President Joe Biden on Monday criticized U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon's decision to dismiss the classified documents case against Donald Trump, calling the ruling "specious" and suggesting it was inspired by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.
"I'm not surprised," Biden told NBC News anchor Lester Holt about the ruling, which tossed out the criminal case against Trump in Florida, finding that the appointment of special counsel Jack Smith was illegal.
He said the ruling "comes from the immunity decision the Supreme Court ruled on" this month, and he pointed to a concurring opinion in the ruling by Thomas, which he inaccurately referred to as a dissent. It was a concurrence that no other justices joined.
"Clarence Thomas, in his dissent, said that independent prosecutors created by the attorney general aren’t legit. That’s the basis of which this judge moved to dismiss," Biden said. In his opinion, Thomas challenged Smith’s appointment. “If there is no law establishing the office that the Special Counsel occupies, then he cannot proceed with this prosecution. A private citizen cannot criminally prosecute anyone, let alone a former President,” Thomas wrote.
The opinion was not binding on Cannon, but Trump's attorneys had urged her to consider it when she made her ruling, and the 93-page decision included three references to it.
Biden noted that he cooperated with special counsel Robert Hur's investigation into him even though "I didn't do a damn thing." He called Cannon's ruling "specious" because he disagrees with Thomas.
Holt noted that Biden has campaigned in part on Trump's legal problems and asked whether Trump's recent court victories would change that. Biden said they would not.
"I can talk about what I think is appropriate," Biden said, which includes that "the Supreme Court made a terrible decision."
"They seem out of touch with what the founders intended," he said.
