Special Counsel Jack Smith went after Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and urged Judge Cannon to ignore his scathing concurring opinion on special counsels.
Earlier this month Judge Aileen Cannon granted Trump’s motion to pause some pre-trial deadlines in Jack Smith’s classified documents case following the Supreme Court’s ruling on presidential immunity.
The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that Trump has absolute immunity for his core Constitutional powers.
Former presidents are entitled to at least a presumption of immunity for their official acts, the high court ruled.
The Supreme Court ruled there is no immunity for unofficial acts.
Trump’s attorneys previously asked Judge Cannon to pause the classified documents case and reconsider two motions to dismiss after the Supreme Court’s decision on presidential immunity.
Trump’s attorneys argued the Supreme Court’s ruling “guts the [special counsel’s] position that President Trump has ‘no immunity’ and further demonstrates the politically-motivated nature of their contention that the motion is ‘frivolous.’”
Citing Justice Clarence Thomas’s concurring opinion, President Trump’s lawyers asked Cannon to reconsider the motion to dismiss based on the argument that Jack Smith was unlawfully appointed.
Recall that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas questioned Jack Smith’s authority as special counsel in his concurring opinion on the high court’s presidential immunity ruling.
Clarence Thomas questioned Jack Smith’s authority because he was a private citizen when he was tapped as a special prosecutor.
Justice Thomas also argued that Jack Smith is not Senate-confirmed (Trump’s lawyers also used this argument before Judge Cannon).
Judge Cannon granted a temporary stay on two deadlines – a July 8 deadline for expert disclosures and a July 10 deadline related to CIPA litigation.
Special Counsel Jack Smith agreed to a briefing on the Supreme Court’s immunity decision, however, he demanded Judge Cannon ignore Clarence Thomas’s concurring opinion blasting his unlawful appointment.
“That single-Justice concurrence —addressing an issue that Trump did not raise that the parties did not brief, and that was not relevant to the question presented to, or decided by, the Court—neither binds this Court nor provides a sound basis to deviate from the uniform conclusion of all courts to have considered the issue that the Attorney General is statutorily authorized to appoint a Special Counsel,” Jack Smith’s prosecutors wrote in a Friday night motion reviewed by The Gateway Pundit.
