Federal Judge Amit Mehta rejected this week a ploy by former President Donald Trump to halt civil litigation that the former White House occupant is facing over his argued role in the developments culminating in the early 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters.
Trump had wanted the litigation paused specifically in light of his federal criminal charges that stem from similar periods of time — but, Mehta said, they’re sufficiently distinct to allow both to move forward. As highlighted by POLITICO, Mehta said that Trump “overstates the significance of that factual overlap in the present posture of these matters,” meaning the criminal charges vs. the civil litigation, which traces to police officers affected by the day’s violent events and members of Congress.
Trump is evidently trying in both contexts to claim a form of so-called presidential immunity, meaning legal protections allegedly held by mere virtue of once serving as president that should stop the proceedings. Trump claims that he should be free from legal threats for actions taken as part of his official responsibilities, and that’s where he’s grouping what he was doing after the last presidential race.
That’s despite the end-point of his evident ambitions being effectively the invalidation of the collective impact of tens of millions of duly documented votes for president from across the United States.
Trump’s arguments to that effect in the criminal context already reached the U.S. Supreme Court, where oral arguments — meaning in-person arguments before the court’s nine members — are slated for coming days. In the meantime, Trump must “begin describing the basis for his claim that he is immune” from the civil litigation at issue, POLITICO explained. These developments come amid Trump’s ongoing criminal trial in New York City on allegations of falsifying business records. Jury selection finished Friday, and opening statements are currently slated for Monday.
