‘Dead Letter’: Legal Experts Show How Trump’s Claim ‘Makes No Sense’

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Law professors, attorneys and authorized analysts have roundly dismissed Donald Trump’s declare to have “absolute immunity” from prosecution for any acts he dedicated when president.

Trump’s attorneys on Tuesday argued to a three-judge panel for the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals that presidents can’t be prosecuted until they’re impeached after which convicted by the Senate. The declare got here as Trump’s authorized workforce sought to nix felony expenses towards the previous president for his function in inciting the lethal U.S. Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021.

The argument was greeted with skepticism from the panel.

As it was by authorized specialists commenting on the declare.

Harvard University constitutional legislation professor Laurence Tribe advised MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell it was “a ridiculous argument.”

“It would be absolutely astonishing if any panel of judges, let alone a panel as qualified and smart as this one, were to give the Trump argument the time of day,” he mentioned. “It’s not an argument that any real lawyer would have come up with” and “makes no sense,” he added.

Watch the video right here:

Former federal prosecutor Andrew Weissmann advised MSNBC’s Ali Velshi the argument was “just so shocking to hear someone say that when it has been assumed for so long that a former president is not above the law.”

Watch the interview right here:

Doron Kalir, a legislation professor Cleveland State University, advised Business Insider that “if a student made the same argument, they would get anywhere between a C or a D for misunderstanding what the Constitution has said.”

Fox News authorized analyst Jonathan Turley mentioned Trump’s argument of “impeachment first, prosecution later, is a dead letter with the panel.”

“I don’t believe that the judges agree that you needed a conviction to ever prosecute a president,” he added.

Former Trump White House legal professional Ty Cobb urged it was only a delay tactic.

And conservative legal professional George Conway advised CNN’s Kaitlin Collins that Trump’s authorized workforce had taken “a bad argument” and conflated it “with another bad argument, which is something based upon the impeachment judgment clause, and mixing them all together in the hope of getting a stronger together.”

The court docket has been given 5 days by the Department of Justice to rule on the argument.

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