Former President Donald Trump walks out of court after the first day of jury selection in Manhattan Criminal Court on April 15, 2024 in New York. Image Credit: Reuters
The Supreme Court on April 16 is taking up the first of two cases that could affect the criminal prosecution of former President Donald Trump in his efforts to overturn his 2020 election defeat. Hundreds of charges stemming from the capital riots are also at stake.
The justices are hearing arguments on charges of obstructing an official hearing. According to the Justice Department, 330 people have been charged in that case, stemming from a law enacted after the Enron financial scandal two decades ago. The court will consider whether it can be used against those who obstructed Congressional certification of Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential election victory against Mr. Trump.
The former president and potential nominee for the 2024 Republican nomination is facing two charges in a case brought by special counsel Jack Smith in Washington that could be knocked out with a favorable ruling from the nation’s highest court. Next week, the judge will hear arguments on whether he has “absolute immunity” from prosecution in the case, a proposal that has so far been rejected by two lower courts.
The first former US president to face impeachment, Mr Trump is on trial in New York on money charges and accused of election interference in Georgia and mishandling of classified documents in Florida.
In Tuesday’s case, the court is hearing the appeal of former Pennsylvania police officer Joseph Fisher, who was indicted on seven counts, including obstruction, for his actions when a group of Mr Trump’s supporters attacked him on January 6, 2021. Capitol to keep Mr. Biden, a Democrat, from taking the White House. Lawyers for Mr. Fisher argue that the charge does not cover his conduct.
The obstruction charge, which carries up to 20 years behind bars, is one of the most widely used felony charges brought in a massive federal prosecution since the deadly coup.
Explained US House Select Committee Report on the January 6 Capitol Attack
About 170 Jan. Six defendants, including two right-wing extremist groups, Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, were convicted of obstructing or conspiring to obstruct a joint session of Congress on January 6. Several defendants have had their sentences delayed until the justices rule on the matter.
Some rioters have won early release from prison, but appeals are pending over concerns that if the Supreme Court rules against the Justice Department they could serve longer than they should have. Kevin Seyfried, a Delaware man who threatened a black police officer with a pole attached to a Confederate battle flag during the storming of the Capitol. Seyfried was sentenced last year to three years behind bars, but a judge recently ordered him released on a one-year prison sentence pending a Supreme Court ruling.
The High Court case will focus on whether the anticipatory provision of a law enacted in 2002 in response to the financial scandal that brought down Enron Corp. can be used against the Jan. 6 defendants.
Mr. Fisher’s lawyers argue that the provision is intended to close a loophole in the criminal law and discourage the destruction of records in response to an investigation. Until the capital riots, he told the court, every criminal case using the provision involved charges of destroying or manipulating records.
But the administration says the other side is reading the law too narrowly, arguing that it “serves as a catchall offense designed to ensure the full scope of all forms of corrupt obstruction of official process.” Fisher’s “accused of violently joining” the riot to disrupt a joint session of Congress certifying the presidential election results. Mr. Smith argued separately in the immunity case that obstruction charges against Mr. Trump would remain valid regardless of the outcome of Mr. Fisher’s case.
Most lower court judges who weighed in allowed the charge to stand. In them, Trump-appointed US District Judge Dabney Friedrich wrote that “the laws reach far beyond the principal evil that animated them.” But US District Judge Carl Nichols, another Trump appointee, dismissed the charges against Fisher and two other defendants, writing that prosecutors went too far. A divided panel of a federal appeals court in Washington reinstated the charge before the Supreme Court agreed to take the case.
Although not important to the Supreme Court case, the two sides present starkly different accounts of Mr. Fisher’s actions on January 6. Mr. Fisher’s lawyers say he was “not part of the mob” that forced lawmakers to flee the House and Senate. Chambers, after Congress retreated, entered the Capitol. The weight of the crowd pushed Mr. Fisher into the line of police, he said in court filings.
Sen. of Arkansas. TOM COTTON AND REPRESENTATIVES FROM OHIO. Jim Jordan, Colorado’s Lauren Bobert, Florida’s Matt Gaetz and Georgia’s Marjorie Taylor Green are among 23 Republican members of Congress, saying the use of obstruction of justice “presents an intolerable risk. Politicized prosecutions. Only this court’s clear condemnation will stop the madness.” In the video, Mr. The Justice Department said before he pushed through the crowd and “crashed the police line.” He wrote that things could turn violent after the riot and social media posts sent by Mr. Fisher before Jan. 6. More than 1,350 people have been charged with federal riot-related crimes, of which roughly 1,000 have pleaded guilty or been found guilty by a jury or jury, prosecutors said.