Trump asks court for absolute immunity from Jan. 6 lawsuits
by Victor I. Nava, Overnight News Editor |
| July 28, 2022 03:02 AM
Former President Donald Trump has asked a federal court to rule that he has absolute immunity from civil suits related to the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol.
In a brief filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Wednesday, Trump's lawyers asked the court to reverse Judge Amit Mehta's February ruling that denied a motion to dismiss lawsuits related to the Capitol riot. They said in the brief that Trump's speech at a "Stop the Steal" rally on Jan. 6 falls within the scope of speech protected by presidential absolute immunity. The former president is facing several lawsuits filed by congressional lawmakers and Capitol Police officers related to his actions on Jan. 6.
"President Trump is shielded by absolute presidential immunity because his statements were on matters of public concern," his attorneys argued in the brief. "No amount of hyperbole about the violence of January 6, 2021, provides a basis for this Court to carve out an exception to the constitutional separation of powers."
Mehta ruled in February that Trump's Jan. 6 speech at the Ellipse near the South Lawn of the White House, as the 2020 election was being certified by Congress, was likely “words of incitement not protected by the First Amendment."
Trump's legal team argued in Wednesday's filing that impeachment is the only means of punishing a president for abuse and that attempts by Democrats and others to sue Trump after he emerged victorious in his impeachment trial are tantamount to "harassment."
"A Democratic-controlled House of Representatives already brought impeachment charges against President Trump for allegedly inciting an insurrection on January 6, 2021. Their effort failed, and President Trump was acquitted. These further lawsuits are an attempt to thwart that acquittal, and it is just this type of harassment that presidential immunity is meant to foreclose," the brief said.
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