Joe.My.God. LGBT News
The Washington Post reports:
The judge overseeing Donald Trump’s classified-documents case issued an unusual order late Monday regarding jury instructions at the end of the trial — even though she has not yet ruled on when the trial will be held, or a host of other issues. U.S. District Court Judge Aileen M. Cannon instructed lawyers to file proposed jury instructions by April 2 on two topics that are related to defense motions to have the indictment dismissed outright.
Juries are instructed on how to weigh the evidence just before they begin deliberating, so Cannon’s focus on this topic suggests she is not only thinking ahead to a trial of the former president, but already zeroing in on the end, rather than the beginning, of such a proceeding. Her two-page order, however, also suggests an openness to some of the defense’s claims that the Presidential Records Act allows Trump or other presidents to declare highly classified documents to be their own personal property.
Read the full article.
In the decades that I have been a lawyer, this is the most bizarre order I’ve ever seen issued by a federal judge. What makes that all the more amazing is that the second and third most bizarre orders I’ve ever seen in federal court were also issued by Judge Cannon in this case. https://t.co/iS609sxIQb
— George Conway (@gtconway3d) March 18, 2024
The PRA is totally beside the point.
Classified records are governed by a different body of law, including EO 13526, which I also worked on.
I explained in this @CNNOpinion oped 2/xhttps://t.co/nP1EAW5JRJ
— Norm Eisen (norm.eisen on Threads) (@NormEisen) March 18, 2024
“Trump’s claims that the Presidential Records Act (PRA) justifies his behavior doesn’t pass muster because that statute doesn’t actually have anything to do with the critical question of whether his possession of these documents was authorized — the EO covers that.” 3/x
— Norm Eisen (norm.eisen on Threads) (@NormEisen) March 18, 2024