Trump special counsel fires back at Cannon order that could disrupt case
Special counsel #Jack#Smith warned the judge overseeing Donald Trump’s #classified#documents case that
👉she is pursuing a legal premise that “is wrong”
and said he would probably #appeal to a higher court if she rules that a federal records law can protect the former president from prosecution.
In a near-midnight legal filing, Smith’s office pushed back hard against an unusual instruction from U.S. District Judge #Aileen M. #Cannon
— one that veteran national security lawyers and former judges have said badly misinterprets the Presidential Records Act and laws related to classified documents.
Smith’s filing represents the most stark and high-stakes confrontation yet between the judge and the prosecutor,
illustrating the extent to which a ruling by Cannon that legitimizes the #PRA as a defense could eviscerate the historic case.
It sets up the possibility that a government appeal of such a ruling could delay the trial well beyond November’s presidential election, in which Trump is the presumptive Republican nominee.
US District Judge #AileenCannon’s ultimatum Mon night came as a surprise twist in what could have been a simple order; one merely asking federal prosecutors & Trump’s lawyers for proposed #JuryInstructions at the upcoming #trial.
“Under the statutory scheme established by the Presidential Records Act, the decision to segregate personal materials from Presidential records is made by the President during the President’s term, and in the President’s sole discretion.”
Judge Amy Berman Jackson, Judicial Watch v. National Archives, 2012