A federal judge says special counsel Jack Smith will issue his final report on Donald Trump’s criminal case until the president-elect’s last-ditch lawsuit, which an appeals court seeks to block from becoming public, is resolved. was temporarily blocked.
U.S. District Judge Eileen Cannon, who presided over President Trump’s criminal case over the retention of classified documents until she dismissed it last year, issued an injunction barring the Justice Department from releasing the final report or its draft version.
“Attorney General Garland, the Department of Justice, Special Counsel Smith, all of their officers, agents, and employees, and all persons actively cooperating or participating with these individuals, are temporarily detained.” Cannon wrote in a two-page order.
A final report on Trump’s criminal case was due to be submitted to the attorney general by Friday, but Cannon’s judicial intervention means the timeline is up in the air, given the complex sequence that could arise. It could mean something.
On Monday, lawyers for Mr. Trump’s former co-defendants in the documents lawsuit asked Mr. Cannon for an injunction. On Tuesday morning, they filed a similar motion in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. The circuit currently has jurisdiction over the case, where prosecutors are challenging Cannon’s dismissal.
The injunction granted by Mr. Cannon will remain in effect until three days after the Eleventh Circuit issues its own ruling on whether to follow his order and block the release of the report, unless the Eleventh Circuit rules otherwise. .
But that leaves only a limited amount of time for Smith to release the two-volume report before Trump becomes president and the next attorney general almost certainly destroys the prospect of the highly damning documents being made public. There is.
According to the regulations, the special prosecutor is required to prepare a final report at the end of the investigation explaining the charging decision. Because special prosecutors are appointed to handle politically sensitive cases, their reports typically receive great public interest.
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The final report will initially be confidential when the special counsel sends it to the attorney general, but the attorney general can then choose how much of it will be made public, Garland previously said. He had promised to make at least some of the book’s contents public.
Mr. Cannon’s sudden intervention comes as Mr. Trump’s lawyers on Monday asked Mr. Garland to block the completion of the report and asked Mr. Cannon to issue a court order to block the release of Mr. Smith’s report. This was done after a series of extraordinary efforts.
Trump’s lawyers reviewed a draft of the report in Washington over the weekend. Efforts to block publication of the contents appear to stem from their fierce opposition to the report, which concludes that President Trump effectively orchestrated a criminal conspiracy.
Mr. Trump’s lawyers even objected to allowing Mr. Smith to write the report and asked Mr. Garland to remove Mr. Smith from his post. If Garland disagrees and Smith writes a report, the lawyers suggested it should be up to the next attorney general to decide whether it should be made public.
Lawyers have largely argued that Smith was improperly appointed because he was not confirmed by the Senate before taking office, which is the basis for Cannon’s dismissal of the classified documents lawsuit against Trump.
They argued that Cannon’s ruling was binding because Smith decided to drop his appeal of the ruling after Trump won the election. “Judge Cannon’s decision is a final decision with preemptive effect on these issues,” the attorneys wrote.
