Plan to stop Trump in court looks doomed to fail
WASHINGTON, DC – Prominent supporters of US President Joe Biden’s re-election campaign say they are now in “freakout” mode after a series of developments suggesting Donald Trump may avoid facing trial before November’s election on most of the 91 criminal charges laid against him.
A series of judges and courts now find themselves in the crosshairs of Democrats who claim the judicial system is now actively contributing to the likelihood that the former president will once again secure the keys to the Oval Office.
Democrats thought it was all going to be so different. Across the nation, they convinced themselves that Trump’s first trial on charges that he attempted to subvert the outcome of the 2020 election would begin in Washington on 4 March, the eve of Super Tuesday when presidential primaries and caucuses will be held in 15 separate states.
But on Friday, Judge Tanya Chutkan bowed to the inevitable and scrubbed the date from her courtroom’s calendar. There will be no need for Trump to present himself before her next month, because an appeals court is still considering the former president’s claim that he enjoys blanket immunity from prosecution for any actions that he committed while in office.
Judge Chutkan said she will only reschedule Trump’s trial “if and when” his immunity claims are resolved. That sparked fury for some, who argue that justice delayed against Trump will be justice denied for American voters.
“I have no idea what the court of appeals is doing,” former acting solicitor general Neal Katyal told MSNBC on Saturday. Describing himself as “officially now at the freakout stage”, the Obama-era official claimed the court’s failure rapidly to reject Trump’s claim of immunity “will put the trial past June”.
Even that timeline now looks optimistic. The immunity decision is sure to disappoint either Trump or special counsel, Jack Smith, and will give rise to an appeal to the US Supreme Court. Trump insiders believe that through myriad legal filings and appeals, they can kick the federal prosecution on election interference into the long grass.
Meanwhile in Florida, Judge Aileen Cannon is now accused of deliberately slow-walking Trump’s federal prosecution on charges of mishandling classified documents that were stored in – among other places – a bathroom at the former president’s Mar-A-Lago resort.
Judge Cannon, a Trump appointee, ordered a 20 May trial date in a ruling last July. But in the intervening months, critics assert she has deliberately moved pre-trial motions at a leisurely pace. If the trial does not start by November, it may not happen at all as Trump could order the Justice Department to dismiss charges if he gains a second shot at the presidency.
In Georgia, a third case against Trump has also run into difficulty. Last August, Democrats celebrated the decision by Fulton County District Attorney, Fani Willis, to bring criminal charges against Mr Trump and 18 alleged co-conspirators, accusing them of election interference in the state. The wide-ranging case even used criminal statutes normally reserved for mobsters in the indictment of the former president.
But last week Willis – an elected Democrat – conceded that she had engaged in an affair with Nathan Wade, a married attorney she appointed special prosecutor in the case against Trump. The affair was revealed in legal filings lodged by Wade’s wife, who is now seeking a divorce. Willis denies allegations that Wade used some of the $650,000 (£517,000) that he has earned working on the Trump case to pay for her to travel with him to Florida, California and the Caribbean.
There is no trial date set for the Georgia case. The Trump team is demanding Willis’s resignation and argues the entire case should be dropped. The district attorney’s conduct has – at the very least – fuelled the likelihood that no proceeding will begin this year.
The only case, then, that may see Trump dragged before a judge soon relates to his alleged 2016 hush-money payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels. Widely considered to be the least serious of the various trials that Trump faces, it’s currently the only one likely to take place in a timely manner.
“This is really not looking good for the federal judiciary,” groused former assistant US attorney, Andrew Weissman, on MSNBC. He is one observer who hopes to see Trump sidelined by legal convictions, but cautions “the delay is allowing him essentially to win the battle and the war”.
