A state judge in New York, becoming the first court in the nation to apply the Supreme Court’s historic grant of presidential immunity to criminal prosecution, ruled on Monday night that Donald Trump cannot apply that ruling to his 34 guilty verdicts, reached by a Manhattan jury last May.
In a 41-page opinion, Judge Juan M. Merchan rejected all parts of a broad immunity claim by Trump’s lawyers, thus upholding the unanimous jury verdicts on all charges growing out of his attempt to keep the voting public in 2016 from learning about his role in a sex scandal with an adult film star. He won that election.
In a separate ruling, the only action having anything to do with Trump’s new election to the Presidency on November 5, Judge Merchan decided that immunity does not protect Trump in the role of President-elect, thus taking effect only when he enters office on January 20.
Although Monday’s rulings were severe setbacks for Trump’s attempt to overcome the only convictions he has faced in four criminal cases, they did not complete all of the disputes that Judge Merchan must yet resolve – presumably, before Trump’s team could try to challenge the verdicts by appealing to higher courts.
The judge has yet to rule on an even broader immunity claim that Trump’s attorneys filed early this month, has yet to rule on a post-trial claim by those attorneys that jurors engaged in misconduct at the trial, and has yet to decide what sentence to impose on Trump – if any – for the New York convictions.
The immunity plea that the judge rejected on Monday had been filed on the same day, July 1, that the Supreme Court created an entirely new form of constitutional immunity, for Presidents and ex-Presidents, to prosecutions for committing crimes. The immunity is complete if the crimes involved actions at the core of official presidential duties, is less protective for actions that are official but outside the core of duties, and are not protected at all against crimes based on unofficial actions.
Monday’s decisions by the judge were focused on Trump’s claims to immunity for what had occurred at his actual trial in New York, and on his claims of immunity in the initial filing of the charges against him. The immunity plea not yet decided is even more sweeping in scope than the one decided Monday, interpreting the Supreme Court decision far more expansively and with strong reliance on the constitutional superiority of national over state law.
In Judge Merchan’s specific rulings Monday, he did the following:
1. Rejected any new claim of immunity to apply to Trump before he officially takes the oath of office at his inauguration next month.
2. Ruled that some of Trump’s social media posts on Twitter during the 2016 campaign might have involved official acts, but it was “harmless error” to put them before the jury.
3. Ruled that some of the testimony at trial of former White House aide Hope Hicks might have involved official actions, but, again, found that their use was “harmless.”
4. Decided that, whether any evidence was potentially immunized, there was such other evidence – “overwhelming” in scope – that the effect on the jury was not legally significant.
5. Ruled that the vast majority of the evidence used by prosecutors involved only unofficial actions by Trump, in his private and personal role as a candidate during the 2016 campaign.
The fact that Judge Merchan’s ruling went as far as it did, however, does not settle the remaining claims that Trump’s team still has pending. Until those are decided, Trump’s lawyers probably do not yet have the option of appealing Monday’s results.