Former President Donald Trump is due in two federal courtrooms this year, but his team reportedly is working to use one federal case’s trial to push both further into the future.
With a scheduling conference currently set for Friday in the former president’s classified documents case in a federal court in Florida, it could be the first step in an attempt to help push his 2020 election subversion case in Washington, D.C., back, according to a report from CNN, citing people familiar with Trump’s court schedule strategy.
The scheduling conference comes as the trial in the classified documents case is set to begin on May 20, while the 2020 election subversion case was expected to begin on March 5 but has been halted due to appeals from Trump’s lawyers over immunity.
The outlet reports that Trump’s lawyers are going to ask Judge Aileen Cannon to delay the proceedings in Florida until July and may seek a further delay based on the complexities of dealing with classified material for the trial.
By delaying the trial in Florida, Trump’s lawyers may be looking to block Judge Tanya Chutkan, who is overseeing the Washington trial, from getting a trial date on the calendar before the election.
“Meaning, ice her,” a person familiar with the strategy told CNN, “making it impossible for her to jam a trial down before the election, by things that are out of her control.”
Chutkan has been more aggressive with getting a trial date nailed down, but as the Supreme Court has yet to decide if it will take up Trump’s appeal on immunity claims, the trial cannot begin. One of Trump’s other criminal indictments, over alleged hush money payments in Manhattan, is scheduled to go to trial on March 25, throwing another wrench into the scheduling saga.
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Trump has maximized the campaign opportunities from his court appearances, alleging the charges mounted against him in the various cases are “election interference.”
His team still appears to want to avoid a conviction in the high-profile cases, including the classified documents and election subversion cases. Polls have shown that if the former president is convicted prior to the election, it would significantly hurt his performance against President Joe Biden.
