The US Supreme Court ruled Monday that Donald Trump enjoys some immunity from prosecution as a former president, a decision set to delay his trial for conspiring to overturn the 2020 election.
International News
Supreme Court Rules On Trump Immunity, Delaying Trial
The 6-3 ruling split along ideological lines comes four months ahead of the presidential election in which Trump is the Republican candidate to take on Democrat Joe Biden.
Justices who disagreed with the judgment issued stinging criticism and aired fears for the country’s democratic future, but Trump was quick to revel in what he called a “big win.”
Conservative Chief Justice John Roberts, in his majority opinion, said a president is “not above the law” but does have “absolute immunity” from criminal prosecution for official acts taken while in office.
“The president therefore may not be prosecuted for exercising his core constitutional powers,” Roberts said.
“As for a President’s unofficial acts, there is no immunity,” the chief justice added, sending the case back to a lower court to determine which of the charges facing Trump involve official or unofficial conduct.
Both a District Court and a three-judge appeals court panel had previously rejected Trump’s immunity claims.
The District Court will now hold a series of pre-trial hearings, making a trial before November extremely unlikely.
Trump is charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States as well as obstruction of an official proceeding — when a violent mob of his supporters tried to prevent the January 6, 2021 joint session of Congress held to certify Biden’s victory.
The 78-year-old former president is also charged with conspiracy to deny Americans the right to vote and to have their votes counted.
– ‘Organize a coup? Immune’ –
The three liberal justices dissented from Monday’s ruling with Justice Sonia Sotomayor saying she was doing so “with fear for our democracy.”
“Never in the history of our Republic has a President had reason to believe that he would be immune from criminal prosecution if he used the trappings of his office to violate the criminal law,” Sotomayor said. “In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law.”
“Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune,” she said.
Trump, in posts on Truth Social, welcomed the decision calling it a “big win for our Constitution and democracy.”
“Today’s Historic Decision by the Supreme Court should end all of Crooked Joe Biden’s Witch Hunts against me,” he said.
Biden’s Deputy Campaign Manager Quentin Fulks expressed outrage.
“They just handed Donald Trump the keys to a dictatorship,” Fulks said.
“This decision will give Donald Trump cover to do exactly what he’s been saying he wants to for months: enact revenge and retribution against his enemies.”
Trump’s original trial date in the election subversion case had been March 4.
But the Supreme Court — dominated by conservatives, including three appointed by Trump — agreed to hear his argument for absolute presidential immunity, putting the case on hold while they considered the matter in April.
– ‘Drag on’ –
Steven Schwinn, a law professor at the University of Illinois Chicago, said the ruling means the case “is going to drag on more and more and longer and longer and well beyond the election.”
“To the extent that Trump was trying to drag his feet and extend this beyond the election, he has succeeded wildly,” Schwinn said.
The opinion also provides a “roadmap” for a US leader to avoid prosecution for a particular action “simply by intertwining it with official government action,” he added.
“That’s going to seriously hamstring the prosecution of a former president because the president’s official actions and unofficial actions are so often intertwined,” he said.
Facing four criminal cases, Trump has been doing everything in his power to delay the trials until after the election.
Trump was convicted in New York in May of falsifying business records to cover up a sex scandal in the final stages of the 2016 campaign, making him the first former US president ever convicted of a crime.
His sentencing will take place on July 11.
By filing a blizzard of pre-trial motions, Trump’s lawyers have managed to put on hold the three other trials, which deal with his attempts to overturn the 2020 election and hoarding top-secret documents at his home in Florida.
If reelected, Trump could, once sworn in as president in January 2025, order the federal cases against him closed.
The Israeli military announced on Wednesday it had struck two naval cruise missile production facilities operating under Iran’s ministry of defence in Tehran.
“In recent days, the Israeli air force acting on IDF intelligence struck two key naval cruise missile production sites in Tehran,” the military said.
It said the facilities were used to “develop and manufacture long-range naval cruise missiles, which are capable of rapidly destroying targets at sea and on land”.
The strikes “represent another step in deepening the damage done to the regime’s military production infrastructure”, the military added.
Last week, the military announced its fighter jets had struck several Iranian naval ships in the Caspian Sea, including vessels equipped with anti-submarine missiles.
AFP
The number of migrants who died on the “Eastern Route” from the Horn of Africa to the Arabian Peninsula doubled to a record high of 922 last year, the UN migration agency said Wednesday.
Tens of thousands of migrants from Ethiopia, Somalia and neighbouring countries take the route across the Red Sea each year, mostly from Djibouti to Yemen, in search of work as labourers or domestic workers in wealthy Gulf countries.
“2025 was the deadliest year ever recorded on the Eastern migration route… with 922 people dead or missing — double the number from the previous year,” Tanja Pacifico, head of mission for the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) in Djibouti, told AFP.
