Legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin said Wednesday that he thinks Aileen Cannon, the federal judge presiding over former President Trump’s confidential documents case, is “trying to kill this prosecution.”
Toobin criticized Cannon for your recent decision allow third parties to argue at a June 21 hearing on Trump’s motion to reject the accusation alleging that special prosecutor Jack Smith, who brought the charges against Trump, was illegally appointed to the position.
“The whole way she handled this case is totally, totally, crazy unusual,” Toobin said during a discussion on CNN’s “Anderson Cooper 360.”
“And allowing outsiders to participate in a day-and-a-half hearing that most justices would rule on the petitions, or perhaps set aside 10 minutes to argue, is just another illustration that she is trying to kill this prosecution.”
“That’s the only conclusion you can draw,” Toobin continued. “No other judge in the federal system that I know of would address these issues in the same way that she is trying to do.”
Trump faces 40 federal criminal charges in Florida related to his misuse of White House records after he left office and his efforts to prevent the government from recovering them.
The files reportedly contained confidential information on national defense and weapons, including some top-secret documents.
In early May, Cannon indefinitely postponed the trial, delaying some trial dates until late July and refusing to set a trial date.
She issued the postponement order less than two weeks before the trial was scheduled to begin on May 20, citing the need to resolve several issues.
In a separate case, Trump was found guilty late last month on 34 federal counts of falsifying business records in a scheme to cover up secret payments made to protect potentially damaging information from the American public ahead of the 2016 presidential election. Trump has vowed to appeal the case.
Trump has been indicted in two additional criminal cases, both related to his efforts to stay in power after losing the 2020 presidential election. The cases — one federal and one in Georgia — have suffered delays that make it unlikely they will be tried before the 2020 election. November.
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
