Who Are the Potential Special Masters? See Trump and DOJ's Nominees

Lawyers for the Department of Justice (DOJ) and former President Donald Trump have submitted their recommendations for a special master to oversee the review of documents seized from Trump's southern Florida home last month.

Each side's picks for the position were laid out Friday in an eight-page filing in the southern Florida-based U.S. District Court. Judge Aileen Cannon this week agreed to a request from Trump's lawyers to appoint a special master to sort through government documents seized by federal agents from Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort. The DOJ has resisted appointing a special master and the filing reveals ongoing disagreements between the two sides.

Trump's legal team is asking that the special master review all seized materials while not requiring them to consult with the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA).

"The Government's position is that the Special Master should not review documents with classification markings; should not adjudicate claims of Executive Privilege (but should submit to NARA any documents over which such claims are made); and should consult with NARA on the determination of Presidential records," reads the filing.

DOJ lawyers have argued that appointing a special master to ensure Trump's personal and privileged documents are protected is unnecessary and not supported by law. This week, the DOJ signaled it was appealing the appointment of the special master and asked the judge to effectively allow investigators to continuing reviewing seized documents marked classified as part of its investigation.

The DOJ also supplied a list of recommendations for a potential special master, which follows:

Barbara Jones

Jones is a retired federal judge for the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, which includes Manhattan and other parts of New York City. Nominated by President Bill Clinton to the post in 1995, she stepped down in 2013 to go into private practice.

She is currently a partner at Bracewell LLP where she focuses on "corporate monitorships, compliance issues, internal investigations and arbitrations and mediations," according to the firm's website.

Notably, Jones has previously served as special master for cases related to Trump. In 2018, she was appointed to oversee potentially privileged documents seized by the FBI from Michael Cohen, Trump's former lawyer. Cohen later pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations, bank fraud, tax evasion and other charges.

Jones reprised the role in 2021 to ensure protection of attorney-client privilege of devices seized from Rudy Giuliani, former New York City mayor and ex-Trump attorney, in an investigation into whether Giuliani illegally lobbied on behalf of countries or entities.

Thomas Griffith

Also a retired federal judge, Griffith was appointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit from 2005 to 2020 after being nominated to the post by Republican President George W. Bush.

Currently, he is special counsel at Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP. Previously, he served as legal counsel for the Senate and as general counsel for Brigham Young University, a Utah school affiliated with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

While serving as an appeals court judge, Griffith in 2007 joined a majority opinion concluding that the Second Amendment protects the individual's right to bear arms.

President Joe Biden in 2021 appointed Griffith to a special commission on the Supreme Court that was assembled to consider reforms to the high court, including the number of justices and the duration of their appointments. Griffith also introduced Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson during her confirmation hearings for her seat on the Supreme Court.

Here are the picks from Trump's legal team:

Raymond J. Dearie

Dearie is a former chief judge for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, a court he was nominated to by President Ronald Reagan in 1986, according to the court's website. He served as the court's chief judge between 2007 and 2011.

Previously, he worked in private practice and as a federal prosecutor.

Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts in 2013 nominated Dearie to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), one of the nation's secretive judicial panels that oversees the collection of intelligence often related to terrorism or espionage.

Defense attorneys in an anonymous survey published by the Almanac of the Federal Judiciary of nominees to FISC, described Dearie as fair, with one reporting him as having "no leanings," Reuters reported in 2013.

Paul Huck, Jr.

Huck is the founder of The Huck Law Firm and a former partner at the Jones Day firm.

Previously, he served as general counsel to then-Florida Governor Charlie Crist, who was a Republican at the time, from 2007 to 2008, according to his biography on the conservative Federalist Society's website. Additionally, he served as deputy attorney general of Florida, overseeing prosecution of cases involving health care, telecommunications and pharmaceutical industries.

He began his career in Miami working on commercial litigation, the biography says.