CNN — Judge Aileen Cannon is again ripping up the court schedule in former President Donald Trump’s classified documents case – pushing some of the legal questions that have been before her for months even further down the road.
Cannon is planning on holding a sprawling hearing on Trump’s request to declare Jack Smith’s appointment as special counsel invalid, signaling she could be more willing than any other trial judge to veto the special prosecutor’s authority.
The planned hearing also adds a new, unusual twist in the federal criminal case against the former president: Cannon on Tuesday said that a variety of political partisans and constitutional scholars not otherwise involved with the case can join in the oral arguments later this month.
It’s an extraordinary elevation of arguments in a criminal case – filed a year ago this week – that likely won’t see trial until next year, if at all.
Wednesday, Cannon went further, adding a hearing on a gag order request from prosecutors to limit Trump’s rhetoric about law enforcement and allotting more time to hear arguments on the special counsel issue.
Cannon will hear arguments on those issues the week of June 21, as well as on the effort by Trump to throw out evidence in his case that was gathered by the FBI in its 2022 search of Mar-a-Lago or provided by his former attorney Evan Corcoran to a grand jury.
At the same time, she delayed other hearings without setting a new date.
The calendar shuffling is the latest example of Cannon’s approach so far to the national security case: scheduling hours in court for arguments that other courts have mostly denied, and pushing off resolution of various legal matters for months.
The delays are a significant legal win for Trump, who also scored a major victory in Georgia on Wednesday, where the state court of appeals put the election subversion conspiracy case there on hold indefinitely.
Similar challenges from Trump and other high-level targets of special counsel probes have flopped from coast to coast in recent years: Hunter Biden’s attorney didn’t get anywhere with judges in Los Angeles and Delaware; Paul Manafort’s arguments fell flat when the former Trump campaign chairman challenged special counsel Robert Mueller’s authority; and Andrew Miller, a former associate of Roger Stone, also lost his challenge to Mueller’s authority.
Even with other federal trial-level judges allowing special counsels’ criminal prosecutions, Cannon could rule differently.
Cannon’s signal of willingness to entertain challenges to the special counsel comes in the same week Republicans are bearing down on Attorney General Merrick Garland for his use of special counsels.
The issue, now before Cannon in the Southern District of Florida federal court, is likely to remain in the political debate at least until Cannon holds a hearing on the legal power of the special counsel to prosecute a defendant, on June 21.
