Democrats warn of ‘dangerous precedent’ set by Trump ruling; Republican House speaker calls decision ‘common sense’ – as it happened

The supreme court ruled on Monday that former presidents are entitled to some degree of immunity from criminal prosecution, a major victory for Donald Trump that guts the 2020 election subversion case against him and any prospect of a trial before November.

Here’s a recap of what happened today:

• In a 6-3 decision, the court found that presidents were protected from prosecution for official actions that extended to the “outer perimeter” of his office, but could face charges for unofficial conduct.

• Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, said a former president is entitled to “absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority”.

• Justice Sonia Sotomayor, in a dissenting opinion, warned that a consequence of the ruling is that “the President is now a king above the law”. The decision “makes a mockery of the principle, foundational to our Constitution and system of government, that no man is above the law”, she added.

• Trump celebrated the ruling as a “big win for our constitution and democracy” – a view echoed by the Republican House speaker, Mike Johnson, and many Republicans.

• But Democratic leaders expressed outrage over a ruling that legal experts warn could undermine the foundations of US democracy. “This is a sad day for America and a sad day for our democracy,” said Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader. New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said the decision was “an assault on American democracy”, while Hakeem Jeffries, the House minority leader, warned that the supreme court’s immunity decision “sets a dangerous precedent for the future of our nation”.

• Trump’s longtime rightwing ally Steve Bannon turned himself in to start a prison term. Bannon arrived at a federal prison in Connecticut to serve a four-month sentence for defying multiple subpoenas surrounding the House’s January 6 insurrection investigation.

2d ago15.54 EDT

Hugo Lowell

The supreme court’s decision to confer broad immunity to former presidents is likely to eviscerate numerous parts of the criminal prosecution against Donald Trump over his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

The court remanded the case back to the presiding US district judge, Tanya Chutkan, to apply a three-part test to decide which actions were protected – but Chief Justice John Roberts pre-emptively made clear that some were definitively out.

On some of the closer calls, Roberts also gave suggestions on behalf of the majority conservative opinion, which could bear on Chutkan when she eventually weighs each allegation line by line and decides whether it can be introduced in any future trial.

Most crucially for special counsel Jack Smith, his prosecutors will not be able to introduce as evidence any acts deemed to be official and struck from the case, even as contextual information for jurors to show Trump’s intent.

Trump is accused of overseeing a sprawling effort to subvert the results of the 2020 presidential election, including two counts of conspiring to obstruct the certification of the election results, conspiring to defraud the government and conspiring to disenfranchise voters.

The alleged illegal conduct came in five categories: Trump pressuring US justice department officials to open sham investigations into election fraud, Trump pressing his vice-president to return him to the White House, Trump trying to obstruct Congress from certifying the election, Trump giving a speech that led rioters to storm the US Capitol building, and Trump’s plot to recruit fake electors .

Roberts undercut at least three of the five alleged categories in the opinion.

Mary Trump, Donald Trump’s niece, was also inspired by Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s dissenting opinion in today’s immunity ruling.

“With fear for our democracy, I dissent,” Mary Trump posted to X, quoting Sotomayor, accompanied by a link selling T-shirts inspired by the justice’s dissent.

The supreme court has wrapped up its 2023-2024 term, issuing a string of blockbuster decisions with enormous implications for American democracy, individual and civil rights, and the basic functioning of the federal government.

Once again, the conservative supermajority, with half its justices appointed by Donald Trump, was in the driver’s seat – strengthening the power of the presidency in its immunity ruling for Trump, and overturning precedent in a dramatic blow to the administrative state.

There were crumbs of comfort for liberals, including a gun rights ruling related to domestic violence and a unanimous decision upholding access to a key abortion pill, but what the US public increasingly sees as an activist court majority continues in full swing.

Read our full report on the supreme court’s biggest cases this term.

Hillary Clinton, responding to the supreme court’s immunity ruling, said it will be up to the American people to hold Donald Trump accountable in the November election.

Posting to X, Clinton said she agreed with Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s dissenting opinion, in which she said that she had “fear for our democracy”.

Former attorney general Eric Holder was also highly critical of the supreme court ruling, warning that American democracy has been “gravely wounded” as a result.

Posting to X, Holder described the decision as “absurd and dangerous”.

New York congressman Jerrold Nadler, a ranking member of the House judiciary committee, has described the supreme court’s immunity decision as “revolutionary”.

The ruling is “far cry from the democracy envisioned by our founding fathers”, Nadler said in a statement.

Once again, Donald Trump’s extremist rightwing court has come to his rescue, dramatically expanding the power of the presidency and removing any fear of prosecution for criminal acts committed using official power. If elected to a second term, this decision has set the stage for an unchecked dictatorship by the former president, who has already made clear his intentions to weaponize the presidency to seek revenge on his political opponents.

Dick Durbin, the Senate majority whip, said it was “disgraceful” that justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito “brazenly” refused to recuse themselves from the Trump immunity case.

The supreme court’s decision “threatens the rule of law”, Durbin wrote in a series of posts on X responding to the ruling.

In May, Alito declined to recuse himself from cases related to Donald Trump and his 2020 election defeat following reports that flags used to support the “Stop the Steal” movement had been displayed at his homes.

Calls for Thomas to recuse himself from the immunity case were also ignored, after critics cited past efforts by the justice’s wife, Ginni Thomas, to reverse the 2020 presidential election in Trump’s favor.

Nancy Pelosi said the supreme court has “gone rogue” with today’s immunity ruling, saying it was “violating the foundational American principle that no one is above the law”.

Posting to X, the former House speaker said:

The former president’s claim of total presidential immunity is an insult to the vision of our founders, who declared independence from a King.

