Trump’s DC Election Felony Case Back to Judge Tanya Chutkan!
Trump’s DC Election Felony Case Back to Judge Tanya Chutkan!
Oh yeah, that old thing!
The Supreme Court’s conservative majority did Donald Trump as many solids as it possibly could in his DC election interference case, the one where he’s charged in federal court with doing four felonies with five co-conspirators to try to overturn that 2020 election he lost.
They put the case on ice for nearly eight months, first declining in December 2023 to take it up before the US Circuit Court of Appeals for DC weighed in. Then after the Court of Appeals said no, Trump can’t legally send Seal Team 6 to strangle Joe Biden in his bed with some piano wire, SCOTUS decided to take the case back up, after all. Then they ass-dragged five more months, and on July 1, the last possible day, they announced that actually, Trump could do that, as long as he did it very officially with the help of federal officials.
And to make extra double sure that Trump couldn’t get LOCK HIM UP-PED before November — like 1,265 other January 6-related miscreants have been so far — SCOTUS held onto the case for the entire past month, because of tradition, or something.
But finally, last week, SCOTUS sent it back to the US Circuit Court of Appeals for DC. And Friday, the appeals court poked it back down the hill to Judge Tanya S. Chutkan, to hold evidentiary hearings and see if the special counsel can make any kind of Manwich out of the now-mangled corpse.
Judge Chutkan has already directed the parties to file a joint status report by August 9, that’s this Friday. And she set a date to set some dates for a court schedule on August 16. What will be left? We shall see! Might a trial start before November 5? Not impossible! Could Trump get elected, convicted and locked up before his inauguration? All seems very unlikely, but not impossible! That would sure be wild.
But first, Judge Chutkan needs to get through the game of Twister that the Roberts court has been spinning here, to figure out what’s Special Official Executive Conduct and what’s not.
No one is above the law for unofficial acts, decided the court. Buuuut, anything the president communicates to anyone in the federal government is automatically official, even if Trump and Mark Meadows were talking about holding up a liquor store. You can’t question a president’s motives, or admit any “testimony or private records of the President or his advisers probing such conduct.” Courts just have to presume whatever Trump was doing with officials was, like, official. And courts can’t use official acts as proof of unofficial conduct. So Judge Chutkan must now hold an evidentiary hearing, Roberts said, and try to untangle exactly what SCOTUS meant by all that, and what evidence is left.
And, in a different case, US v. Fischer, the Roberts court limited the scope of the federal obstruction statute used to charge Trump and about 52 other insurrectionists. It’s not obstruction of an official proceeding if a defendant doesn’t touch documents, or something. But could those fake elector documents count? Maybe!
A lot of uncertainty. But still, the case is back, baby!
And Judge Chutkan is clearly not here to let Trump’s lawyers, led by that crying little shit Todd Blanche, derail the schedule or get the case tossed with some bullshit motions. Within 24 hours over the weekend (because unlike SCOTUS, Judge Chutkan works in the summer and on weekends) she received and rejected the first one he had to fling at her, some selective prosecution fantasyland bullshit that he’d pasted together from out-of-context quotes from the newspapers.
When might all this get going? And end? And what’s left? In just a few weeks, we will find out!
For lawyers to have time to prepare, it can’t start sooner than 30 days, by federal law. And before SCOTUS stuck a wrench in it by demanding immunity hearings, prosecutors estimated it would take four to six weeks. There won’t be a verdict before November, no matter what.
Buuut, that still leaves the small-but-not zero possibility that Trump wins the election, then the trial ends before inauguration, and he gets locked up immediately, like the other January 6ers did. Then what? He leaves JD Vance in charge and pardons himself from prison? That would be wild!
But first, prosecutors will have to redo the case without being able to use federal officials. No Mike Pence, Mark Meadows, Hope Hicks, Jeff Clark, etc. They’re all now off the table, along with all those other things.
But, that still leaves everybody else. Only one of the six un-named co-conspirators in Trump’s DC indictment is listed as a government official. Four are described as attorneys, and one as a political consultant. Could Trump’s illegal dealings with personal lawyers possibly be an official act? And how about if two of these people happen to be, say, Sidney Powell and Ken Cheseboro, who’ve already pleaded guilty in Georgia? And what about the fake electors? What about Trump’s call to state officials, such as Georgia’s Brad Raffensperger, in which Trump begged for 11,780 votes to be found? Now Judge Chutkan gets to decide just how “official” all that was!
Regardless of the schedule, Trump can’t go appealing back to SCOTUS until this case is all done. Todd Blanche can spam Judge Chutkan with a million bullshit motions, and surely he will. But it all just puts Trump’s treasonous ways back in the headlines, and right around the election, too.
Finally, there’s also the not-zero possibility that Trump refuses to abide by the gag order in this case, as is his way, and gets himself locked up for that. It’s not likely, as no judge wants to do that. It would be better for everyone if a jury did the lock-him-upping. But Trump sure can’t shut himself up, and seems determined to push his luck. If he really thinks being locked up before the election would actually help his chances, as he bragged in the New York case, he could work himself into a lather of being so outrageously threatening towards witnesses or a jury that Judge Chutkan gets to the point she feels she has no choice.
None of this is good for Trump!
It could’ve been a lot worse for Trump, if SCOTUS hadn’t lifted him up with its holy hands. The case could’ve started in March like it was supposed to, and he could’ve been locked up right now. Infuriating. But the case is not gone, and there’s nothing good for him about any of this. While Kamala Harris heads into the fall on a tide of momentum, Trump heads in with his sentencing in New York on September 18, plus all of this mess.
Womp womp!
Ta, Marcie. While I believe that POS will never spend a day behind bars, I can dream, can't I?
Chump in court is my favorite Chump.