The nation's highest court stays out of a high-profile legal battle involving former President Donald Trump.
CBS News reported that the Supreme Court has declined to intervene in a dispute concerning special counsel Jack Smith's efforts to obtain records from Donald Trump's account on X, formerly known as Twitter.
This decision leaves intact a lower court ruling that upheld a nondisclosure order, preventing the social media company from informing Trump about the demand for his information.
The case stems from Smith's investigation into alleged attempts to subvert the peaceful transfer of power following the 2020 election. In January 2023, the federal government obtained a court-authorized warrant for information associated with Trump's @realDonaldTrump account.
U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell ordered X to turn over the requested data and prohibited the company from disclosing the warrant for 180 days. X, owned by billionaire Elon Musk, initially challenged the nondisclosure order, claiming it violated the company's First Amendment right to communicate with Trump.
However, Judge Howell ultimately ruled the order valid and imposed a $350,000 civil contempt sanction on the company for failing to hand over the records on time.
The dispute between X and Smith remained confidential for several months until a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit was unsealed in August 2023. By this time, Trump had been indicted on four charges related to what the special counsel described as a plot to reverse the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.
The prosecution was temporarily halted while Trump appealed a district court's decision regarding presidential immunity from prosecution. In July 2024, the Supreme Court's conservative majority ruled that the former president cannot be charged for some official acts that occurred during his time in office, but unofficial acts are not covered by immunity.
Following the high court's ruling, a federal grand jury returned a new indictment against Trump with a narrower set of allegations. The federal district court is now conducting further proceedings to determine whether Trump's conduct, particularly his communications with Vice President Mike Pence, is subject to immunity as outlined by the Supreme Court.
X had asked the Supreme Court to decide whether social media companies can be forced to give user communications to the government while being prohibited from notifying the user.
The company claimed that the nondisclosure order denied Trump the chance to claim executive privilege over the information before it was passed to the special counsel.
X also pointed out that the issue is not limited to Trump's case. Other users, like journalists, doctors, or lawyers, might want to protect their own privileges but wouldn’t have the opportunity to do so under such orders. This raises concerns about how nondisclosure orders could affect various professions and their confidential communications.
The Supreme Court's decision not to intervene in this dispute allows the lower court ruling to stand, enabling special counsel Jack Smith to access certain information from Trump's X account. This development is part of the ongoing investigation into alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 election results. The case highlights the complex intersection of social media, privacy rights, and criminal investigations involving high-profile political figures.
