Aileen Cannon Gives Donald Trump a 48 Hour Deadline

Judge Aileen Cannon is giving former President Donald Trump's defense team 48 hours to file all pretrial motions in the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case individually.

Cannon issued an order on Tuesday rejecting Trump's efforts to file all of his pretrial motions in one go. Instead, she asked that each motion be filed "on an individual basis" to the court and Special Counsel Jack Smith on or before Thursday. She also rejected his request to file redacted versions of certain motions on a temporary basis.

Newsweek reached out to Trump's lawyers via email for comment.

The order comes after Trump attorney Todd Blanche said in a Tuesday motion that the former president wanted to file "at least 10 pretrial motions" disputing the charges that accuse him of having retained classified records after leaving the White House and obstructing efforts to have them returned.

The motions were expected to dispute Smith's appointment to the case, Trump's presidential immunity claim, the raid at Mar-a-Lago and the Presidential Records Act, among other things, according to Blanche.

The request to submit a consolidated brief of the motions was opposed by Smith, who argued that it was part of Trump's "relentless" plan to delay trial "at any cost." Smith argued that Trump's legal team could load up the motions with "misleading" theories that would further stall the proceedings.

Trump's lawyers had argued that filing the motions together would make it more efficient and argued that the public version should be censored because of the highly classified nature of the case.

However, Cannon ordered all "final, unredacted copies" to be emailed within 48 hours of her order. After those filings, any party wishing to redact anything in the motion could file another motion specifying why on or before February 27 and opposition to those requests would be due February 29, two days after issues were raised. Cannon would then decide which redactions, if any, to accept.

Throughout the case, Cannon, who was nominated to the federal bench by Trump, has been viewed as favoring the former president.

Last year, she halted the FBI from reviewing the documents found in the former president's possession and handed it over to a special master for review first—a decision that was overturned by the 11th Circuit. She also ordered Smith to turn in certain sensitive information that would reveal witness identities, a move that some experts have said gave Smith cause to ask for Cannon's removal from the case.