Special counsel Jack Smith accused former President Donald Trump's legal team of attempting to delay both of his criminal trials in a warning to a judge that she may be "manipulated" by their arguments.
The Thursday filing came from Smith counselor Jay Bratt and was filed before U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon in Florida, pointing to a new motion from Trump's lawyers entered Wednesday evening in his separate Washington, D.C., criminal case.
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Trump's lawyers had asked U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan in the District of Columbia to halt proceedings of Trump's election interference case until she delivers an opinion about the pretrial question of whether a chief executive of the United States is immune from criminal proceedings.
Bratt told Cannon on Thursday that Trump's team didn't disclose the plans to file the motion in Washington federal court during a Wednesday afternoon hearing before Cannon in South Florida, where Trump lawyers flagged concerns over scheduling conflicts between the pair of federal criminal trials slated to begin within the first two quarters of 2024.
Cannon had suggested at the Wednesday hearing that she was open to altering her May 20, 2024, trial start date for Trump's case over alleged mishandling of classified documents after leaving the Oval Office and obstruction of the federal investigation. Trump's trial in Washington is tentatively set to begin on March 4, and Cannon conceded that her own trial could be affected by the Washington trial schedule.
Bratt signaled that Trump's pattern of requests between both federal courts showed an obvious and "overriding interest" in delaying both trials, no matter the stakes.
"As the Government argued to the Court yesterday, the trial date in the District of Columbia case should not be a determinative factor in the Court's decision whether to modify the dates in this matter," Bratt said. "Defendant Trump’s actions in the hours following the hearing in this case illustrate the point and confirm his overriding interest in delaying both trials at any cost. This Court should [not] allow itself to be manipulated in this fashion."
The word "not" wasn't included in the final sentence of Bratt's filed brief, but a spokesman for Smith's office told the Washington Examiner that "the filing mistakenly omitted the word 'not' in that sentence."
Trump pleaded not guilty in June to 37 criminal counts related to his handling of classified materials. Two months later, he pleaded not guilty to four charges over an alleged "criminal scheme" to undo the results of the 2020 election.
Piling on top of his busy federal criminal court schedule are two other criminal indictments. Trump has pleaded not guilty to charges in New York alleging he falsified business records to cover up hush money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels and has likewise maintained his innocence after he was indicted in Fulton County on charges of conspiring to overturn the state's election results.
State prosecutors have largely said Smith's cases should be prioritized among Trump's busy legal calendar, though Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis expressed a desire to try Trump and his co-defendants as early as March.
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The former president's immunity defense was also first included in a motion filed in the 2020 elections case last month, in which his counsel said he had "absolute immunity" from prosecution for actions taken while serving as the commander in chief.
Cannon said Wednesday she would move quickly to decide whether she needs to adjust her schedule for the classified documents case.