Special prosecutor asks to reopen classified papers case against Trump | USA Elections

Donald Trump will never forget the process of confidential papers that he took to his mansion Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach (Florida). Although the judge in charge of the case, Eileen Cannon, decided to archive the case, special prosecutor Jack Smith has appealed that decision before the Court of Appeals to try to reopen the case. In the 81-page document, Smith accused Judge Cannon, appointed by Trump, of ignoring all precedents to overturn the case.

In a surprising ruling, the judge concluded that the appointment of the special prosecutor, Jack Smith, violated the Constitution because he was not appointed by the president (he was made by the attorney general) or confirmed by the Senate. Now, the prosecutor says that decision was wrong. “The Attorney General validly appointed the special prosecutor, who is also properly funded. By ruling otherwise, the district court avoided binding Supreme Court precedent, misinterpreted the statutes authorizing the appointment of special counsel, and failed to properly take into account the Attorney General’s long history of special counsel appointments,” the resource indicates.

“If the Attorney General does not have the power to appoint lower officials, that conclusion would invalidate the appointment of all members of the Department who exercise significant authority and hold continuing office, other than the few specifically identified by law,” they write. They added, “The district court’s reasoning would similarly raise questions about hundreds of appointments throughout the executive branch, including the departments of Defense, State, Treasury, and Labor.”

The complaint points out that, prior to the creation of the Department of Justice and to date, the Attorney General has repeatedly appointed special and independent prosecutors to handle federal investigations, including The Watergate Affair.

The judges of the 11th Circuit or Judicial Division will now be in charge of resolving the appeal. But even if they agreed with the prosecutor and canceled the file, Trump would have already won a small victory: delaying the case. In addition, the former president’s lawyers could in turn appeal to the Supreme Court, which has a conservative majority of six to three judges and in which three judges were appointed by Trump himself when he was president. The Supreme Court has handed down important rulings in favor of Trump in the last judicial year, including a decision recognizing broad immunity.

The legal moves by his defense to delay the trials against the former president have been working, with the exception of the New York case, where he was found guilty of 34 crimes by a jury and is awaiting sentencing — which has also managed to be delayed.

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If Trump becomes president again, he could be stripped of federal charges (the Washington case for leaking classified papers and interference in the 2020 election). He could also seek a self-pardon.

The judge’s decision to toss out the case was announced on the first day of the Republican convention in Milwaukee in July and just two days after an attempted assassination of the president. At the time, he seemed headed for the White House. Now, the prosecutor’s appeal comes shortly after the Democratic convention, where the replacement of Joe Biden with Kamala Harris as the nominee has sent ripples through Democratic ranks.

Harris’s supporters pointed out several times at the convention that their candidate is a former prosecutor, while Trump is a convicted felon. Still, the president’s criminal cases have not played a major role in voting intentions so far. In a way that was unimaginable a few decades ago, a large majority of Americans seem willing to elect a criminal as president. Trump has presented himself as a martyr and an unjust victim and has at times managed to turn the accusations against him into lucrative.

Although it was going on with the former president neglecting requests, the case of the classified Mar-a-Lago papers came to light with the search of Trump’s mansion in Palm Beach (Florida) by FBI agents on August 8, 2022. He was formally charged with dozens of crimes the following year. The former president was accused of handling hundreds of secret or classified documents that he took to his private residence, which is also a hotel and a social club, without permission when he left the White House in January 2021. When the US president leaves office, they come under the National Archives according to the law. He is also accused of refusing to return them when officials repeatedly asked him to do so. These resistances led to the aforementioned registry.

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