The majority of victims were from Ethiopia, the second most-populous country in Africa with more than 130 million people. It is plagued by multiple internal conflicts and deep poverty.
“IOM remains fully committed to working alongside the government of Djibouti to promote safe and dignified migration pathways, in order to prevent further tragedies,” said Pacifico.
Many migrants who cross the Red Sea find themselves stuck in Yemen, the poorest country on the Arabian Peninsula, which has been embroiled in a civil war for nearly a decade, and some even choose to return.
Rapid economic growth in Ethiopia — estimated to reach around 10 percent in 2026 — could encourage less migration, IOM says, but that is mitigated by high inflation, also around 10 percent in February.
AFP
Denmark’s political parties began the thorny process of forming a government Wednesday, with the centrist Moderates as kingmaker after the prime minister’s Social Democrats scraped through a general election without a majority.
Danes were braced for a weeks-long process as Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen seeks to consolidate power in the deeply splintered parliament after Tuesday’s snap vote.
A left-wing bloc made up of five parties, including Frederiksen’s Social Democrats, won 84 seats; the right-wing and far-right claimed 77; and the Moderates won 14 in the election.
The Social Democrats posted their worst election score since 1903—though they remained Denmark’s largest single party, with 38 seats in the 179-seat parliament.
Frederiksen formally tendered her coalition government’s resignation to King Frederik on Wednesday, telling a televised party leader debate she wanted to try to form a centre-left government.
“The most realistic scenario” would be a coalition with the five parties on the left and the centre-right Moderates, she said.
But it is not certain the Moderates, led by Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen, would agree to that.
“I don’t believe that Denmark needs policies aligned with” the leftist Red-Green Alliance, Lokke said.
King Frederik was to meet party leaders individually later Wednesday to determine who should be asked to try to form the next government.
“My expectation is that Mette Frederiksen will become prime minister,” University of Copenhagen political science professor Rune Stubager told reporters.
“But I don’t know with the backing of which parties, like the left wing or the right wing,” he said.
He noted that Lokke, a two-time former prime minister, would likely vie for the position of prime minister, even though he has adamantly denied any interest in the job.
“Danes want me and not another prime minister. I still have the backing to be able to continue on behalf of the Danish people,” Frederiksen insisted during the debate.
Frederiksen has for the past four years headed an unprecedented left-right coalition made up of her Social Democrats, the Moderates and the Liberals.
The Liberals have refused to continue in a Social Democrat-led government.
‘Too Hard To Say’
Danes are now prepared for long negotiations. After the 2022 election, the talks lasted six weeks.
“It’s a long process, which means the government won’t be formed and it will be quite difficult to pass laws during this period,” lamented Jesper Dyrfjeld Christensen, a 54-year-old engineer.
“It’s really too hard to say who will be part of the coalition,” admitted Stubager.
With 12 parties in parliament, the political landscape is jagged — though Denmark is accustomed to minority governments.
“To some extent, this is the way Danish politics works. You have a minority government in the centre which forms a majority with the left on some issues and with the right on others,” he explained.
The negotiations are expected to focus on economic and pension issues, pollution and immigration, he said.
The traditional far-right party, the Danish People’s Party, which has heavily influenced policy since the late 1990s but slumped in the 2022 election, more than tripled its result to 9.1 per cent of votes.
The three anti-immigration groups together garnered 17 per cent, a stable figure for Denmark’s populist right over the past two decades.
“If negotiations take place in the left-wing bloc with the moderates, then there will be more focus on green issues than on immigration,” Stubager said.
“But if, instead, the Moderates negotiate with the parties on the right, then the central issue will be immigration.”
Four seats in Denmark’s parliament are held by its two autonomous territories — two for Greenland and two for the Faroe Islands.
While the Faroese renewed the mandates of the two outgoing lawmakers, with one for each bloc, Greenland overwhelmingly backed the left-wing party and Naleraq, which advocates rapid independence from Denmark.
AFP
-
News3 years agoJust In: President Tinubu returns to Nigeria
-
News3 years ago2023 Elections: Outgoing Rwandan High Commissioner say s Nigeria, ‘ handle their destiny’ in a peaceful way.
-
Entertainment3 years agoSocial media cloth Vendor Found Dead In Ibadan Hotel.
-
News3 years agoOgun HoS Solicit Affordable Housing For Civil Servants
-
Sports3 years ago
CAF SALUTES RIVERS UNITED AFTER SEALING QUARTER-FINAL TICKET.
-
Trending News3 years agoFG begins 40% pay rise for workers.
-
Entertainment3 years ago9mobile Ambassadors Begin “Meet And Greet” Session With Staffs, Customers.
-
Health & Wellness3 years agoBreastfed babies have lower risks of diabetes – Nutritionist