Mar-a-Lago Judge: Jury Sees Top Secret Files or Trump Wins
Mar-a-Lago Judge: Jury Sees Top Secret Files or Trump Wins
Trump-appointed Judge Aileen Cannon handed prosecutors in his Mar-a-Lago case a shocking ultimatum on Monday.
The MAGA-friendly federal judge who keeps siding with Donald Trump in his Mar-a-Lago classified records case has forced prosecutors to make a stark choice: allow jurors to see a huge trove of national secrets or let him go.
U.S. District Judge Aileen M. Cannon’sultimatum Monday night came as a surprise twist in what could have been a simple order; one merely asking federal prosecutors and Trump’s lawyers for proposed jury instructions at the upcoming trial.
But as she has done repeatedly, Cannon used this otherwise innocuous legal step as yet another way to swing the case wildly in favor of the man who appointed her while he was president.
Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith must now choose whether to allow jurors at the upcoming criminal trial to peruse the many classified records found at the former president’s South Florida mansion or give jurors instructions that would effectively order them to acquit him.
Either “a jury is permitted to examine” every record a former president swipes and claims as “personal” to determine whether it is, or jurors must be told that “a president has sole authority… to categorize records as personal or presidential during his/her presidency.”
Can't categorize files as personal after you vacate office. Classified files are by law government property and cannot be owned by anyone. Can't declassify files after leaving office.
This hack needs to be impeached and this trial appealed and the judge replaced posthaste.
"Hey random person! How's about you read this document and tell me if it sounds Top Secret."
"Okay, but in your uninformed opinion, is this document one or two levels more secret than those other declassified files?"
Another option for the prosecution is to redact classified info. It doesn't actually matter what is in the document, just that it's classified because a former President is disallowed to possess classified material.
For more info: classified documents have extensive
marketsmarkings. The header and footer of every page with material is marked either, Unclassified (if present in docs with higher), CUI, Secret, Top Secret, etc. In addition, the document will have markings for each paragraph on if that particular paragraph or line contains classified material and at what level. So the prosecution could definitely just redact everything above Unclassified and the remainder of the text should paint a fairly clear picture of what the document contains without revealing specific classified details.Of course this treasonous judge would probably interpret as you did because she belongs behind bars not a bench.___
Judge: ignore any markings on the filed indicating top secret, classified, human intelligence, and make your own decisions on each file!
The judge was appointed by trump and should be automatically recused from the case.
Recusal, by definition, is to remove oneself. She isn’t going to do that.
and you can't just handwave classification away. There is a legal process involve.
It’s a Trump appointed judge. I doubt they could even pass an intro to law class.
Grounds to have her replaced? Most people know that top secret means security clearance.
That's like demanding to see the contents of a snatched purse that clearly didn't belong to the defendant.
That's some pretty old-fashioned thinking. That purse could now be owned by anyone named Property of US Govt: Top Secret
There is also the whole CIPA System for presenting classified documents in summation or censored format, but Judge Cannon is at least implying that the Jury should see the entire document.
Trump's lawyers got the prosecutor on another case fired for going on a date and we keep putting up with this woman????
Different rules depending on whos intereste you signal you're going to serve.
While I agree with the sentiment... if you are referring to Nathan Wade, my understanding is that it was way more than "going on a date".
More like fucking your boss (the DA, who assigned you this case) on the reg (behind your wife's back), going on trips with your boss and being reimbursed by her for her expenses in cash, and perjuring yourself at your divorce hearing where you lied about when you started fucking your boss on the reg. There's more that I'm sure I don't remember. Lots of drama.
Admittedly not super relevant to the trump case but still enough of a shit show that looks bad and shouldn't be happening. If he didn't resign, I believe the entire office would have been kicked off the case since it's under the DA/boss he'd been fucking. Now some other lawyer needs to take it over.
This is totally fair and I am grateful that you added a lot more context to my admittedly emotional and hyperbolic reactionary comment, while understanding the sentiment that this judge is doing unethical things that are directly affecting the case in favor to one side; in comparison to what amounts to a bad look (since there was no evidence that it was affecting the outcome of the case)
It's unprecedented. I know what the supporters would say "so is prosecuting an ex president ". There's a difference. A fast food CEO killing a dozen people and serving them up in 15 different locations is unprecedented. A judge wouldn't say that the jury has to try the burgers though.
This ignorance alone should get her removed from the case. Dear Lord. There are laws and rules for how classified information must be handled. Wtf?
There are also rules for evidence, which are generally the most important rulings in a criminal trial. Allowing the documents to be left out but also used as evidence is an obvious appeal that likely wins, secret evidence isn't allowed.
