is the last word. the 11th hour with stephanie ruhle starts right now. tonight, the historic supreme court decision on donald trump's immunity claim. the high court raising the bar for prosecuting the former president . how will impact the federal election case. what is next after last week's debate. the biden campaign touting big fundraising numbers. will defend of calls for the president to drop out of the race. the 11th hour gets underway on this monday night. good evening. i am stephanie ruhle live from rockefeller center and we are 127 days away from election. today, the supreme court gave donald trump more legal cover in his election interference case and transferred the power the u.s. presidency. in a 6-3 decision, the justices ruled the trump has immunity for some of his actions as president in that case. here is my car like laura jarrett with the details. >> reporter: tonight, monumental win at the supreme court for former president trump . the conservative majority finding the gop nominee must receive sweeping immunity for any official acts taken during his presidency. the 6-3 ruling, defeat for special counsel jack smith in the court bulldozing through the charges against trump for his alleged criminal efforts to stay in power, making the completion of any trial before november virtually impossible. chief justice john roberts laying out a new sliding scale of what can be prosecuted singing a president may not be prosecuted for exercising his core constitutional powers. he has immunity from prosecution for all his official acts but a president has no immunity for private, an official acts while cautioning the president is not above the law. a federal grand jury indicted the former president for orchestrating a conspiracy to retake the white house. prosecutors alleging he leaned on his doj, vp, and state officials to help and restores the election results mobilizing meetings of a collectors. culminating in the violent attack on the capitol. trump has pleaded not guilty to all charges and argued without immunity, every president could be prosecuted by political opponents. >> if you don't have immunity, you won't do anything. will be a ceremonial president. you won't take any other risks. >> reporter: the majority agreeing the commander in chief must be able to carry out his constitutional duties without risk of political prosecution writing without immunity, such types of prosecutions of ex- presidents could quickly become routine. that would weaken the presidency which is exactly what the framers intended to avoid. the special counsel had pushed to get the case to trial before november. >> my office will seek a speedy trial. >> reporter: chipping away at parts of smith's case in the justices finding then attorney general to investigate voter fraud, now absolutely immune from prosecution. what remains in the indictment including his pressure on his former vp? >> mike pence will have to come through for us. >> reporter: local officials like this phone call to the georgia former secretary of state. >> i just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. >> are entitled to a presumption of immunity. >> reporter: the liberal justices with a pushback, justice sotomayor writing when a president uses his official powers in any way under the majority reasoning, he will be insulated from criminal prosecution. orders the navy seal team six to assassinate a political rival? immune. organizes a military coup to hold onto power? immune. takes a bribe in exchange for pardon? immune. even if these never play out, the damage has been done. >> tonight, president biden criticize the court's decision calling it a dangerous precedent for the future and saying it's a disservice to the nation that donald trump will not stand trial for his actions before the upcoming election. >> now the american people have to do with the court should've been willing to do but will not. we have to render a judgment about donald trump's behavior. perhaps, most importantly, american people must decide they want to and trust the president once again, the presidency to donald trump now knowing he will be even more emboldened to do whatever he pleases when he wants to do it. >> let's get smarter with the help of our leadoff panel. andrew weissmann a former senior member of the mueller probe and now a law professor at nyu, harry litman, former u.s. attorney. susan glasser, staff writer for the new yorker. andrew, what does this mean for jack smith's election interference case against trump? there's lots of reaction but level it for us. >> sure. small picture. the big picture, by the way, is the decision in terms of what it means for the presidency and checks and balances. this could not be a worst decision in terms of our country. in terms of what it means for the case, one, there will not be a trial before the general election. there is no way for that to happen. there's too much that we need to happen in too many appeals. two, there likely will be a hearing that judge chutkan has been called on by the supreme court to have to decide what is official conduct and what is an official conduct. at that hearing, although i think there will be lots of disputes about what evidence can be used, a lot of witnesses can be called so you could have a mini trial. that is sort of a small silver lining that there may be that vehicle for people to see additional evidence that did not, during the january 6 hearing. then whatever judge chutkan finds, there likely to be appeals of that as to whether she got her decision correct as to what should be in the official bucket and therefore immune under this case are what is unofficial and therefore not immune under this case. >> harry, you wrote an op-ed for the l.a. times saying this ruling makes it anyone's guess whether trump, not just before the election, but will ever face accountability in this case. how does the decision compared to what you expected to see? >> it is more far-reaching and in particular to that point, it lops off big chunks of the indictment, and it's not at all clear, we have no concrete guidance that obviously saves any part of the indictment. trump as an argument to make in any context. the point andrew raised, he will fight tooth and nail and say you can't even put on evidence because i would be immune here. they are cryptic but it's quite clear, if he is acting in a way that can somehow be classified as parts of for powers he's immune. he was be immune for pernicious reasons, they cannot look into his motive which is the core, i think, what we think he did wrong in the soul of the criminal live. it doesn't