house of the dragon streaming exclusively on me good morning. >> i'm jake tapper in washington. welcome to our special coverage july 1, 2024, a monumental day that will shape both the 2024 election and beyond that, the powers of the u.s president, at any moment, the nine us supreme court justices will hand down their ruling on donald trump's claims of presidential immunity from criminal prosecution and i'm kaitlin collins live outside the supreme court this morning, this landmark case, trump versus united states, revolves around whether trump is immune from prosecution regarding charges that he used his office to attempt to overturn the 2020 election but as neil justice, neil gorsuch summed it up, the significance of this is a decision not just for donald trump but also for future presidencies. >> as he said, quote, we are writing a rule for the ages. >> i made her son cooper from new york. today's ruling could boiled down to whether trump's actions were official as part of his presidential duties are private, and the court's decision will determine if trump could face trial on these federal charges before the november election. it's really difficult to overstate just how consequential this ruling is going to be, not just for donald trump's immediate legal and plop possible political peril. but for all future us presidents as well, it's taken 67 days to issue this opinion on the final day of the term after us supreme court justices heard oral arguments back in april, trump's lawyers argued that presidential immunity is an essential protection against overzealous prosecutors if a president can be charged, put on trial in imprisoned for his most controversial decisions as soon as he leaves office that looming threat, we'll distort the president's decision-making precisely when bold and fearless action is most needed. but the attorney for the u.s. justice department argued that no president should ever be above the law his novel theory would immunized former president's for criminal liability, for bribery, treason, sedition murder and here, conspiring to use fraud to overturn the results. someone election. and perpetuate himself in power thanks so much. >> let's talk about this with my panel or in studio with us, we have many experts. i'm going to start with john king and john, it's going to what happens today is so incredibly important maybe not as important politically is what happened last week but for the ages certainly, it took the court 67 days to release this decision, just over four months until election day. that in itself is a victory for donald trump anything that delays the trials. and so the decision today, let's say they send it back to the court and saying they make a distinct the lower court said it's back to the lower courts. they make a distinction between official acts because some of this could have been, he was president and some of it was he was candidate, even that causes more delay. so in the short term, donald trump, in some ways has already won in that it's most unlikely, even if he loses at the court today, pretty hard to see that trial taking place before the election and that's the more consequential trial in the stormy daniels hush money campaign finance. it's a much more serious issue that jack smith is trying to prosecute. so trump has won with the delay the question is, what happens today in the short-term in a very competitive race where trump has to be feeling better this week they did last week because of the debate, what happens there and justice gorsuch is absolutely correct. a president's 20 a 4050100 years from now will be impacted by this decision. in the immediacy because of where we are four months, 18 weeks to a presidential election. we're thinking about trump and trump trials, but it is a bigger decision than that with all the cases against donald trump, donald trump is promising retribution. he's promising that he's going to go after the he's generals, these members of the january 6 committee, et cetera, and then obviously there is this question of what kind of immunity mike president joe biden, if he doesn't win in november, what might he have? i actually asked trump about that on thursday about going after his political opponents. take a listen your main political opponent is standing on stage with you tonight. can you clarify exactly what it means about you feeling you have every right to go after your political opponents. >> well, i said my retribution is going to be success, but he could be a convicted felon as soon as he gets out of office, joe could be a convicted felon with all of the things that he's done, he's done horrible thing all of the death caused at the border telling the ukrainian people that we're going to want $1 billion, or you change the prosecutor. otherwise you're not getting $1 billion this isn't just about hypotheticals. trump has already using the rhetoric this decision today could have an impact again, who knows what's going to happen in november, but it could have an impact on what happens after november. >> it absolutely could and certainly trump was you could hear their that he had a message that his team wanted him to deliver to steer away. i mean, they know that this retribution kind of line is something that tends to damaged his standing with independence and swing voters. so you could hear them, they're trying not to, but then you could see what seems to really be there when we hear donald trump speaking without a teleprompter in more unfocused, shall we say situations right? how he really feels about this? i think the other piece when you look at it from the flip side of how how it could impact things. let's not forget about how much people have talked about how donald trump is running for president to protect himself from the situation that he is facing with the federal judiciary. because the bottom line is, if he is reelected he can make this entire case go away. >> that's absolutely true. and likely everyone stayed with me i'm going to throw it to caitlin outside the court, kaitlan yeah. >> daken, obviously, the trump team has been weighing all of that as they are at this point waiting to find out, just like the rest of us, what exactly it is that the supreme court has decided here they have run through basically every option in their mind. and kristen holmes is here with me in casino. obviously, we've been talking to the trump to you about this. they don't expect to outbreak when they don't think that the supreme court's going to come out and say, actually, yeah, you are completely immune from prosecution, but they're looking for a way to essentially