Attorneys for former President Donald Trump ripped special counsel Jack Smith over an emergency filing with the U.S. Supreme Court that goes around an appeal that they filed in Trump’s Jan. 6 case.
Smith filed a motion on Monday seeking a quick resolution from the nation’s highest court, asking justices to determine whether Trump has immunity from being prosecuted, which led Trump’s team to label his action “election interference.”
The Supreme Court has agreed to promptly review Smith’s petition, allowing Trump until December 20 to submit a response.
“Crooked Joe Biden’s henchman, Deranged Jack Smith, is so obsessed with interfering in the 2024 Presidential Election to prevent President Trump from retaking the Oval Office, as the President is poised to do, that Smith is willing to try for a Hail Mary by racing to the Supreme Court and attempting to bypass the appellate process,” a Trump spokesperson said of the filing.
The statement also alluded to Smith’s supervision of the Department of Justice’s public integrity unit, which successfully obtained a bribery and extortion conviction against former Virginia Republican Governor Bob McDonnell in a gift case, noting that it was so poorly prosecuted that the Supreme Court ultimately overturned the conviction with an 8-0 decision in 2016.
“Deranged may need to be reminded that the Supreme Court has not been kind to him, including by handing down a rare unanimous rebuke when the Court overturned him 8-0 in the McDonnell case,” the spokesperson added.
Following the district court judge’s dismissal of Trump’s immunity claims last week, the former president’s legal team promptly filed an appeal, seeking a temporary halt in the court proceedings.
Smith’s legal team subsequently petitioned the nation’s highest court on Monday to examine the question of immunity before a D.C.-based federal appeals court could make a ruling on the issue. They argued that there is precedent from the Nixon Watergate tapes case in the early 1970s.
Smith’s team acknowledged this was an “extraordinary request” in an “extraordinary case,” adding: “It is of imperative public importance that respondent’s claims of immunity be resolved by this Court and that respondent’s trial proceed as promptly as possible if his claim of immunity is rejected.”