matter where he uses powers, and that really does make him tantamount to a king. >> core powers. you know whatever the case may be, i'm going to try to connected to money and power. i want to talk the business impact. now donald trump has an even more wide open lane if you were to be president again to mix personal business interests with a possible official government role. early in his presidency, he claimed there could be no conflicts of interest for a president. that he steamrolled through his four years with the trump hotel and dcn said in mar-a-lago. lobbyist groups, foreign governments booking rooms, basically soft bribing him with paying his businesses. we saw ivanka trump get chinese trademarks and jared raising monies from the saudi's. they talked about the emoluments clause but nothing happened. now, he is going to have an even easier time if you were to be president again, the irony of all of this, it reported today that the trump family just inked a deal for trump tower saudi arabia. >> but of course they did. look, it's a breathtaking decision and you can only imagine that donald trump, he is a maximizer and will seek to push the limits, whatever the limits are. the supreme court has basically said there are no limits whatsoever. of course, he will claim the basically any contact he engages in is ipso facto official conduct and he can do whatever he wants. i think your point is an important one that already trump pushed the boundaries. other presidents abided by the rules that apply to other federal employees. they divested themselves of their private business investments. they tried to avoid even the appearance of a conflict of interest. trump was the first president to say, no, i'm not going to do that. he did not sell his business or otherwise put it into a blind trust. he refused to do that. other family members follow suit. saudi arabia, jared kushner was in the middle east on january 6 itself flying back for meetings in the middle east where he was working to set up his future to billion-dollar investment fund with funding from the crown prince of saudi arabia. it's not even new for the trump family to be engaged in business with the same family that they are trying to use to help influence elections in the united states, try to influence international diplomacy. it's a morass of conflicts of interest that we would not tolerate in any other federal government employee except, apparently, the former president. >> it is bananas. when trump was running for reelection, democrats were arguing, we are not going to let the barn door be open. we will change the rules and tighten up, and now here we are. they are looser than. our friend barb mcquade said there's good news. no community for unofficial exelon was saying immunity for official acts is only presumptive. i want to share a bit of what chuck rosenberg and lawrence o'donnell had to say about it. >> i don't see anything in here that says the assassination of a political rival is part of the president's core constitutional responsibilities for which he or she would be absolutely immune. the problem is much of this is indeterminate. we know certain things are absolutely immune and purely private conduct is not. for the other official acts which are presumptively immune, you have to have a case-by-case factual analysis. >> what this is, we create absolute immunity on one paragraph of the indictment. exactly one paragraph. all of the rest of the indictment goes back to judge chutkan's courtroom and she schedules this, the supreme court has ordered her to have a hearing about the evidence in the case to determine whether the act in question is an official act, whether it might have some protection or not. >> andrew, it's not at total home run for trump, correct? >> it's not a total home run but i think there are two clips are to -- one, the court has said there is absolute immunity with respect to what the president does or the department of justice. absolute immunity. the court has said for official acts and by the way for any core acts in which they say it's very broad, anything that involves basically take care clause and anything assigned directly to and exclusively to the president, those are absolutely immune. even for just ordinary official acts, the presumptive immunity and the test for overcoming that is one that seems very high in terms of the state meeting it. it is important to note that the court did not say presumptive immunity is it. they said at least presumptive immunity. from that, i think what you can read is certain of the justices wanted to go further. they left open the door to say it's at least presumptive but that does not mean they cannot go further. later. and it means when it comes back, if there is a hearing and judge chutkan makes rulings, when it comes back to the supreme court, the court can say, you know what? that's not the right test and these are all official and not an official and they are all immune. the court doesn't have to reach that now because of trump becomes president, the case will be gone. it will be gone the moment he takes office. he will dismiss it. they don't have to reach that now, but i think it's way too early for someone to have a rosy view of this case. my view it is a fundamental change in our country as to the checks and balances on the presidency. >> trump certainly has a rosy view. his fundraising email was titled total immunity. based on this decision, he is trying to get his sentencing in the new york case postponed and the guilty verdicts set aside. what are the chances that happens? >> most of the conduct there is pre-presidency but some of it was after. can you conceptualize, that's always the issue. he is signing checks to pay back someone who advanced money for hush money to a mistress. if anything is unofficial, it sure seems that is. i do want to agree with andrew that i think chuck and maybe lawrence are being a little rosy. this presumption only applies at a second level. at the higher level quote unquote official action, article 2 powers, you are out of luck. when he is usually baby seal six, he's a commander-in-chief. when he is doing saudi arabia deals, he is doing foreign- policy. if he can place it in the category of article 2, game over. period. >> my goodness, susan, the washington post editorial board wrote this decision invites presidents to push the boundaries. harry walked us through how that could happen. we could president biden do now that the decision is made. he is still in office. >> well, you know, everybody has a hypothetical. we are in a brave new world in terms of scenarios so everything is hypothetical. president biden did come out tonight, this evening, and i think he tried to make it clear that he will continue to abide by what he sees as the rule of law. i think his point about this decision is it would empower bad actors like the former president donald trump. i do not think in the white house as much as they might be tempted to, they probably are not sitting around drying up scenarios for using seal team six against donald trump. that would be my strong presumption at this moment. you know, we really are in the row above the unthinkable. >> justice thomas, the employment of jack smith is special counsel might be illegal. that's an issue in the florida classified documents case. what is your reaction? >> if you want to know the corruption of this supreme court and where it has gone, the idea to there's a precept when you are a judge that you only reach the issues that are before you and you don't give advisory opinions about things that are not before your. he issues this can concurrence which is a road map to judge cannon to say, you should rule that the appointment of special counsel smith is illegal. he had no business going down that road. the issue is not fully briefed and before the court. by the way, if jack smith's appointment was bad, well, what about rod per and david weiss and all the other special counsel's. you don't get to pick and choose, you know what, i don't like special counsel that deals with the horse that you are backing. to me, it was a deplorable sign of where this supreme court has. >> john dean, richard nixon's white house counsel said under today's decision, nixon would have had a pass on watergate. what are your thoughts on that? >> it is totally true. nixon and watergate in 1973 orders the doj to tell the fbi to stand down on the investigation. that to us as the sole obstruction. the soul of corruption. how would it come out under today's opinion? he's talking to the doj and that's part of his official powers, deciding whether to investigate and prosecute cases. by the way, we will not inquire into motive. that is it. he gets a pass there. the court to try to preserve the principle of having to produce evidence. he could not be subject to criminal prosecution or anything i can think of in water great in the most serious transgressions the country in history of long since convicted him of. and now it's by the boards, completely. >> oh, my goodness. here we are. thank you all so much for getting us started. when we return, the supreme court is facing serious heat not just from the american people but from fellow judges. one of them joins us to share what she thinks about the decisions and the fears he has for the future of the high court. strike the biden campaign navigating postdebate, and those calling for the president to drop out. the recovery efforts as the biden family urges him to keep on fighting. on fighting. today's decision on presidential immunity is bringing scrutiny to the supreme court. our next has spent decades as a federal judge and was considered for the supreme court under president clinton. this year he retired from the d.c. circuit court of appeals in part because of his frustrations with the current supreme court. he says the court, quote, seem to hold in the low regard the principles to which he dedicated his life. it turned into something he could barely recognize. i would like to david tatel, he served for three decades on the federal bench. his new book, vision, and memoir of blindness and justice is out now. thank you so much for being here. i want to start picketing your reaction to this immunity ruling. what do you make of this decision, sir? >> in my book, i say in a chapter about the supreme court's is a ration of the voting rights act. at the end of the chapter, i say, quote, i fear for our democracy. today, i fear for it even more. i had exactly the same reaction reading this that john dean did. if this opinion had been issued in 1970, don't think president ford would've had to issue a pardon. it is not exactly clear what the parameters, limitations of this decision is, but to me the one thing that is clear, i think it's unlikely that any future former president could be held responsible for criminal acts committed during their presidency. i think it is unlikely. >> house democrats about to get aggressive on the supreme court after this decision. they have few lovers to do so. she intends to file articles of impeachment against at least one justice. we don't know what justice that is. what do you think a solution could and should be? >> i think it's a long-term solution. i think it depends on elections and how they turn out. i think it depends on the court itself. i don't think there are shortcuts to this problem. >> you say impeachment is not one of them? >> no. i don't have any doubt that under the constitution, impeachment is reserved for high crimes and misdemeanors and not judicial decisions. impeach a judge because of a decision would be a terrible development. >> we know the american people has possibly the lowest opinion of the supreme court than they have had in modern history. do you think the court cares? none of them have to run for election. no risk of getting fired. are they brushing the soft? >> having been a one of those positions, lifetime appointment, to be honest i didn't think much about what the public thought either. i worked hard to function as a judge. here is what i think the problem is. i think the public respects courts and has a high respect for courts. when courts function as courts and are perceived as nonpolitical. i suspect there is a direct relationship between the decline in the publix support for the court and the publics view that the court is increasingly political. look what happened in 2016. donald trump said he was going to overrule roe v. wade and rain and the federal administrative state. he gave a list of judges who he said he would appoint, who would do that. he won the election and appointed them. the overruled roe and in decisions last week and today, they effectively reined in the administration, all on 6-3 decisions with the republicans in the majority. you can forgive the public for thinking this is a political not a legal institution and i think that's why it's polling has dropped. >> in your book, you talk about chevron, calling it an important principle of judicial restraint. then last week the supreme court overturned that landmark decision. what was your reaction to this? >> i dealt with chevron on the d.c. circuit for 30 years, hundreds of cases. chevron was a very effective way of