Donald Trump hit with new indictment in 2020 election subversion case

Donald Trump faced a revised federal indictment on Tuesday accusing him of illegally trying to overturn his 2020 election loss, with prosecutors narrowing their approach after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that former presidents have broad immunity from criminal prosecution.

U.S. Special Counsel Jack Smith's team obtained the superseding indictment in the Washington case, though it was highly unlikely to proceed to trial ahead of the Nov. 5 election when the Republican Trump faces Democratic Vice-President Kamala Harris.

The revised indictment lays out the same four charges it brought against the Republican former president last year focusing on Trump's role as a political candidate seeking re-election, rather than as the president at the time.

The Supreme Court ruled on July 1 that Trump is at least presumptively immune from criminal prosecution for actions that were within his constitutional powers as president.

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan in Washington has been expected to decide in the coming weeks which aspects of the case must be tossed out based on the Supreme Court's immunity decision.

Attorneys for Trump did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In a statement on his Truth Social media platform, Trump said the Supreme Court's immunity ruling should lead to the entire case being thrown out, saying, "Smith rewrote the exact same case in an effort to circumvent the Supreme Court decision."

Trump has pleaded not guilty to the initial charges, denouncing this case and the others he faces as politically motivated attempts to prevent him from returning to power.

Opinion polls have shown Harris opening up a narrow national lead over Trump since Democratic President Joe Biden ended his re-election bid last month.

This indictment, like the initial one, accuses Trump of a multi-part conspiracy to block the certification of his election defeat to Biden.

It retains allegations Trump pressured then-vice-president Mike Pence to use his role presiding over the congressional certification of the election on Jan. 6, 2021, to reject electoral votes from battleground states Trump lost.

"The defendant had no official responsibilities related to the certification proceeding, but he did have a personal interest as a candidate in being named the winner of the election," the revised indictment states, language that did not appear in the original charging document.

A mob of Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on that Jan. 6 in an attempt to halt the congressional certification, which remains part of the case against Trump.

When asked how strong this updated case against Trump was, David Weigel, a politics reporter for Semafor, told CBC News it's "strong enough to get around what the justices argued when they ruled in Smith's last case."