He didn't choose most of these documents because of their contents, just because they're classified to satisfy his power trip, so all the jury needs to know is that they're genuine government documents which are classified which he didn't have the right to take.
If this case had involved what he did with information in it then sure, but it ISN'T
Secret evidence is literally allowed all the time when dealing with secrets if the document in question is specs of nuclear weapons you redact all the strategically important info and allow them to see the header and subject matter without all the details.
Can she really do that, force the jury without security clearance to view top secret documents? Seems bullshit to me.
But what are the options? Obviously she says to let Trump go if the jury can't see the docs. If he gets the jury see the docs, do they have to get security clearance? They have to sign an NDA of some sort?
Hopefully they can appeal and just provide summaries or redacted documents. Or get security clearance for jurors, sure.
There has to be a way to convict someone for stealing state secrets without sharing those state secrets publicly.
If it's illegal to share classified documents, including to jury members, and the jury can't convict without seeing all the info on the classified documents, then it is just legal to share classified documents, you would be unable to prosecute. That would be crazy.
you would be unable to prosecute
I think that's the point
I know right? What circular reasoning this is. The government is concerned about keeping our secrets safe, so they ask for the former president to return them and must force the issue when he doesn't, but to keep the secrets safe the judge wants them to divulge the secrets?
I do not see the relevance of the actual contents. It could have been a government encryption device or a cell phone or something.
As an alternative couldn't they redact the crucial parts? Ex. "Submarine x, with a periscope depth of xxx is to be deployed in a xxx configuration to secure the xxx area." Pretty easy to see the reason for the secrecy without giving the details. Although there are probably situations where this wouldn't work.
Well, can't say she's not effective. The case made it past the election.
Showing TOP SECRET and HIGHER documents to random people on the street HELPS American National Security!
I sort of think that showing them the secrets would actively harm Trump because it would become obvious just how dangerous the material is. I don't think she's really thought this thing through.
Is the gambit here that they weren't actually that bad?
No, I think that they are actually that bad. I also think that the judge is dumb enough to have actually now placed these super important documents in the hands of 12 jurors plus some alternates in an effort to bow to her orange master. My take: she's not actually that smart but thinks she is and she thinks she just did a "gotcha". I believe that a jury seeing them would be shocked at what was left in a bathroom for anyone to steal.
She is helping Trump extend the trial until after the election.
If she can help him get elected, then he can order the Justice Department to drop the case.
I think this might get her thrown off the case
It would delay things further unfortunately, but this is so egregiously wrong and in such a long list of mistakes and/or illegitimate moves meant to provide cover for Trump, I don't think there's any recourse but for Jack Smith to move to have her taken off the case. Even more when you consider her involvement prior to these charges when she got improperly involved with the search warrant bussiness before a higher court told her off and dismissed the whole thing. Shame she's the one assigned to the strongest and least legally controversial criminal case against him.
Yeah this does feel like a bit of a rubicon moment for her. “Show this SCI/TS/NOFORN stuff (that Trump stole) to random yahoos from
the publicFlorida who are not vetted or security cleared.” That’s incredibly fucking stupid.
Maybe they should move the case to DC then so there are enough active Top Secret clearances to create a healthy jury pool.
No defense/prosecutor would want a jury make up like that, they'd be too smart.
Could this be the first judge to go to jail for Trump?
I don't really care what hole she goes into, but she needs to go somewhere that isn't the courtroom!
Fired
Out of a cannon
Into the sun
Wasn’t this one of the main reasons for delaying the case to begin with? They had the “special examiner” review all the files to verify they were indeed top secret. I don’t understand why that person can’t just provide a summary to the jury. Letting them see the files seems like massive judicial overreach and probably illegal. Can she be disbarred for this?
Jury selection will take forever… Step 1, reject everybody without a security clearance…
I truly underestimated how deep the movement that's using Trump's cult of personality for its own means runs.
We're so very fucked.
It's just Aileen Cannon. Again.
This does underscore a critical weakness in our government: if a corrupt federal judge gets in position, they can cause all sorts of havoc. The judicial branch of the government needs an overhaul.
Unfortunately we're too close to the election at this point. I don't see any case that isn't just a monetary settlement being delt with before he takes office and makes his DOJ dog wipe it all away....
NY criminal case regarding the Stormy Daniels hush money should start next month.
Its also the weakest case, most inconsequential, and puts Trump at no real risk. And even in that case, the judge and da seem willing to bend over for him.
Here are a few other good legal analysis for those who haven't been following this shit show
First summary I've seen that's so digestible. Thanks for sharing!
I highly recommend civil discourse. She does an excellent job of breaking down everything going on in the trump cases: