history in our nation's capital today the Supreme Court in a 63 decision ruled that former president Donald Trump and other presidents have absolute immunity from prosecution for official acts taken during their presidency however the justices ruled presidents can still be charged for acts that weren't part of their official duties The Landmark case on presidential Powers is the first of its kind as never before had the Supreme Court considered if a president could face criminal charges for act taken while in the Oval Office the ruling now raises the question could this further delay the federal election interference case against the former president and how will this decision impact evidence in that case joining me now to break down this decision is former New Jersey attorney John Farmer John thanks for joining me thank you for having me so the court has ruled that the former president is absolutely immune to prosecution for all official acts committed as president can you explain what defines an official act as opposed to an unofficial act so there are really three categories of Acts that the court uh talks about in its opinion official acts are are acts related to the core competencies of being president uh things like the pardon power um the power to um uh appoint ambassadors and and it's basically functions that are that are seen to be the core comp competencies of the president are official are official acts conferred by the Constitution uh unofficial acts are acts that are private nature uh and then in in the sort of Nether world between those two categories there are uh there are acts that they say are at the outer limits uh of Presidential Power uh and those are sort of the heart of the of the opinion trying to distinguish you know among those three categories of of actions uh absolute immunity for official Act uh U presumptive immunity for acts that are sort of Quasi official and then no immunity all at all for private acts well thanks for clarifying that you know the other thing is what does this mean for the ongoing January 6 investigation how will those actions now be defined in a court of law so what the court basically held the majority of it's holding is that um there's no record to allow it to decide which the actions alleged the indictment fall into which categories uh so the the heart of the opinion is a remand to the trial court uh to have hearings on which acts in the indictment are should be considered official and therefore immune uh which are in that Nether world that sort of quazi official and therefore have a presumption of immunity that could be overcome uh and which are if any are completely private acts the one acception to what I just said is that the court did say uh in its in its opinion that uh president Trump's consultations with the acting attorney general where he was urging the justice department uh to investigate uh election fraud uh th those actions were within his core competence as president and therefore should not have been part of the indictment and the court further held that those meetings sh will not even be presented to the jury at a trial which is an unusual ruling because as part of a conspiracy there are things called over acts normally over acts can be uh completely legal but they sort of explained part of the conspiracy they're admissible but the court went beyond that today and said those consultations with the justice department uh are not going to be uh part of the indictment and are not going to be submitted to the jury uh with with respect to the conversation with the vice president uh there's a potential loophole that the court allowed uh the district court to find which is that although the president's consultation with the Vice President are typically official acts within both of their purview and therefore subject to Absolute immunity there's an exception to the vice president's role as president of the Senate that's a separate role that he has that is not directly connected with executive branch actions and therefore the court left open a finding by the trial court uh that his his attempts to pressure vice president Trump uh that morning uh could be subject to prosecution so here's the thing John how does this affect any of the other cases against the former president such as the election interference case in Georgia does it have any effect on the non-federal cases at all uh it's not clear to me what effect it would have on the state prosecutions I mean if the if the uh the scope of the the Court's finding is the president is absolutely immune I guess it would be something to be litigated whether that would have an effect in a state court in the state court prosecution under the supremacy clause You could argue that because federal law is supreme and absolute immunity for for the president might affect that case but I think that's something I'm sure will be litigated uh and I don't see any effect at all on the classified documents case um that's being litigated in Florida and John what does this ruling mean for future presidents moving forward well that was really what the Court's main concern was the court went out of its way to say we can't just focus on the facts in front of us we have to consider uh the the the turn effect that um not conferring immunity would have and encouraging future presidents to be prosecuted by their Pol political enemies uh so the the court took a much broader view than just the ca the case in front of it and because it is unprecedented I think the court was concerned about the about basically creating conditions where future presidents could be prosecuted my own opinion is it went too far uh in in the uh conferring the ABS IM absolute immunity in the context that it did but I understand what the concern was that the court had and the Practical effect of this is by sending the case back for extensive hearings on what conduct con falls into which categories I think the prospects of any trial before the election are basically nil yeah a lot of information thank you for breaking it all down clarifying John thanks for joining me thank you for having me appreciate it [Music]