The defendant asserts that he is immune from prosecution for his criminal scheme to overturn the 2020 presidential election because, he claims, it entailed official conduct. Not so. Although the defendant was the incumbent President during the charged conspiracies, his scheme was fundamentally a private one. Working with a team of private co-conspirators, the defendant acted as a candidate when he pursued multiple criminal means to disrupt, through fraud and deceit, the government function by which votes are collected and counted -- a function in which the defendant, as President, had no official role. In Trump v. United States, 144 S. Ct. 2312 (2024), the Supreme Court held that presidents are immune from prosecution for certain official conduct -- including the defendant’s use of the Justice Department in furtherance of his scheme, as was alleged in the original indictment -- and remanded to this Court to determine whether the remaining allegations against the defendant are immunized. The answer to that question is no.
-- Special Counsel Jack Smith, in the opening paragraph of his 165-page filing in United States of America v Donald J. Trump, 2 October 2024
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