CNN
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A federal judge on Monday dismissed the classified documents case against Donald Trump, a shock ruling that removes one of the main legal challenges facing the former president.
In a 93-page ruling, District Judge Eileen Cannon said the appointment of special prosecutor Jack Smith violated the Constitution. He did not rule on whether or not Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents was correct.
“Ultimately, the executive’s growing comfort in appointing ‘regulatory’ special counsels in the most recent era follows an ad hoc pattern with little judicial scrutiny,” Cannon wrote.
The ruling by Judge Cannon, a Trump appointee in 2020, comes on the first day of the Republican National Convention, and the country reeled from a failed attempt on Trump’s life over the weekend. Although a trial before a presidential election was considered highly unlikely, many legal experts considered the classified documents case the strongest of the four cases pending against the former president.
On Trump True community He said the impeachment “must be the first step” as he called for other cases against him to be dismissed, calling the charges “political attacks”.
In a statement Monday evening, Peter Carr, a spokesman for the Office of Special Counsel, said the Justice Department had approved plans to appeal.
“Dismissing the case departs from the uniform conclusion of all previous courts that the attorney general is legally empowered to appoint a special prosecutor,” Carr said. “The Judiciary has empowered the Special Prosecutor to appeal the court’s order.”
The White House referred requests for comment to the Justice Department.
Smith last year accused Trump of taking classified documents from the White House and resisting government efforts to retrieve the materials. He is innocent.
In a separate criminal case brought by Smith against Trump in Washington, D.C., the special counsel pursued federal charges stemming from Trump’s efforts to alter the results of the 2020 election. Trump also faces a statewide election tampering charge in Georgia, and he was convicted of state crimes in New York earlier this year for his role in a 2016 pre-election payoff scheme.
Trump’s efforts to dismiss the case under the Appointments Clause were seen as a long shot, as several special counsels — even during his own presidential administration — were treated the same way.
But while Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas threw his support behind the theory, a footnote in the high court’s presidential exception ruling said “serious questions remain as to whether the attorney general violated that framework by creating a special counsel not established by law. Those questions must be answered before this case can proceed.”
However, Cannon held a hearing on the issue several weeks ago, pushing attorneys to explain exactly how Smith’s investigation into Trump is being funded. The judge’s questions were so pointed that special counsel James Pearce argued that even though Cannon had thrown out the case because of an appointment clause issue, the Justice Department was “prepared” to fund Smith’s cases through a trial if necessary.
Cannon said in his order that the special counsel’s position “effectively usurps” Congress’ “significant legislative authority” that requires the head of a department — the DOJ, in this case — to appoint such an officer.
“If the political branches want the Attorney General to appoint Special Counsel Smith to investigate and prosecute this action with the full powers of the United States Attorney, there is a proper way to do so,” he wrote.
“Judicial funds could be reallocated to fund the continued operation of Special Counsel Smith’s office,” Cannon said in his ruling Monday, but said it was not yet clear whether the newly brought case would pass legal action.
“For more than 18 months, Special Counsel Smith’s investigation and prosecution has been funded by substantial funds obtained from the Treasury without statutory authorization, and attempting to rewrite history at this point seems almost impossible,” Cannon wrote. “The Court has difficulty seeing how a remedy short of removal would cure this substantial separation-of-powers violation, but the answers are not entirely clear, and the case law is not well developed.”
In his ruling, Smith’s team noted in a court hearing that his concerns could be satisfied by restructuring the office’s finances.
This story has been updated with additional updates.
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