Welcome to this week’s edition of the Deadline: Legal Newsletter, a roundup of top legal stories, including the latest developments from the Supreme Court, Donald Trump’s legal cases and more. Click here to have the newsletter delivered straight to your inbox every Friday this Supreme Court term.
As you likely know by now, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that Donald Trump is disqualified from holding the presidency under the 14th Amendment’s insurrectionist ban. I explained here, though, why Trump may ultimately wind up on the Colorado primary ballot. Still, the Colorado decision gives the U.S. Supreme Court the chance to settle the issue nationwide. There are many different ways the U.S. justices could reverse the state court, as MSNBC Daily columnist Jessica Levinson explored.
In another Trump matter, the justices on Friday rejected special counsel Jack Smith’s request to step in early and decide the former president’s immunity claim in the federal election interference case. It’s a limited win for Trump, as his appeal moves forward on a fast track in the D.C. Circuit. Whoever loses at the circuit court will likely be petitioning the justices again, so another appeal on the issue could be back before the high court soon. But until it’s resolved, the case in Washington is on hold, putting a March trial start increasingly at risk.
In the Georgia election prosecution, former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows lost big in his attempt to move his charges to federal court. An 11th Circuit appeals court panel smacked down Meadows’ claim on Monday, reasoning that former officers like Meadows can’t remove their cases and that even if they could, the events giving rise to the state election subversion charges weren’t related to his official duties. While that’s clearly a loss for Meadows, it bodes ill for his co-defendants’ removal attempts as well, and the logic of the ruling undercuts Trump’s immunity claims, too. But we still don’t know when the remaining 15 Georgia state defendants will go to trial or plead guilty.
Remember the Mar-a-Lago case? It still exists! It even has a trial date and everything, in late May. But don’t bank on Trump’s classified documents and obstruction trial starting then. For one thing, the increasingly possible delay of the March trial in Washington could push the federal election interference case into a spring or summer slot, when the Florida case could theoretically be in trial. Plus, as we know, Trump has a more pliant judge in Florida with Aileen Cannon, which the former president’s lawyers no doubt had in mind when they dismissively referred, in a pretrial filing this week, to the “partisan talismanic significance” that prosecutors “have assigned to May 20, 2024.”
With all these moving parts, the possibility arises that Trump’s fourth criminal case, in New York state court — which was the first to be indicted — could be the first to see trial. The hush money case has been set for a late March trial, which obviously wouldn’t happen if the federal election case starts as scheduled earlier that month. But given the uncertainty over the timing of the Washington case, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s prosecution may be the first to go to a jury. For those who hear that and react, “Ho, hum, nothing but sex there,” Laurence Tribe and Dennis Aftergut offer another way to think about the Stormy Daniels case in this MSNBC Daily column. As they explain, silencing the porn star ahead of the 2016 election about an alleged affair she had with the now-leading GOP presidential candidate for 2024 “was a preview of Trump’s efforts to steal the 2020 election.”
And could more charges come? New reporting from Michigan raises the question. The Detroit News reportedly heard recorded audio of Trump and Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel pressuring GOP officials in the state not to certify the 2020 presidential election. Whether that lands Trump a fifth indictment or not, this newly reported evidence can bolster the existing election interference cases against him in Washington and Georgia.
As for the justices, they’re next set to take the bench for oral argument Jan. 8, but Trump’s docket alone could keep them busy in the meantime.
