Jack Smith is a legal maestro playing in an orchestra of the willfully tone deaf. He’s helming two major cases, major in both a legal and historical sense. Yesterday he filed a formal appeal to Judge Aileen Cannon’s dismissal of the classified documents case. Today, a new superseding indictment in the January 6 insurrection case was just returned against Donald Trump. That means (in the words of Georgia constitutional law professor Anthony Michael Kreis,) “The superseding indictment is the Special Counsel’s attempt to adhere to the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity decision without showing the prosecution’s cards in an evidentiary hearing a/k/a a mini trial. Jack Smith is working to preserve his case and move expeditiously.” I cannot overstate my admiration for Jack Smith handling both of these complex and crucial cases. I think we are going to see some legal virtuosity here and at the end of the day it should result in a prison sentence for one criminal named Donald J. Trump.
Here’s a link to Court Listener where the document is stored. The legal world is reacting and here’s what they say at first blush.
“On a quick read, I believe this is aimed at bringing the indictment into more conformity with the Supreme Court’s decision in Trump v. US — essentially by removing the bits in the previous indictment about corrupting the DOJ, which SCOTUS said were absolutely immune,” wrote attorney Luppe B. Luppen, known on X as @nycsouthpaw.
“Smart,” wrote national security lawyer Bradley Moss. “All of this would arguably be inadmissible now under the SCOTUS ruling. No reason to bother keeping it in.”
“Jack Smith is not going anywhere,” wrote former federal prosecutor Barbara McQuade. “Here is his just-filed superseding indictment against Trump in election interference case, conforming the allegations to SCOTUS’s immunity decision.”
“Jack Smith has officially filed a superseding indictment in Washington, D.C. clearing the way for the criminal charges against Trump to move forward in lieu of the recent Supreme Court decision,” wrote lawyer and Democratic activist Aaron Parnas. “The Special Counsel is not messing around.”
“The superseding indictment returned today in Washington reflects an effort by prosecutors to remove portions of the original indictment that would be immune from prosecution under the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity ruling,” wrote Lawfare’s Anna Bower.
Meanwhile, Georgia State University constitutional law professor Anthony Michael Kreis believes Smith’s new indictment could have impacts on another of the criminal cases against Trump.
“The Special Counsel’s superseding indictment disproportionately relies on Trump’s actions in Georgia for evidence of unlawful conspiracies as conduct that falls outside the scope of presidential immunity, emphasizing his status as a candidate,” he wrote. “This will be an important roadmap for Judge McAfee whenever the case returns to Fulton County Superior Court and similar rulings on presidential immunity and Supremacy Clause matters have to be decided.”
These cases are moving and Trump world is not glad. While Trump sells his digital trading cards and grifts madly, stories break right and left about his criminal cases, which are not going away. Trump remains the only presidential candidate in history to run for office, let alone a second term, as a convicted felon with three other criminal cases pending.
Jack Smith is not going to let up. He’s going to do his job. This situation is already wildly out of hand because the defendant, Trump, could have done some kind of a plea bargaining at some point but that would have involved an admission of guilt. And he’s constitutionally incapable of admitting any wrong.
So Trump has cast the dye for his own doom. And Jack Smith and Fate will be only too happy to deliver.
OK, this is nitpicking. it’s die, the singular of dice my ba in English makes me overly sensitive to these things. I attribute my own spelling, grammatical and punctuation issues to typing these things on a phone.
I can’t wait for Jack Smith to become a judge, and be promoted to the new, enlarged SCOTUS.
It’s been quite a while since someone who is truly intelligent and capable was nominated to it.
C’mon, let Mr. Smith complete his current and well performed day job first, please, before you promote him to other positions. He is doing superb work.
For all those gnashing-teeth anti-Garland monsters out there: Due to trumpie’s delays, not Attorney Garland’s, the cases have not reached trial just yet. However, the next best thing, thanks to trumpie’s abject stupidity in his inability to plan ahead and look at a fu*king calendar, ALL of the charges are now being REHASHED IN PUBLIC during the hmm you guessed – ELECTION SEASON. Oh, goodie!!!
