US prosecutors have issued reviewed charges against former President Donald Trump for his alleged efforts to interfere in the 2020 election after his loss to Joe Biden.
The charges follow a US Supreme Court ruling last month that presidents have broad immunity from prosecution for official acts committed while in office.
The revised indictment sets out the same four counts against Trump — which he denies — but now they relate to his status as a political candidate rather than a sitting president.
The 2020 election interference case, and other criminal cases facing the Republican candidate, are not likely to come to court before the election on November 5 of this year
In addition to denying the allegations of election meddling, Trump backed his claim — without evidence — that there was widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election.
The revised indictment, presented by the Special Counsel of the Department of Justice, Jack Smith, leaves in place the four crimes that Trump is charged with: conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, attempted obstruction of an official process and conspiracy against rights.
Donald Trump has already pleaded not guilty to all charges.
The former president’s personal lawyer, Todd Blanche, referred the BBC to Donald Trump’s campaign team, which did not respond to a request for comment.
Donald Trump said in a post on Truth Social that the new indictment was “an effort to resurrect a ‘dead’ Witch Hunt” and “distract the American People” from the election.
He asked for it to be ‘dismissed IMMEDIATELY.’
A source close to Donald Trump’s legal team told CBS News that the new accusation did not come as a surprise.
“This is what the government is supposed to do based on what the Supreme Court did,” the source said. “It doesn’t change our position that we believe Smith’s case is flawed and it should be dismissed.”
The new charging document, which has been reduced from 45 to 36 pages, reworks the language of the charges and refines the way the former president allegedly committed these crimes to comply with the Supreme Court’s ruling on presidential immunity.
For example, the new indictment rejects the allegation that Trump tried to pressure Justice Department officials to work to overturn his defeat.
The Supreme Court ruled that Trump’s instructions to justice officials were not illegal.
The special counsel’s office explained its reasoning in a statement.
The indictment was presented to a new grand jury that had not yet heard evidence in the case. A grand jury is set up by a prosecutor to determine if there is enough evidence to prosecute.
The Justice Department declined further comments.
What are the functions of a grand jury?
The new charging document argues that Trump acted as a private citizen — not as president — when he undertook the alleged scheme to influence the election.
“The defendant had no official responsibility in relation to the certification procedure, but had a personal interest as a candidate to be declared the winner of the elections,” a new line in the document stated.
Another new line refers to a lawsuit filed by his campaign in Georgia. In the old text, it was said that the complaint was “presented in his name”, but the new charge specifies that “it was raised in the capacity of the presidential candidate”.
The new indictment also appears to have dropped charges against Jeffrey Clark — a former Justice Department official who played a key role in the so-called voter fraud scheme, according to prosecutors.
The voter fraud scheme was an attempt to interfere with the Electoral College system that decides the presidential election.
That included persuading Republican-controlled legislatures in seven states to choose Republican electors or no electors in states won by Biden.
The forged certificates were later transferred to the US Senate in an attempt to count their votes instead of the real voters and nullify Biden’s victory.
Clark was not named in any indictment, but was identified to the media through public records.
The new indictment leaves open several key allegations against Trump, including that he tried to convince Vice President Mike Pence to block the certification of Biden’s election.
In last month’s Supreme Court ruling, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that any conversation between Trump and Pence likely falls into the category of official acts.
“Trump is at least presumptively immune from prosecution,” he wrote, adding that it remains to be seen whether the government can rebut “that presumption of immunity”.
The new indictment shows that Smith interpreted the Supreme Court’s decision to mean that his case could still move forward, said Daniel Charles Richman, a constitutional law expert at Columbia Law School.
But it is not clear whether it could satisfy the Supreme Court’s framework for presidential immunity, said the law professor, because “the Court was painfully vague as to what private conduct done by a president can be charged criminally”.
The new charge will not necessarily speed up the case either, Richman told the BBC.
He doubts that it will be heard before the election.
The CBS News source close to Trump’s legal team said the former president’s lawyers would ask for more time to prepare for the case.
They said it would likely delay the start of the trial if the judge agrees.
The case began after Smith was appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland in 2022 to oversee two federal investigations into Trump: the election fraud case and another case that accused the former president of taking classified documents to his Florida home after leaving office.
On Monday, Smith’s team appealed a Florida judge’s decision to throw out the confidential documents case.
“The district court deviated from binding Supreme Court precedent, misconstrued the statutes that authorized the special counsel’s appointment, and took inadequate account of the longstanding history of Attorney General appointments of special counsels,” the special counsel’s team wrote in their appeal.
Both cases face an unsure future after the Supreme Court’s decision last month.
If Trump defeats Democrat Kamala Harris, he will likely order the Justice Department to drop all federal charges against him.
Source: BBC News