Jack Smith urges Supreme Court to reject Trump’s bid to delay Jan. 6 trial

Special counsel Jack Smith quickly voiced opposition to former President Trump’s request for the Supreme Court to delay his federal election subversion trial by freezing a ruling that rejected Trump’s immunity claims.

Earlier this week, Trump filed an emergency motion with the high court asking it to keep his trial proceedings on hold as Trump continues appealing.

In a 40-page response filed days before his deadline, Smith’s team on Wednesday urged the justices to reject Trump’s request and allow the trial to move ahead.

“Delay in the resolution of these charges threatens to frustrate the public interest in a speedy and fair verdict — a compelling interest in every criminal case and one that has unique national importance here, as it involves federal criminal charges against a former President for alleged criminal efforts to overturn the results of the Presidential election, including through the use of official power,” prosecutors wrote.

Smith’s request reflects the need for speed in Trump’s election interference trial, with the March 4 trial date held in abeyance until the court settles whether he enjoys any immunity from criminal charges as a former president.

If the Supreme Court is inclined to review Trump’s immunity claims, Smith urged the justices to take up the matter now, expedite the case and set it for argument in March.

That timeline would lead to a decision by the summer, if not earlier, potentially enabling Trump to go to trial before the general election, if the case does move forward. 

“An expedited schedule would permit the Court to issue its opinion and judgment resolving the threshold immunity issue as promptly as possible this Term, so that, if the Court rejects applicant’s immunity claim, a timely and fair trial can begin with minimal additional delay,” Smith’s office wrote in the filing.

Both the judge overseeing the case and an appeals court have determined he does not have immunity.

“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 panel for the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals wrote in its 57-page decision earlier this month.

“We cannot accept that the office of the Presidency places its former occupants above the law for all time thereafter. Careful evaluation of these concerns leads us to conclude that there is no functional justification for immunizing former Presidents from federal prosecution in general or for immunizing former President Trump from the specific charges in the Indictment.”

Trump has yet to formally ask the high court to take up the case itself, a move expected in a later filing.

But should the court accept the case, it would mean further delay before the other proceedings in the case can continue. U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan has largely stopped any additional filings in the case, writing earlier that she would punt the March 4 trial to accommodate the delays. 

Trump is charged in the case with four federal felonies that accuse him of conspiring to subvert the 2020 presidential election results. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges and those brought against him in three separate criminal cases.