have them split the baby where they do they are vindicated on certain points of this and it does go back down to a lower court to figure out. okay. what's an official act and what's not an official active, therefore, delaying the case even further. right. and i would actually argue that they think this went better than they thought it would even at the beginning, when i talked to them when they were going into the supreme court, originally, they were like this as a hail mary pass. we're going in there, we're saying blanket immunity, but we don't know if this is actually going to go anywhere. we just know the fact that the supreme court has taken up is going to the delay the case. but when i talk to their various legal advisors that members of the campaign, they feel i'm cautiously optimistic and that is not based on just their hopes. this is based on what they saw particularly the line of questioning from justice kavanaugh, justice roberts. they are looking at this for any kind of limited immunity because as you said, this is all about how can they delay this case past the election node? argue that isn't just a maybe of whether or not he's going to dismiss the case if you wins in the fall, this is certain that is part of the plan that they have had all along that these two federal cases would be gone almost the moment that he enters the white house, if he is to win again, the whole point has been to push this further and further. now, in their mind, their calculus says that if everything goes terribly and they lose on all fronts today, that it's still possible this could get delayed past the election just given the fact that it'd be so close to the election, there might be some kind of conversation around political powers and political sway, but they don't know if that would work what's interesting also is in speaking to them is that trump doesn't draw the distinction that his attorneys do. >> and well, some of this is official acts, some of its unofficial acts. trump just argues for blinken immunity. i mean, what they argue in court as different than what he argues publicly and untrue, so then that's always how it is with that, right? you know, he he says one thing just in terms of a statement that's out there and lays there and then they tried to find the nuance and we're looking at a case here. where they have a very powerful and very smart lawyer. jonathan's our who has done this before. and as somebody who is well-respected on both sides of the aisle and by the supreme court itself. so what he is looking at, what they are hoping for right now is this limited immunity so that this does go back to jack smith. he has to restructure the case. he has to do this sorting between what was personal and what was an official act. and then this will get delayed beyond the election, which of course would mean that donald trump would eventually be able to dismiss this case. and we actually heard from trump this morning he did a radio interview with john frederick's, one of his favorite conservative host. and this is what he said about this decision that we are waiting any moment to get immunity statement that's coming out they say on sunday on monday, that you have to be very interesting to see what happens. but i think it has a bigger impact joe biden then it has an mi actually i mean, obviously he's implying and what trump has argued is that future presidents would face prosecution. >> i mean, he's been out personally to go after what i mean, we saw what he said to jake take essentially saying, oh, he should be worried. >> joe biden because he's committed more crimes while in office, and also, it's almost like saying, if i was to be in office and this of course, is that his veiled way of saying, i might look at his chart, what he did and office as well, which is something he has said before. this is very important to donald trump, no matter what he says, matter what he says about it being more important to president joe biden. that's just how he talks as you obviously know, this is critical to them because they don't want this case, they do not want this trial happening before the election and just given all that they have seen, there is still a chance that if he does not get any immunity he which seems highly unlikely again, given what we saw during oral arguments that this could go to trial. and so for them, it is critical to have any kind of slice here of immunity or vagueness, or of nuance so that the case has to go back. >> and the fact that we're even here showed that the justices at least wanted to explore that question and to see what it was exactly anderson that what is the limit of presidential immunity because clearly they don't believe it's blanket immunity, but they also don't agree with what a court in dc found, which is that there is no immunity for what the president had. what whether we as an office and of course, what he could be held accountable for after he left office. >> yeah, i'm the supreme court heard arguments, indicates back in april after lower courts rejected trump's claim of presidential immunity. >> now that hearing, the newest justice on the bench could zhongyi a codon g. brown jackson questioned if taking liability off the table could embolden future presidents to commit crimes while in office if someone with those kinds of powers, the most powerful person in the world with the greatest amount of authority could go into office knowing that there would be no potential penalty for committing crimes. >> i'm trying to understand what the disincentives it is from turning the oval office into the seat of criminal activity in this country here, here in new york, with the team. >> let's start abby, phillip, and attorney joey jackson i mean, it really boils down to what are private acts and what our official acts yeah. >> and i think first of all, i think the court did not necessarily by the idea that what trump was accused of here. we're private acts that seemed like a bridge too far. >> there were a number of cases during the questioning where attorneys for trump, but essentially admitted that some certain things would be proud of and they actually went line by line through the indictment. and in some cases acknowledged that at the core of the indictment were public acts. they were they were they were or sr i'm sorry. we're not official acts of a sitting president of the united states, not in furtherance of his role as president. so in a way, are they acknowledged that i don't necessarily think that that's where this is going to come. come down to. i do think that the court has already said by just taking this case, that