The judge in Donald Trump‘s classified documents case is to have a top-secret meeting with Trump’s lawyer to discuss classified files he wants to obtain.
The meeting will take place in a secure safe room in Miami where they can discuss highly classified documents without fear of eavesdroppers. “The meeting will be held in a facility suitable for discussion of the classified information contained in the parties’…submission,” Judge Aileen Cannon wrote in a court order detailing the meeting arrangements.
The first meeting on Monday will take place from 9.30 a.m. until 2 p.m. She will then hear from prosecutor Jack Smith and his team from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m.
Tuesday has been set aside for both sides to present additional pleadings.
The court previously heard that the Department of Justice has set up two secure rooms in Miami where classified documents found at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate can be viewed by Trump’s lawyers and by Smith and his team.
The rooms have special anti-bugging technology installed and no cell phones are allowed inside.
Donald Trump speaks at the National Rifle Association presidential forum at the Great American Outdoor Show on February 09, 2024 in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Trump’s lawyers are to have a top secret meeting with the judge in Trump’s classified documents case on Monday.
Spencer Platt/Getty Images
Lawyers for Trump’s two co-defendants, Walt Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira, are not permitted to be present.
Trump is seeking classified documents that are covered by the Classified Information Procedures Act.
Section 4 provides that “[t]he court, upon a sufficient showing, may authorize the United States to delete specified items of classified information from documents to be made available to the defendant through discovery under the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, to substitute a summary of the information for such classified documents, or to substitute a statement admitting the relevant facts that classified information would tend to prove.”
Trump will be seeking less deletion of words and sentences in the documents, the prosecutor will be seeking more, and Judge Cannon will decide how the documents will ultimately be censored before being handed over to Trump’s legal team.
Trump has pleaded not guilty to 40 federal charges of retaining classified materials and then obstructing federal attempts to retrieve them from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. The frontrunner in the GOP primary denies all wrongdoing, and has repeatedly said that the charges are part of a politically motivated witch hunt to stop him winning the 2024 election.
Newsweek sought email comment from Trump’s attorney on Monday.
On Thursday, Smith accused Cannon of making a “clear error” when she allowed that other documents be handed over to Trump’s team. He said in filings that the move would reveal the identities of numerous potential witnesses, as well as potentially exposing them to “significant and immediate risks of threats, intimidation, and harassment.”
Cannon had originally paused deadlines for Smith’s team to hand over the documents while she considered the special counsel’s motion. However, the stay lasted only a few hours, and later she ruled on Friday that the information must be delivered to Trump and the other defendants by Saturday, February 10.
The judge ruled that the information, including the names of potential witnesses, will be sealed from the public until a later court order.
Cannon, who was nominated to the bench by Trump, has long faced calls to recuse herself from the case after she made a number of decisions that favored the former president; these include ones that could potentially delay the start of the trial, scheduled for May.
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.