On Monday, the prosecution asked the court to dismiss criminal proceedings who are against the newly elected president Donald Trump led on charges that he tried to forcefully change his defeat in the 2020 elections, reports Reuters.
Prosecutors, who are working with Trump special counsel Jack Smith, cited Trump's return to the White House after winning this year's election and the Justice Department's decades-long policy that sitting presidents should not be criminally charged in their filing. chased.
"This outcome is not based on the merits or strength of the case against the defendant," prosecutors wrote in a motion to the court.
The prosecution also decided to drop its appeal of the decision of a federal judge in Florida to dismiss the criminal case against Trump for illegally retaining classified documents after the end of his first term, Reuters reports, citing court filings.
"A great victory for the rule of law"
Trump's spokesman Stephen Chang said it was a "great victory for the rule of law" and that the federal cases against Trump were "unconstitutional." In a post on social media, Trump called the criminal proceedings "a low point in the history" of the country.
The request represents a major turnaround for the special counsel who succeeded in bringing two indictments against Trump in two separate cases in which he was accused of criminal acts of endangering election integrity and US national security.
In August 2023, Trump pleaded not guilty to four counts of a federal indictment charging him with attempting to obstruct the confirmation of Joe Biden's 2020 election victory.
It was expected that when he assumed the presidency, he would order the Secretariat of Justice to end the proceedings against him for subverting the election, as well as the special prosecutor's attempts to revive another case against the newly elected president for withholding classified documents.
Prosecuting Trump would be a violation of the Constitution
Under Justice Department policy dating back to the 1970s, prosecuting a sitting president would violate the Constitution for undermining the country's leader's capacity to carry out his duties.
Washington District Court Judge Tanya Chatkan has yet to rule on prosecutors' request to dismiss the election tampering case.
Trump's lawyers had previously announced they would seek to dismiss the charges against him, based on a Supreme Court ruling in July that former presidents are immune from prosecution for actions taken in the course of their official duties.
After the decision of the highest court in the country, the special prosecutor tried to save the case by dropping some counts of the indictment, but claimed that the others were not covered by the decision on presidential immunity and that the trial against Trump could be conducted based on them.
Chatkan had to decide whether to dismiss the other counts of the indictment because of the immunity decision.
The election tampering charge against Trump came after Smith's investigation into Trump's attempts to stay in office after his 2020 defeat, culminating in an attack on the Capitol by his supporters in 2021.
Trump has denied the allegations and argued that the judiciary was instrumentalized to damage his presidential campaign, during which he announced that he would fire the special counsel if he won.
Source: Reuters
