Because of the DOJ policy that a sitting president can’t be prosecuted, Special Counsel Jack Smith has moved to dismiss the case against Trump.
From Smith’s filing:
As a result of the election held on November 5, 2024, the defendant, Donald J. Trump, will be inaugurated as President on January 20, 2025. It has long been the position of the Department of Justice that the United States Constitution forbids the federal indictment and subsequent criminal prosecution of a sitting President. But the Department and the country have never faced the circumstance here, where a federal indictment against a private citizen has been returned by a grand jury and a criminal prosecution is already underway when the defendant is elected President.
Confronted with this unprecedented situation, the Special Counsel’s Office consulted with the Department’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), whose interpretation of constitutional questions such as those raised here is binding on Department prosecutors. After careful consideration, the Department has determined that OLC’s prior opinions concerning the Constitution’s prohibition on federal indictment and prosecution of a sitting President apply to this situation and that as a result this prosecution must be dismissed before the defendant is inaugurated.
This is the expected outcome. Trump is an example of what money and political power can do to the justice system. All of those lawyers who populated cable news and social media who professed that the rule of law would take care of Trump and justice would be done, were 100% wrong.
Their faith in the rule of law was religious-like and misguided.
The rule of law bends to money and power, and the court cases against Trump were bound to wither away as soon as it was clear that he would be the nominee. When the Republican Party ignored the rule of law, the door was open for Trump to skate on all charges, and now that a president essentially has immunity from everything, the country will never be in this situation again.
Trump not only got away with it, but he changed presidential immunity forever.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association