they want to put this issue on the table. they think it's a legitimate issue for them to address and secondly, i think that just that alone is a victory even if they don't answer the full question, which we've seen just in this term on a number of occasions, they have not decided on the full question. they might leave it open just enough that it keeps this issue alive, not just right now in this case for trump, but down the road, it should another situation like this emerge. and one of the real issues and risks risks that are a lot of people say the country faces is trump, basically being emboldened by a lack of accountability for his previous set of actions and going even further another time around making it certain that this is not going to be the last time we'll revisit this. >> enjoy alina kagan, justice kagan, a press trump's lawyers over whether a person staging a coup would be considered a quote, official akre. want to play that let's say this president who ordered the military to stage a coup he's no longer president. >> he wasn't a phd, couldn't be impeached. but but he ordered the military to stage a coup and you're saying that's an official act i think it would i think it would depend on the circumstances where there was an official act if it were an official act, again, he would have to be what does that mean? it depend on the circumstances. you sent an official on the way you described that hypothetical it could well be. i just don't know. you'd have again, it's a fact specific context is determination that answer sounds to me as though it's like yeah under my test, it's an official act, but that sure sounds bad, doesn't it enjoy the court today? >> might not make a decision about whether what trump did was an official act or a private act. they might just craft a ruling that then sends it back down to a lower court to make to actually define whether what trump did fits their quality okay she's so that is a very likely outcome, anderson. and if they do that, that leads some more uncertainty, right? because think about it. the court has a number of options here. one of the options is to create a bright line rule, as did judge chutkan when she issued her ruling saying, you know what, presidents and i kings then i popes, they have presidents and they have to follow the law like everyone else. then you have the court of appeals weigh in and say essentially the same thing now if we have a supreme court that makes him more nuanced rule, i don't think they'll make that assessment with respect to what's official, what's on official, and if it's official is it criminal? is it not? i think that would be a remand down to the lower court to make that assessment. one thing further, if they do that that that is a supreme court issuing it back to the lower court. do they then make this a judicial determination? a question of law in terms of what's official or unofficial or does it become a jury question, meaning it's up to a jury after hearing all the evidence to make an assessment as to a do you meet the element if a president is prosecuted? of it official, non-official, it can get very complicated. so it's going to be a ruling with major implications as to whether it's specific and clear and articulate will or whether it just puts us in a more state of confusion. and john, this does not affect the classified documents case. this is not about the new york hush money case. this really will affect jack smith that's the four felony charges on the election. >> i can have an impact in george also because it deals with actions that were taken during the time in which donald trump was president. >> so those are the cases where the most clearest direct impact right now, i will say this as we are waiting for the supreme court to weigh in an issue, it's official decision, it's already made two decisions here. which have effectively gone donald trump's way. number one, jack smith asked to have the supreme court rule on this last january, like way now come early and tell us now what you think about this. they said no, no, it's not for us. let's let it work up. the court system here and then when ultimately it did go pass the appeals court court and supreme court decided it was going to get in. it's not that they've taken their time, but you will note this is the last case they're deciding and this term no, no one said it had to be the last case. you decide in this term they could have issued their decision earlier. so the delay or the time it has taken has made this almost impossible, almost for this to go to trial before lecture, there should be happening any minute, jake, let's get back to you. thanks, anderson. and let's talk about this issue of immunity and what it means. jamie can go let me start with you what does it mean to jack smith? what does it mean to voters? this idea that what the court's going to rule on. so apart from the question of whether we can have this trial before the election if, there is a trial on any part of it, it's going on during the campaign but if there isn't a trial american voters don't get to hear the evidence. >> they don't get to your the grand jury testimony from people like former chief of staff, mark meadows. maybe they don't get to see the rest of his text messages from former vice president mike pence, who apparently was taking notes during the time from the former white house counsel's pets ipl one pat fill open an eric hirschman who knew what trump was doing and saying in real time. so that could potentially be a game changer in this election and frame elie if you would, what the court is looking at here is as a legal matter and whether this is in your view, going to be a simple yes, he has immunity or no, he doesn't have immunity. it's probably gonna be something more complicated. they will be now as we sit here, 10:17 a.m. we know nothing about criminal immunity. it's never been decided by the u.s. supreme court before, so we're about to get some really big answers. number one, is there even such thing as criminal immunity? we've had civil immunity in this country going back 42 years, but we don't officially know whether there's criminal immunity. question two, if there is such thing as criminal immunity, what are the parameters? where does it apply? where does but not apply seems likely it's going to be somehow related to was the on-the-job or off the job. and then really importantly, question three, if there is some immunity, will get the rules, the parameters. how does it apply to trump? it's possible. the supreme court says, we find it does or does not apply to donald trump. that's that i think i