Republican presidential candidate and former U.S. President Donald Trump gestures while he walks with his attorney Todd Blanche, as his criminal trial over charges that he falsified business records to conceal money paid to silence porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016 continues, at Manhattan state court in New York City, U.S., May 6, 2024.
Brendan Mcdermid | Reuters
A federal judge Tuesday indefinitely postponed the criminal classified documents trial of former President Donald Trump, a court filing shows.
The trial on charges that Trump willfully retained classified national security records after leaving the White House and then hid them from federal authorities was scheduled to start May 20.
But the new ruling from U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon vacates that date and sets a new slate of pretrial proceedings, the latest of which is a hearing set for July 22.
The ruling casts more doubt on whether Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, will face trial on the federal criminal charges prior to the Nov. 5 election.
Lawyers for Trump have urged Cannon, whom Trump appointed to the federal bench in southern Florida, to set the trial after the election.
Cannon wrote in Tuesday’s court order that it “would be imprudent” to finalize a trial date “at this juncture” when various pretrial issues have yet to be resolved.
Cannon pointed to pending questions about how classified information will be handled in the high-profile trial of the former president, along with “additional pretrial and trial preparations necessary to present this case to a jury.”
To move forward with the trial in May would be “inconsistent with the Court’s duty to fully and fairly consider” those issues, she wrote.
“The Court therefore vacates the current May 20, 2024, trial date (and associated calendar call), to be reset by separate order following resolution of the matters before the Court, consistent with Defendants’ right to due process and the public’s interest in the fair and efficient administration of justice,” Cannon ruled.
Trump is fighting 88 criminal counts in four separate courts as he campaigns to unseat President Joe Biden. He is currently on trial in Manhattan Supreme Court on charges of falsifying business records related to a $130,000 hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels.
Whether any of Trump’s other cases will head to trial before Election Day is unclear — and after Cannon’s latest ruling, increasingly unlikely.
In addition to the documents case, Trump is charged in federal court in Washington, D.C., with conspiring to overturn his loss to Biden in the 2020 election. He also faces election-interference charges in Georgia state court.
