Donald Trump traveled to a Florida court Thursday to attend his lawyers’ request to drop charges against him for his potentially casual handling of classified documents upon his departure from the White House.
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Judge Aileen Cannon, in charge of the case, is holding a day-long hearing in a court north of Miami to hear motions to dismiss proposed by the 77-year-old billionaire’s lawyers.
The Republican candidate for the November presidential election is accused of compromising national security by keeping classified documents and pleaded not guilty in June.
Among these documents, some of which are “top secret”: military plans or even information on nuclear weapons. They were kept after his departure from the White House in January 2021 at his private residence Mar-a-Lago in Florida instead of being turned over to the National Archives as required by law.
He is also accused of attempting to destroy evidence in this case, for which he faces a total of 41 counts.
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According to his lawyers, Donald Trump had the right to keep these documents under the terms of a presidential records law, and his indictment should be dismissed by the judge.
But special prosecutor Jack Smith, who filed the indictment against the ex-president, rejected that argument in a court document.
Donald “Trump was not authorized to possess classified documents at all (let alone in unsecured locations at Mar-a-Lago),” Jack Smith said.
The trial, initially scheduled for May 20, will probably be postponed for several months, Judge Cannon wanting a timetable sufficiently spaced out to allow “flexibility”, in particular because of the possibility of overlap with other criminal proceedings against the ex-president.
Donald Trump’s lawyers argue that “a fair trial cannot be held until after the 2024 presidential election.”
If he were elected again, Donald Trump could, once inaugurated in January 2025, order an end to federal proceedings against him.
