Legal/Law/Criminal Justice and Reform

Trump’s Lawyers Try To Push Classified Documents Trial Until After The Election

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Former President Donald Trump’s lawyers asked the judge overseeing his classified documents case to postpone the trial until after the election.

Trump’s trial for charges stemming from his alleged possession of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago is currently scheduled for May 20, 2024. His lawyers asked U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon in a Wednesday night court filing to push it until “at least mid-November 2024,” citing scheduling conflicts with other trials and delays in the production of records used by Special Counsel Jack Smith.

With Trump’s 2020 election case trial in Washington, D.C. scheduled for March 4, 2024 — which also happens to be the day before Super Tuesday —  lawyers told Cannon the schedule currently requires Trump and his legal team “to be in two places at once.”

“The Special Counsel’s Office has not provided some of the most basic discovery in the case,” lawyers Christopher Kise and Todd Blanche wrote. “Given the current schedule, we cannot understate the prejudice to President Trump arising from his lack of access to these critical materials months after they should have been produced.”

Trump’s co-defendants, valet Walt Nauta and Mar-a-Lago employee Carlos De Oliveira, join his request to postpone the trial, lawyers wrote in a footnote.

Prosecutors wrote in a court filing week that they would provide many of the remaining materials by Oct. 6.

“This production will include certain materials that Defendants have described as outstanding, including audio recordings of interviews and information related to the classification reviews conducted in the case,” they wrote, noting the government has thus far produced “about 1.28 million pages” of discovery material for the defense

Trump’s lawyers have wrangled with judges over proposed trial dates in each of his cases, seeking to postpone them to accommodate conflicting case schedules as he continues to run his 2024 campaign.

His lawyers previously argued that the March trial date in his 2020 election case violated Trump’s due process rights, not allowing his legal team adequate time to prepare. In Georgia, where his trial has yet to be scheduled, Trump has fought to sever his case from co-defendants requesting a speedy trial.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis asked for all 19 co-defendants in the racketeering case, including Trump, to be tried starting on Oct. 23, a request the judge shot down.