The Supreme Court almost immediately granted Special Counsel Jack Smith’s Monday request for expedited consideration—a highly unusual rapid response that highlights the historic nature of the case.
Smith wants the court to weigh in on the question of whether former president Donald Trump has absolute presidential immunity for crimes he’s accused of carrying out while in the White House.
In its response, the high court ordered Trump’s attorneys to file a reply to Smith’s petition by next Wednesday, Dec. 20 at 4 p.m. ET.
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The Supreme Court’s Monday decision does not mean it will take up the case—it simply means the nine-judge panel will make that decision on a much faster timeline than it normally would.
If the case is accepted, it will be the first time the high court will weigh in on the criminal charges facing the former president—specifically, whether his attempts to overturn the 2020 election were protected by presidential immunity, something Trump has repeatedly claimed.
In the 81-page filing, obtained by The Daily Beast, Smith told the Supreme Court he was pursuing the court’s opinion—and asking them to skip an appeals court’s ruling before it was ever made—to ensure Trump can’t drag out the case for months, or longer.
“The United States recognizes that this is an extraordinary request,” the filing states. “This is an extraordinary case.”
Trump fumed in response to Smith’s filing in a statement, calling the move a “hail Mary.”
“Crooked Joe Biden’s henchman, Deranged Jack Smith, is so obsessed with interfering in the 2024 Presidential Election, with the goal of preventing President Trump from retaking the Oval Office, as the President is poised to do, that Smith is willing to try for a Hail Mary by racing to the Supreme Court and attempting to bypass the Appellate Process,” Trump said via a spokesperson.
“There is absolutely no reason to rush this sham to trial except to injure President Trump and tens of millions of his supporters.”
Trump’s election subversion trial was slated to begin on March 4 in Washington, D.C., but his legal team asked U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan to delay proceedings while he pursued an appeal.
Trump’s decision to appeal became public after Judge Chutkan ruled earlier this month that Trump could not be immune to prosecution because he’s no longer president.
Smith wrote in the new filing that it “is of imperative public importance” a decision on Trump’s immunity be reached as soon as possible. He’s previously accused Trump of using legal delay tactics to push each of his quartet of criminal trials until after the 2024 presidential election, where he remains the Republican Party’s clear frontrunner.
Smith asked the high court to consider having oral arguments to discuss the matter sometime early next year. He added there is some precedent for his request—likening his request for an expedited decision to a similar case related to the Watergate scandal, when the high court resolved a petition penned by then-President Richard Nixon in about two months.
The court ruled unanimously in that case, U.S. vs. Nixon, that the president was required to deliver subpoenaed materials to the court.
Nixon, who was subpoenaed but not himself tried in the case, resigned shortly after the ruling.
Smith, however, acknowledged the unprecedented nature of his case in Monday’s filing, writing: “the government acknowledges that this Court has not addressed a comparable claim.”
“This is a quintessential example of ‘an important question of federal law that has not been, but should be, settled by this Court,’” he added.
The court has more recently taken on cases that were still in an early stage of litigation after determining they were of national importance. These included the Biden Administration’s vaccine mandate for businesses and its plan to forgive student loan debt—two instances where the conservative-majority court, which includes three Trump appointees, ruled against the administration.
Trump has pleaded not guilty in each of his four indictments, three of which are federal. In the case being overseen by Chutkan, Trump is facing four criminal counts of conspiracy to defraud the U.S.
Trump’s classified documents trial in Florida, also being prosecuted by Smith, is slated to begin in May. The start date for a separate racketeering case in Georgia, meanwhile, is still unknown.
Despite this, the former president’s lawyers told a Georgia judge on Friday that scheduling Trump’s trial there before next fall would amount to the “most effective election interference” in U.S. history.
