(NewsInsights.org) – Legal cases brought against former President Donald Trump have raised unique legal questions concerning the Constitution and the principle of presidential immunity. Legal scholars, including Alan Dershowitz, a retired Harvard law professor specializing in Constitutional law, weighed in on the issues after two recent rulings by federal judges. In an exclusive interview, Dershowitz defended Trump’s bid for the immunity defense.
The Harvard professor emeritus told Newsmax host Chris Salcedo that Judge Tanya Chutkan’s dismissal of Trump’s immunity claims in her recent ruling set “a terrible precedent,” in a recent interview. In essence, Chutkan held Trump’s immunity from criminal prosecution expired when his term as president ended in her ruling on whether Trump and his attorneys could apply the claim as a defense against the Justice Department’s (DOJ’s) indictment alleging that he tried to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
In another opinion issued by a three-judge panel from the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, Chief Judge Sri Srinivasan wrote that the court dismissed Trump’s motion to dismiss Blassingame v. Trump, a set of lawsuits brought by law enforcement officers and Congressional staffers for harm suffered resulting from the January 6, 2021, Capitol Hill riot. Trump claimed “official-act immunity” for his actions on and before the fateful day.
Yet, Srinivasan wrote, “The President, though, does not spend every minute of
every day exercising official responsibilities.” He cited examples, such as when presidents act as office-seekers in presidential campaigns or speak at rallies as candidates rather than as elected officials. He wrote the court held that a president acting “outside the functions of his office” no longer enjoyed “immunity from damages liability” because of his presidential office. Without ruling on the case’s merits, the three-judge panel held the case could move forward.
However, Dershowitz argued, “The president has no private life.” He claimed all actions a sitting president takes fall under the “outer perimeter” of the immunity rule. Chutkan’s opinion didn’t necessarily dispute his interpretation for sitting presidents, but she held that past presidents don’t enjoy the same immunity after their terms end, that only one sitting president at a time enjoys immunity, and that the “position does not confer a lifelong get-out-of-jail-free pass.”
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