The federal judge presiding over the classified documents case against former President Donald Trump in Florida dismissed the accusation on Monday, siding with defense attorneys who said the special prosecutor who brought the charges was illegally appointed by the U.S. Justice Department.
The decision by U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, which can be appealed and overturned by a higher court, brings at least for now a surprising and abrupt conclusion to a criminal case that at the time of its filing was considered the most dangerous of all. the legal threats faced by the former Republican president.
Although the case had long been stalled and the prospect of a trial before the November election was already an unrealistic scenario, the ruling is a legal victory for Trump as he recovers from a attempted murder at the weekend and is preparing to accept the Republican nomination in Milwaukee this week.
In one of four criminal cases against Trump, he had faced dozens of felony charges accusing him of illegally hoarding classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, and obstructing FBI efforts to recover them. He has pleaded not guilty and denied wrongdoing.
Defense attorneys filed multiple challenges to the case, including a legally technical one claiming that special counsel Jack Smith had been illegally appointed under the Constitution’s Appointments Clause because he had been appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland, rather than confirmed by Congress, and that his office was improperly funded by the Justice Department.
“The Special Prosecutor’s position effectively usurps that important legislative authority, transferring it to a Department Head, and in the process threatens the structural freedom inherent in the separation of powers,” Cannon wrote in a 93-page order granting a defense request to dismiss the case.
“If the political branches wish to grant the Attorney General the power to appoint Special Prosecutor Smith to investigate and prosecute this action with all the powers of a federal prosecutor, there is a valid means to do so,” he added. That mechanism is through congressional approval, he said.
The order is the latest example of how Cannon, a Trump appointee, handled the case in ways that have benefited the former president.
He drew intense scrutiny during the FBI investigation when he appointed an independent arbitrator to inspect classified documents recovered during the Mar-a-Lago search in August 2022, a decision that was overturned months later by a federal panel.
Since then, the judge has been slow to rule — playing into Trump’s strategy of delay — and has considered defense arguments that experts say other judges would have dismissed without hearings. In May, she indefinitely canceled the trial date amid a series of unresolved legal issues.
Smith’s team had vigorously challenged the Appointments Clause argument during hearings before Cannon last month and told the judge that even if she ruled in favor of the defense team, the appropriate remedy would not be to dismiss the case.
Smith’s team had also noted that the position had been rejected in other courts in connection with other prosecutions brought by other Justice Department special counsels. But Cannon was not swayed, calling the prosecution’s claims “strained.”
“Both the Appointments and Appropriations challenges, as framed in the Motion, raise the following basic question: Is there a statute in the United States Code authorizing the appointment of Special Prosecutor Smith to conduct this prosecution?” he said. “After careful study of this fundamental question, the answer is no.”
A spokesman for Smith’s team did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday, and Trump’s team had no immediate comment.
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