I am, of course, not a lawyer nor am I familiar with how criminal trials are scheduled by courts but I would be surprised if judges feel obliged to schedule them around the convenience of the defendant. Hence the ruling by judge Tanya Chutkan that she will not take into account the serial sex abuser Donald Trump’s (SSAT) political calendar when scheduling his trial that special counsel Jack Smith has requested for January 2, 2024 was to be expected. She also issued restrictions on what he can say about the case.
The federal judge presiding over Donald Trump’s 2020 election subversion case on Friday warned inflammatory remarks from the former president would push her to schedule the trial sooner, saying she would take every step to safeguard the integrity of proceedings and to avoid tainting the potential jury pool.
…Broadly speaking, Chutkan ruled that Trump was free to share “non-sensitive materials” as designated by prosecutors, but narrowed the scope so closely that it could ultimately amount to only a pyrrhic victory. Chutkan also ended up rejecting the majority of Trump’s other requests.
The judge repeatedly emphasized that she would not take into account Trump’s presidential campaign, telling Trump’s lead lawyer John Lauro that the former president’s free speech rights were not absolute and that they came second to the fact that he is now a criminal defendant.
“What the effects of my order are on a political campaign are not going to influence my decision. This is a criminal trial,” Chutkan said. “The defendant’s desire to conduct a campaign, to respond to political opponents, has to yield.”
While rejecting all of the government’s request for limiting SSAT’s use of the discovery materials, she did limit the scope of the material that could be classified as ‘non-sensitive’ and thus could be discussed publicly by SSAT.
The judge was skeptical of the government’s argument that even non-sensitive materials should be subject to the protective order, saying Trump was prohibited from intimidating witnesses as a condition of his pre-trial release, and agreed to limit the scope of the order.
But Chutkan was unimpressed by the attempt of Trump’s lawyers to designate witness deposition transcripts and recordings as “non-sensitive” and rejected that request, which will dramatically reduce the volume of records that Trump could discuss publicly.
The judge also refused to allow yet-unnamed volunteer attorneys or consultants working for Trump to view the discovery material, saying the request from Trump’s lawyers was so broad that it could “include just about anyone” including potential “unindicted co-conspirators”.
…Chutkan’s final decision was to allow Trump to review the discovery materials alone so long as he did not carry electronic devices that could replicate the records. She also ruled that Trump could take notes, but that his lawyers needed to review them to ensure it did not include “sensitive” content.
The judge also made clear that the moment Trump took a break from looking at the the discovery materials, his lawyers needed to regain custody of them from Trump. “Certainly he can’t carry them around with him,” Chutkan said.
Frankly, I cannot see SSAT studying the discovery documents carefully. He is just not a reader. They also do not have the cachet of being secret documents that only he had access to and could boast to his friends about. If he reads these at all, it will be to try and find out who has given evidence that could be used against him and are thus, in his eyes, traitors that he can lash out at.
SSAT is so used to having his demands met that he will chafe at being told by a judge (and an immigrant woman of color at that) what he can and cannot say and do with the documents. He is bound to be enraged and no doubt would like to lash out at her in his usual unhinged all-capitals style. But he has to be careful about venting too much with this judge. She seems like a no-nonsense type. His lawyers must be on tenterhooks about what he will say that will force them to go into damage-control mode.
This all seems rather speculative.
Also, when you write that he has to be careful about venting too much with this judge, that suggests that he can vent at least somewhat.
But not too much.
Notably also, he is 77 years old. So far, impulsive and injudicious as he might seem to others, he has managed to avoid bad consequences such as being imprisoned.
(There’s an adage about old, bold pilots)
Frankly, I cannot see SSAT studying the discovery documents carefully. He is just not a reader.
Perhaps some of the documents will have lots of pretty pictures.
John Morales @ 1
Until he became president, he only defrauded those who invested money in his failed schemes and the ordinary joes who bought services, like the suckers who paid money to his Trump University thinking this was a “university”.
He also refused to make the final payments to the contactors that built his houses.
He kept losing lawsuits but was not in serious risk of prison. He could have kept this up the rest of his life.
The two-tired justice system only became a threat to him after he became a president and started doing things with consequences for people “who mattered”.
As he is unable to learn from experience he kept on as usual, ignoring lawyers and other advisors that could have kept him out of trouble (this arrogance is also typical of Boris Johnson).
I will not credit him with great cunning.