US Special Counsel Jack Smith on Tuesday filed a supplemental indictment in former President Donald Trump’s election meddling case, narrowing the scope of the charges in response to the Supreme Court’s recent immunity ruling, US media reported.
The special counsel’s office was quoted by several US media outlets as saying:
“The superseding indictment, which was presented to a new grand jury that had not previously heard evidence in this case, reflects the government’s efforts to respect and implement the Supreme Court’s holdings and remand instructions in Trump v. United States.”
While none of the four original charges against Trump have been dropped, some charges have been removed from the revised indictment, including those related to attempts to use the Justice Department to support Trump’s false claims of election fraud, CNN reported.
This comes after the Supreme Court ruled last month that Trump is entitled to a degree of immunity from prosecution for official actions, but not for actions he took as a candidate.
Smith is prosecuting Trump for criminal interference in the 2020 presidential election, while the former president’s legal team is trying to get the election interference case dismissed, citing presidential immunity.
Trump has called the new indictment in the Capitol storming case an attempt to interfere in the election. He stated:
“This is merely an attempt to INTERFERE WITH THE ELECTION, and distract the American People from the catastrophes Kamala Harris has inflicted on our Nation, like the Border Invasion, Migrant Crime, Rampant Inflation, the threat of World War III, and more.”
The ruling could also affect the case against Trump in Florida for taking classified documents from his time as president as a private citizen and resisting returning them to the government.
