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The judge overseeing Donald Trump's classified documents case has refused the former president's legal team's request to delay pre-trial deadlines.
Judge Aileen Cannon rejected calls for a February 22 deadline to file pre-trial motions to be put back amid discussions between the judge, the former president's counsel and Special Counsel Jack Smith's team on how the sensitive materials related to the case can be discussed in front of the jury.
Cannon, who was was nominated to the bench by Trump, has frequently faced criticism that her rulings have favored the former president, including ones that could delay the start of trial, which is currently scheduled for May 20.
Trump, the expected 2024 Republican presidential nominee, has also faced accusations he is hoping delay the start of the federal classified documents trial until after November's election in the hopes that if he wins the race, he could then demand the Department of Justice drop the case once he enters office.
Lawyers for Trump recently asked Cannon to extend a deadline by when the former president and his two co-defendants, Walt Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira, have to file evidentiary motions. Cannon rejected the request.
"The deadline to file pre-trial motions (as distinct from motions in limine seeking the exclusion of specific evidence/arguments from being presented during trial) remains February 22, 2024," Cannon wrote in court filings.
"However, to the extent the Court's resolution of the pending Motions to Compel Discovery 262 yields a specified need of any party to supplement previously filed pre-trial motions and/or to file evidentiary motions that could not reasonably have been filed by February 22, 2024, the Court will consider such arguments as appropriate, but only upon a particularized and timely showing that events post-dating February 22, 2024, clearly justify additional pre-trial briefing."
Trump's legal team has been contacted for comment via email.
Reacting to Cannon opting to rule against Trump, Barbara McQuade, a former U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan, told Newsweek: "I think we should look at judges' decisions the way we look at decisions of a good referee. They should be calling each decision as they see them, and not worry about make-up calls."
Cannon recently gave Trump's team a boost after allowing them to receive unredacted FBI witnesses' reports as part of the classified documents case, despite Smith's objections.
Smith had argued to Cannon that allowing the evidence to be handed over during discovery as unredacted would reveal the identities of numerous potential witnesses, as well as potentially exposing them to "significant and immediate risks of threats, intimidation, and harassment" ahead of the high-profile trial.
Trump has pleaded not guilty to 40 federal charges over allegations he illegally retained classified and top secret materials after he left office in January 2021 and then obstructed federal attempts to retrieve them from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.
The former president has repeatedly called the case against him a politically motivated "witch hunt" that aims to stop him from winning the 2024 election.
Update 2/16/24, 9:22 a.m. ET: This article has been updated with comment from Barbara McQuade.
About the writer
Ewan Palmer is a Newsweek News Reporter based in London, U.K. His focus is reporting on US politics, and Florida ... Read more