Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion in the one of the final cases the court heard this term. Roberts was joined by the court’s five other conservative justices, while the three liberal justices dissented.
The Supreme Court did not say Trump has immunity in this specific case, in which the federal government has accused the former president of trying to overturn the 2020 election through his actions on Jan. 6, 2021.
“Trump asserts a far broader immunity than the limited one we have recognized,” Roberts wrote in the majority opinion, adding, “The text of the [Impeachment Judgment] Clause provides little support for such an absolute immunity.”
Instead, the court remanded the case back down to the lower courts, which will now have to determine whether Trump’s actions constituted “official acts.”