Arguably one of the more potent campaign attacks against Donald
Trump is the fact that he has been convicted of
34 felony counts and is awaiting sentencing.
Probably. Last night, Trump's lawyers filed a new motion asking
the judge who oversaw Trump's hush money trial,
Judge Juan Marshawn, to throw out Trump's convictions conviction.
His lawyers cite the recent decision by the Supreme Court
in which the conservative majority ruled that presidents are immune
from prosecution for official acts.
Trump's team is arguing that that immunity ruling effectively nullifies
the jury verdict in New York.
This is their argument. Some of the evidence presented at
Trump's trial included conversations Trump had with aides during his
time as president.
And Trump's lawyers are now calling that evidence unconstitutional official
acts and saying that the inclusion of that evidence taints
his guilty verdict.
Joining me now is MSNBC legal correspondent Lisa Rubin.
Lisa,
can you flesh out this argument a little bit more
on how,
how much weight do you think it actually carries with
Judge Marshawn?
I think, Alex, part of it carries weight and another
part of it doesn't.
The argument, as you just said,
is that if you're entitled to immunity based on your
official acts,
that's not just immunity from criminal liability.
You also have immunity from those acts being introduced as
evidence for even the things you do that are wholly
and squarely personal,
like the things for which Trump was charged in the
hush money verdict.
And so they are saying that it was impermissible for
the DA to introduce a host of evidence that dates
back to Trump's time in the white.
Everything from Hope Hicks and Madeleine Westerhouse testimony about conversations
with Trump to even his tweets and a government ethics
disclosure that he filled out.
Now, some of that is well overstated and overblown.
On the other hand, they make an argument toward the
back end of their brief that I think a lot
of folks are overlooking.
And what they're saying is the court in their majority
opinion said that if you're going to exclude evidence or
make determinations about immunity,
you got to do it at the outset of the
case.
Obviously, Judge Mershawn did not because this wasn't the law
at the time that he was approaching his trial.
And now they're saying because he didn't and because this
is now the law of the land before Trump's sentencing,
the whole thing has to be thrown out,
not even on substance per SE,
but just because the procedure didn't work correctly.
And that's where I think they might have a point,
Alex.
Lisa, the fact that the Supreme Court ruled after the
jury issued it for its verdict is not special dispensation
here because Marshawn hasn't sentenced Trump.
This is all up for reexamination.
Yeah. And in fact, if the verdict were still on
appeal,
it would be up for reexamination as well.
Until the verdict and the sentence are fully and squarely
finalized,
a Supreme Court opinion can have impact on that case.
And that's exactly where we find ourselves now.
I should know that if Trump's trial had started when
it was supposed to in March,
we might not be facing the same situation.
At least they might have to interrupt his appeal or
see that differently,
but at least he would have been sentenced by now.
But because through variation of delay tactics,
the trial didn't start until mid-april,
this is where we are given where the Supreme Court
has been.
Judge Marshawn has been pretty clear in his rulings.
And, you know, he's ruled for Trump in some occasions.
He's ruled for the special counsel.
Do you have an expectation about how deferential he's going
to be to this very,
in my mind, problematic Supreme Court ruling that is hazy
at best?
I mean, do you have a sense of where he
might go on this?
I think Judge Marshawn is in a completely unenviable position
because,
as you just said, the Supreme Court opinion isn't just
lawless in many ways, it's highly unclear and amorphous in
others.
I think that he will find that many of Trump's
arguments about what constitutes an official act is is an
exaggeration of the Supreme Court's opinion,
even taken at its most generous.
On the other hand, that sentence in the opinion that
says immunity decisions have to be made at the outset
of a proceeding,
it's very hard to see why evidentiary decisions would be
different than decisions about what conduct can be charged and
not charged.
That's particularly the case because the special counsel tried to
argue to the court,
well, evidence issues can be dealt with through jury instructions
or through normal appellate procedure.
And the majority said, no,
that's not enough. If you're immune from prosecution,
that means you shouldn't have to go through the burden
of all these pretrial proceedings and trial.
That's the part I think he's really going to struggle
with.
And he might have to hold his nose and grant
some relief for Donald Trump,
even if the danger of their arguments are really a
perversion of the Supreme Court's ruling.
Alex.
Well, I'm assuming that if he doesn't rule in Trump's
favor,
Trump's going to appeal this.
And then we're going to end up right back at
that court with 9 justices and a six to three
conservative majority.
But what do I know?
Lisa Rubin, thank you for your time.