donald Trump doesn’t have it in the federal election interference case. The D.C. Circuit panel finally confirmed that on Tuesday in a thorough, unanimous ruling. “For the purpose of this criminal case, former President Trump has become citizen Trump, with all of the defenses of any other criminal defendant,” the judges wrote. The defendant has vowed to appeal, as is his right.
But the clock is ticking while the trial is on hold pending resolution of the immunity claim. The D.C. Circuit gave Trump until Monday to ask the Supreme Court to keep the case paused while he appeals to the justices. It would be shocking for even this Supreme Court to reverse the circuit’s solid ruling. But if the high court doesn’t quickly reject Trump’s gambit, he may be able to delay long enough to retake the White House and quash the case.
Meanwhile, the justices sounded ready to let him run for president again despite the 14th Amendment’s ban on insurrectionists. Oral argument in Trump v. Anderson on Thursday displayed the justices’ discomfort with the idea of disqualifying him. Chief Justice John Roberts, for example, worried aloud that upholding the Colorado decision would prompt reprisals in other states against Democrats. Of course, that’s irrelevant to the question of what the Constitution demands. But all signs from the hearing point to reversal — now, the justices just have to funnel their unease into legal language to make it official.
Another big decision we’re still waiting on is in the $370 million civil fraud case in New York. Judge Arthur Engoron added a wrinkle this week when he asked the parties for any information they have about former Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg, one of Trump’s civil co-defendants,…
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