2d ago14.23 EDT

House Republicans sue Merrick Garland over Biden interview

Joanna Walters

House Republicans on Monday filed a lawsuit against the US attorney general, Merrick Garland, for the audio recording of Joe Biden’s interview with a special counsel in his classified documents case, asking the courts to enforce their subpoena and reject the White House’s effort to withhold the materials from Congress, the Associated Press reports.

The lawsuit filed by the House judiciary committee marks Republicans’ latest broadside against the justice department as partisan conflict over the rule of law animates the 2024 presidential campaign. The legal action comes weeks after the White House blocked Garland from releasing the audio recording to Congress by asserting executive privilege.

Republicans in the House responded by voting to make Garland the third attorney general in US history to be held in contempt of Congress. But the justice department refused to take up the contempt referral, citing the agency’s “longstanding position and uniform practice” to not prosecute officials who don’t comply with subpoenas because of a president’s claim of executive privilege.

The lawsuit states that House speaker Mike Johnson made a “last-ditch effort” last week to Garland to resolve the issue without taking legal action but the attorney general referred the Republicans to the White House, which rebuffed the “effort to find a solution to this impasse”.

Garland has defended the justice department, saying officials have gone to extraordinary lengths to provide information to the committees about special counsel Robert Hur’s classified documents investigation, including a transcript of Biden’s interview with him.

2d ago14.12 EDT

Joanna Walters

Yulia Navalnaya, the widow of late Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny, said on Monday she would use a new role as chair of the US-based Human Rights Foundation (HRF) to step up her husband’s struggle against Russian president Vladimir Putin, Reuters reports.

The New York-based HRF said in a statement on Monday it had appointed Navalnaya to succeed former world chess champion and Kremlin critic Garry Kasparov as chair of the non-profit rights group, which provides humanitarian aid to Ukraine and runs campaigns against authoritarian leaders around the world.

Navalnaya, who is located outside Russia and had two children with Navalny, accused Putin of having her husband murdered. The Kremlin denied the allegation.

Navalnaya said after her husband’s death that she wanted to continue his work and has since met world leaders and suggested sanctions she believes would hasten the end of the current political system in Russia.

Navalnaya, 47, said in the HRF statement:

As someone who has personally witnessed the threat dictatorships pose to our loved ones and the world at large, I am deeply honored to take on the role of chair of the Human Rights Foundation.

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2d ago14.00 EDT

Hunter Biden sues Fox News over 'mock trial' miniseries

Joanna Walters

Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden sued conservative news outlet Fox News on Monday for publishing nude photos and videos of him in a fictionalized “mock trial” show focused on his foreign business dealings, Reuters reports.

Hunter Biden alleges Fox violated New York state’s so-called revenge porn law, which makes it illegal to publish intimate images of a person without their consent. He is also suing for unjust enrichment and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

Fox aired The Trial of Hunter Biden: A Mock Trial for the American People on its Fox Nation streaming platform in October 2022 but later took it down under threat of a lawsuit by Biden’s attorneys.

Fox News said in a statement:

This entirely politically motivated lawsuit is devoid of merit.

It only removed the program out of an abundance of caution, it said.

Biden’s lawyers did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The series depicted a fictional trial of Hunter Biden on illegal foreign lobbying and bribery charges, crimes he has never been indicted for.

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Americans are digesting the monumental supreme court decision this morning that’s dominating the news. And Trump sidekick Steve Bannon has reported to a prison in Connecticut to serve a four-month term for contempt of Congress. There’s no shortage of US politics happenings, so stay tuned.

Here’s where things stand:

• Some prominent Democrats in the House have blasted the US supreme court ruling that US presidents have absolute immunity from prosecution for “official” acts taken while in office. Progressive caucus chair and Washington congresswoman Pramila Jayapal called it “another horrible ruling from the MAGA Supreme Court” while New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said the decision is “an assault on American democracy”.

• And Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic House minority leader, warned that the supreme court’s immunity decision “sets a dangerous precedent for the future of our nation”, adding that “the framers of the constitution … did not intend for our nation to be ruled by a king or monarch who could act with absolute impunity”.

• But Mike Johnson, the Republican House speaker, welcomed the immunity decision. He said it was a victory for Donald Trump “and all future presidents” and, on the principle, added that the court “clearly stated that presidents are entitled to immunity for their official acts. This decision is based on the obviously unique power and position of the presidency, and comports with the constitution and common sense.”

• Donald Trump’s longtime rightwing ally Steve Bannon turned himself in to start a prison term. Bannon arrived at a federal prison in Connecticut to serve a four-month sentence for defying multiple subpoenas surrounding the House’s January 6 insurrection investigation.

• The three liberal justices on the US supreme court, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, all dissented from the majority opinion granting US presidents immunity for “official acts” while in office. Sotomayor wrote the dissent, saying: “The relationship between the president and the people he serves has shifted irrevocably. In every use of official power, the president is now a king above the law.”

• Donald Trump posted on his Truth Social platform shortly after the court issued its decision on his immunity case, writing: “Big win for our constitution and democracy. Proud to be an American.”

• The US supreme court ruled that US presidents are entitled to “absolute immunity” from prosecution for “official acts”. The court held that a former president – in this case Donald Trump – has absolute immunity for his core constitutional powers. The decision fell along party lines, with six conservative justices ruling against three liberal ones. But the court also ruled that former presidents are not entitled to immunity from prosecution for actions taken in a private capacity. It’s now down to interpretation which acts are which.

Pramila Jayapal, the Democratic representative for Washington, has described the supreme court’s immunity ruling as a “bad decision”.

Posting on X, she wrote:

This is another horrible ruling from the MAGA Supreme Court that strips protections for people and empowers conservative special interests.