While it would be great to have him behind bars already, this is about the bestest next best thing we could hope for. Instead of newspapers occasionally reminding us of his crimes, in opinion columns, we get the HEADLINES back along with detailed background articles. You know, for those goobers who weren’t paying attention for the last eight years.
And, more importantly, for those 20 million or so NEW VOTERS.
I’d say: Good Timing Mt. Smith.
Continuity may have forgotten about Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, a Biden appointment and well-worth her position.
I believe whole-heartedly, that Trump’s wind down to self-ignition and flame-out in public , has reached the most dangerous tipping point he has ever had before …
His rhetoric started years ago, BS on a giant scale, blowing every dollar he got from his Dad, should have been shown to the public as his non-business-worthy mental problem …
He was always a taker, NEVER a giver, he could have started out by using some of his stash from his dad to promote his image as a man of intelligence and generosity, instead he has burned virtually every bridge he built, ending in botched deals and every bank in town closing and locking their doors when he showed up …
If it was not so obvious, he could have dodged so much of his current woes by actually paying for people’s time and materials, NOT moving into massive losing propositions, way ahead of his financial stability … Now, it’s all gone, the huge money gifts from billionaires that don’t want to buy tickets at the racetrack for a dead horse to win …
Poor wittle Trumppy, should have gone to a real school experience, actually done his homework, like millions of other kids at every level of income and family living …
Now, it’s a miracle he has made it this far, he cannot read, or does not comprehend words with more than 6 letters in them, he’s living in his own mindless world of stupidity, like someone latched him into a hyper-baric chamber and forgot to get him out, he has no input/output channels, all his whining is a sign and cover for his next BIG thing which is dead in the water, even as he blurts out some outrageous nonsense, that is building a huge sinkhole under his properties and places he feels like, “HOME”, news for him …
Home away from home is becoming Jack Smith’s daily dozen exercises for Trump’s benefit, Trump obviously knows this and cannot really believe he won’t be flattened by KAMALA”S wit and knowledge surpassing his by miles and kilometers, Trump probably has no idea what miles and kilometers are, but he thinks it is so cool to plan for space domination, while taking credit for Obama’s portion of the wall on our southern border …
Trump is toast already, and if he DOES continue his ways, his toast may burn badly …
North…Jack is doing his job but to say those of us critical of Garland are ‘monsters, is way the phuck off base. Garland waited almost two phucking years AFTER THE CRIME, to get jack on the case. HE IS the reason it started so late, and the main reason it hasn’t gone to trial or will until after the election.
Hey, I’m sure North was calling things like he (she?) saw them.
Don’t want to be called a “monster,” don’t act like one. As I kept pointing out to all of you Garland haters, if had ACTUAL SOLID EVIDENCE that you could offer–beyond your “feelings” and “beliefs”–then you were obligated, even duty-bound, to provide that evidence.
But, no. It was easier to bitch and whine and moan that Garland wasn’t moving fast enough for your liking.
Remember that “everyone” knew Al Capone was a killer, that he orchestrated the deaths of hundreds (possibly thousands) of people during his career, but NO ONE could actually PROVE his complicity. Tax evasion, on the other hand, proved far easier and that was what got him behind bars.
So, if what I read from Mr Luppen is accurate, then the Supreme Court effectively ruled that Trump had, indeed, “weaponized” the DOJ during his term in office. And that it was perfectly okay.
I mean, what else could be meant by “essentially by removing the bits in the previous indictment about corrupting the DOJ, which SCOTUS said were absolutely immune,”
Oh, I’m sure the Supreme Court in its actual decision didn’t come out and put it in those “exact words” but the paraphrase should be more than enough to knock the winds out of any argument that Trump is somehow the “victim” of a “corrupt DOJ.”
Special Council Mr. Jack Smith is a triathlon athlete. He had knee surgery so I’m not so sure he could have been brought in back then.