A majority of Americans surveyed in a new poll reject former President Trump’s legal argument that presidents should be immune from criminal prosecution for crimes they commit while in office.
of POLITICO Magazine/Ipsos In a poll released Monday, 70 percent of respondents rejected this argument, while only 11 percent said the president should be immune from criminal prosecution. A further 18% said they did not know.
Pollsters noted that the debate over presidential immunity is less important when broken down by party.
Forty-eight percent of Republicans say the president should not be exempt, while only 24% disagree. 27% of Republicans surveyed said they didn’t know.
The argument for presidential immunity was overwhelmingly rejected by Democrats (92%) and independents (75%), but Democrats were the first to argue that the president should be immune from criminal prosecution for acts committed while in office. Only 3% of respondents and 8% of independents.
Investigation will be conducted after the Supreme Court decided Late last month, it was to hear President Trump’s request for immunity in special counsel Jack Smith’s lawsuit alleging that the former president conspired to overturn his 2020 election defeat.
The Supreme Court’s order set oral arguments for the week of April 22, setting an expedited timeline with a likely landmark decision by the end of June or sooner. Last month’s order marked the first time the Supreme Court, which includes three Trump appointees, has agreed to take up a criminal case against a former president.
If the conservative-dominated court ends up siding with Trump, as many court officials expect, Smith’s case could move forward, with the justices deciding in November. That would give some leeway to schedule a trial before the election. However, the case, which was originally scheduled to begin earlier this month, has now been put on hold.
Trump’s lawyers have specifically argued that the federal election destruction charges should be dismissed because the former president has absolute presidential immunity from criminal prosecution. Trump has made similar claims in the Georgia election interference and classified document scandal. He pleaded not guilty in all these cases.
The presidential immunity claim was rejected by both Trump’s judges and a three-judge panel on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.
“For the purposes of this criminal case, former President Trump assumed all defense of other criminal defendants and became a Trump citizen,” the D.C. Circuit wrote in a 57-page decision earlier this month.
“It is unacceptable for the presidential administration to continue to place its predecessor above the law,” the decision continued. “After carefully evaluating these concerns, we have concluded that there is no functional justification for exempting the former president from federal prosecution generally or for exonerating former President Trump from the specific charges in the indictment. Reached.”
The Politico poll was conducted March 8-10 and interviewed 1,024 American adults online. The margin of error for all respondents was 3.3 percentage points.
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