President Donald Trump speaks during a rally protesting the Electoral College certification of Joe Biden's win in the 2020 presidential race, in Washington, Jan. 6, 2021. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
This new indictment “reflects the government’s efforts to respect and implement the Supreme Court’s holdings,” after the court ruled last month that former presidents have sweeping legal protections from charges for alleged acts that they committed while in office.
On Tuesday afternoon, Special Counsel Jack Smith filed a superseding indictment in the federal election interference case against former president Donald Trump.
In a 36-page document, Smith again accuses Trump of resisting the peaceful transfer of power following the 2020 presidential election, which President Joe Biden unequivocally won.
The indictment narrows the allegations against the former president, bringing renewed focus to the case in light of the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling last month, which fell along ideological lines.
Smith and his team said in a separate filing that a new grand jury, who had not previously heard evidence in the case, returned the superseding indictment on Tuesday. The lawyers wrote that the new indictment “reflects the government’s efforts to respect and implement the Supreme Court’s holdings.”
A source close to Trump’s legal team told CBS News on Tuesday: “This was not a surprise. This is what the government is supposed to do, based on what the Supreme Court did. It doesn’t change our position that we believe Smith’s case is flawed and it should be dismissed.”
In the immunity case, the Supreme Court concluded that former presidents have sweeping legal protections from charges for alleged acts that they committed while in office. The decision therefore made Trump immune from prosecution for some of the acts included in Smith’s original 45-page document.
In that indictment, Smith argues that from Election Day 2020 to Jan. 6, 2021, Trump “mounted a wide-ranging campaign to subvert Joe Biden’s victory in the presidential election.”
Smith laid out a mountain of evidence showing that Trump and his allies spread false information about voter fraud, urged Republican state officials to undermine the results of the election, assembled false electors, and pressured former Vice President Mike Pence to “unilaterally toss out the legitimate results.”
These actions culminated, prosecutors argue, in the events of Jan. 6, 2021, when an insurrection broke out at the US Capitol in Washington D.C., resulting in five deaths and hundreds of injuries.
The former president was originally charged with four felony counts in this case–one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States, two counts (including one conspiracy count) of obstructing an official proceeding, and one count of conspiracy to deprive Americans citizens of their right to vote and have their vote counted.
Prosecutors maintained the four counts against Trump in Tuesday’s indictment, but limited the evidence included and removed one unnamed individual who was listed as an “unnamed conspirator.”
The new indictment also repeats allegations that Trump tried to “enlist” then-Vice President Mike Pence in his scheme to overturn the 2020 election, but eliminates at least one phone call between the two running mates. In that call, which occurred on Dec. 29, 2020, the former president allegedly repeated the false claim that the Justice Department was finding “major infractions” in the election results and evidence of widespread voter fraud.
Also, the indictment now no longer mentions the former president’s discussions with White House lawyers and officials about the integrity of the 2020 election.
The former president has pleaded not guilty to all of the 91 charges leveled against him across four indictments. It currently appears unlikely that this case, and the others, will reach court before November’s election.
