We begin tonight with the breaking news involving former President
Trump and the federal election interference case in what's called
a superseding indictment.
Jack Smith bringing a new recalibrated indictment with the same
charges against Trump, but with revised evidence to reflect the
recent Supreme Court ruling that offered sweeping presidential immunity involving
official acts.
So this new indictment from Jack Smith now separates out
what Trump allegedly did in his role as a candidate
from what he did in his role as president.
Of course, the election just 70 days away.
So what does this all mean?
AB CS Chief Justice correspondent Pierre Thomas leading us off
tonight.
Tonight, Special Counsel Jack Smith filing a new indictment against
former President Donald Trump for its efforts to overturn the
2020 election, A direct response to the recent Supreme Court
ruling on presidential immunity.
That ruling granting president sweeping immunity for virtually all official
acts of the executive branch.
So Smith went back to the drawing board, now prosecuting
Trump for what he allegedly did in his role as
a candidate, not as president of the United States.
The new indictment charges Trump with the same 4 crimes,
including conspiracy to defraud the United States, to obstruct the
certification of the electoral votes on January 6th, and conspiracy
against the right to vote and to have one's vote
counted.
But there are some changes in the wake of that
Supreme Court ruling, which determined a president is entitled, at
a minimum, to a presumptive immunity from prosecution for all
of his official acts.
The new indictment removes any mention of Trump's alleged behavior
the prosecutors believe could be considered official acts.
For example, it no longer describes Trump's alleged effort to
enlist Justice Department officials to subvert the election, and it
no longer details how multiple federal officials, including the director
of national intelligence, told Trump his claims of election fraud
were false.
What Smith has done instead is focus on Trump as
the leader of his campaign, highlighting he was not acting
in his official role as president, but in his capacity
as a candidate for office.
In one instance noting the defendant had no official responsibilities
related to the certification proceeding, but he did have a
personal interest as a candidate in being named the winner
of the election.
The special counsel knew the clock was ticking.
DOJ policy discourages prosecutors from filing federal charges against candidates
within 60 days of an election.
But we're not yet within that 60 day window.
All right, so let's bring in Pierre Thomas with us
live in Washington on this breaking development late today.
Pierre, bottom line here, in the wake of that Supreme
Court ruling that it offered sweeping presidential immunity, a special
counsel, Jack Smith, it would seem as essentially gone back
to the case here and has reworked his indictment, zeroing
in on Trump's actions, his alleged actions as a candidate,
not his actions as president, which of course, now protected
by the Supreme Court's ruling.
And what will we see next?
Of course, with 70 days now until the election, David,
the special counsel is trying to be surgical, even removing
from his indictment statements Trump made from the White House
podium about the election being stolen.
We expect Trump's legal team to respond in court in
the coming days, but it's unlikely we will see Trump
in court before the election.
For his part, Trump called today's indictment ridiculous and an
act of desperation.
He said the case should be thrown out.
David.
Pierre Thomas leading us off in Washington tonight.
Pierre, thank you.