Washington, DC [US], January 8 (ANI): US District Judge Aileen Cannon has blocked the release of special counsel Jack Smith’s final report on his probe into US President-elect Donald Trump, CNN reported.
Her order stops Smith and the Justice Department from releasing the report until the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals has time to review the emergency motion by Trump’s co-defendants to block the report’s release.
The decision of the judge comes amid a flurry of legal filings that took place on Monday and Tuesday. Trump’s lawyers have reviewed a draft of Smith’s final report connected to the federal probe into the US President-elect, according to a letter included in court filings from Trump’s former co-defendants on Monday.
Trump had appointed Cannon during his first term as US President. Aileen Cannon’s order blocking the US Justice Department on Tuesday does not distinguish between the two volumes said to be in Smith’s report – one covering the probe into 2020 election interference and the other dealing with the mishandling of classified documents investigation. According to Trump’s lawyers, the arguments against publication of the report applied to both volumes.
The filings included letters from Trump’s attorneys to Attorney General Merrick Garland, which mentioned that they were allowed “to review the two-volume Draft Report in a conference room at Smith’s office between January 3 and January 6, 2025,” CNN reported.
The attorneys, two of whom have been chosen by Trump for top roles in the US Justice Department in his administration, requested advance notice of the report’s release so that they can “take appropriate legal action.”
In the court filings, the defence lawyers said that the government gave them “limited access” to review the draft over the weekend and that it “revealed a one-sided narrative arguing that the Defendants committed the crimes charged in this case.”
Garland has told Congress he plans to give the report to lawmakers, allowing for redactions needed under Justice Department policy. That would imply the Justice Department would likely redact portions of the report related to the two co-defendants as the department is seeking to continue those cases and it is barred from prejudicing their potential trials.
In a separate overnight court filing, Smith’s office shared more details of the timeline for the finalization of the report. The special counsel’s office said it would not give the report to the attorney general until 1 pm ET Tuesday at the earliest, and the attorney general would not release it until at the earliest Friday morning.
Smith’s team wrote, “The Attorney General has not yet determined how to handle the reported volume pertaining to this case, about which the parties were conferring at the time the defendants filed the motion.”
According to federal regulations about special counsel’s office work at the US Justice Department, the decisions regarding the release of reports like these lie in the hands of the attorney general. The office further said it plans to give more on its position to Cannon on Tuesday evening (local time). The defence attorneys expressed dissatisfaction over the filings on Monday with the level of redactions in the draft that they had reviewed. (ANI)
