The Supreme Court’s decision on presidential immunity could reshape the criminal case against former President Donald Trump in Georgia related to efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in the Peach State.
The Georgia case has been paused while an appeals court weighs whether Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis should be disqualified – an unrelated decision that is not expected to come until after the November presidential election.
If Willis is allowed to remain on the case, proceedings at the trial court level would be allowed to resume – meaning Fulton County Judge Scott McAfee would have to go through the same analysis on presidential immunity that the US Supreme Court is requiring in the federal election subversion case. Under that test, Trump is entitled to some immunity for official acts as president and none for unofficial acts.
Trump’s lead attorney in the Georgia case, Steve Sadow, argued in January that the state-level charges should be dismissed on immunity grounds.
Prosecutors had been waiting for the Supreme Court to weigh in before responding to Sadow’s motion.
Willis’ office did not respond to CNN’s request for comment on Monday.
CNN legal analyst Michael Moore said the Supreme Court decision will undoubtedly complicate the Georgia case, noting that evidence related to official acts – that the justices said are immune from prosecution – would be excluded from the Georgia case, too.
That “creates a major problem in the Georgia case because Willis is relying largely on the state’s anti-racketeering statute,” Moore said.
“The usual benefit of that charge is that each defendant can be held accountable for the bad acts of their co-defendants,” Moore said, but if certain Trump conduct is not considered criminal, “how can the co-defendants have conspired to commit criminal acts?” he added.
But Anthony Michael Kreis, an attorney who has closely monitored the Georgia RICO case, said the impact on the case “should be minimal.”
“By and large, because the crux of the alleged criminality rests on Trump reaching out to state officials seeking a particular electoral outcome for his private benefit, the overall impact should be minimal because that conduct falls outside the ambit of official presidential functions,” he said.
Defense attorneys in the Georgia case say any decision from McAfee on presidential immunity would be subject to appeal, potentially all the way back up to the US Supreme Court. Other issues, like the Supremacy Clause, could also come into play.
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