U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan set a March 2024 trial date for former President Donald Trump's alleged 2020 election subversion trial after attorneys for the defense and Jack Smith's team engaged in a scheduling fight in court Monday morning.
Lawyers for Trump, John Lauro and Todd Blanche, met with prosecutors from Smith's team at the federal district courthouse in Washington, D.C. to quibble over their conflicting preferences for when a trial will commence in the alleged election subversion case.
DONALD TRUMP TURNS ATTENTION BACK TO JACK SMITH OVER SLOWING DOWN TRIAL
Chutkan decided on a trial date of March 4, 2024 — before the presidential election. “The public has a right to a prompt and efficient resolution of this matter," Chutkan said. The trial date she requested comes just before Super Tuesday.
"It gives Trump seven months" to prepare, Chutkan added, saying she was concerned about all relevant factors under the speedy trial act.
Notably, Chutkan has set the date for Trump's second federal case on the same day that Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis wanted her anti-racketeering trial to start, though that request is highly unlikely to actualize due to the complexity of the multi-defendant racketeering case. Trump also has a state criminal case currently slated for trial on March 25.
Chutkan said she had spoken to New York State Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan to let him know that her case could overlap with the District Attorney Alvin Bragg's case against Trump, which is a 34-count indictment alleging Trump falsified business records to conceal a hush money payment.
Jury selection in the case before Chutkan will begin on March 4, which went against the government's request to begin that process early.
Smith, who is leading two prosecutions into Trump, wanted the D.C. federal trial to commence on Jan. 2, and Trump's attorneys responded that they needed until April 2026 to prepare. Chutkan was dissatisfied with both requests.
Chutkan's decision also left Lauro dissatisfied on Monday, who declared, "The trial date will deny president Trump the ability to have effective counsel."
"[The] Trial date is inconsistent with Trump's right to due process and inconsistent with 6th Amendment," Lauro added.
Lauro claimed several times during the hearing that his defense would “have to absorb a gargantuan amount of facts.” Trump “is not above the law, but he’s not below the law,” the attorney stated.
Asked how much discovery Trump had access to before the start of the case, prosecutor Molly Gaston said that of the 12.8 million pages turned over to Mr Trump, approximately 61% or 7.8 million pages were from “entities associated with the defendant” and were available to him at this time.
Gaston also said that Smith's team has already flagged Trump's team "key documents" in the case, including around 47,000 pages such as agent summaries, agent testimony, and other records Smith's team plans to bring to the trial.
“It’s essentially a road map to our case,” Gaston said. Chutkan responded that the government has made a "considerable efort" to ease the process for Trump's team to review evidence against him.
Chutkan ultimately didn't buy Lauro's argument, saying that much of the discovery is "duplicative" and that Trump's counsel has known about the indictment coming for "some time." The grand jury's investigation into the matter now before Chutkan's court began in September 2022.
“This case isn’t going to trial in 2026 and I want to know, despite the rhetoric in your response to the government’s trial date, realistically why you think you need this time,” Chutkan said.
The former president's defense attorney also said he intends to file several motions in the near future, including a select prosecution motion with a request for an evidentiary hearing, an executive immunity filing with a motion to stay the case, and further motions to dismiss each conspiracy count — all of which could prompt further delay of the case.
Trump pleaded not guilty on Aug. 3 to four federal felony charges over Smith's accusations that he engaged in a scheme to overturn the will of voters and maintain power after losing the 2020 election, resulting in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. Two counts relate to the disruption of Congress's certification of the electoral vote on Jan. 6, one for allegedly scheming to defraud the United States, and a fourth charge of conspiracy to deprive citizens of their right to have their vote counted.
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Trump is presently the frontrunner in the Republican primary and faces steep odds to campaign efficiently in the wake of four criminal trials.
The former president has repeatedly suggested the cases against him are a form of "election interference."