Donald Trump’s four criminal trials are legal slogs, but the former president had reason to celebrate at the end of this week after seeing a string of small victories in them.
The presumptive GOP presidential nominee has pushed to have his cases dropped and has consistently employed delay tactics in them, and this week, he has seen his strategies pay off for him in Georgia, New York, and Florida.
Georgia
The election interference case in Georgia brought by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis ended the week with six fewer charges and one less prosecutor than when the week began.
First, Judge Scott McAfee dismissed six counts in Willis’s indictment related to allegations Trump and several of his co-defendants solicited violation of an oath of office. Three of the 13 charges Trump is facing were tossed out as a result, although the president is still facing broader charges that he participated in a racketeering conspiracy.
“The Court’s concern is less that the State has failed to allege sufficient conduct of the Defendants — in fact it has alleged an abundance. However, the lack of detail concerning an essential legal element is, in the undersigned’s opinion, fatal,” McAfee wrote.
Trump’s attorney Steve Sadow, who filed demurrers last year objecting to Trump’s charges, called McAfee’s decision “correct.”
McAfee left open the ability for Willis to attempt to bring the now-withdrawn charges again, but some legal analysts, such as Georgia-based attorney Andrew Fleischman, have cautioned against that because it would open up new avenues to delay or challenge the case.
While McAfee’s decision rocked the case, two days later, he handed down an even more jolting and highly anticipated decision not to disqualify Willis over her previously undisclosed relationship with special prosecutor Nathan Wade, whom she hired to help prosecute Trump. McAfee was sharply critical of Willis’s “tremendous lapse of judgment,” however, and forced her to fire Wade. Wade resigned within hours of McAfee’s decision.
Trump responded by calling the move “BIG STUFF” on social media.
“This is the equivalent of Deranged [special counsel] Jack Smith getting ‘canned,’ BIG STUFF, something which should happen in the not too distant future!!!” Trump wrote.
New York
Trump is facing 34 counts of business fraud over allegations brought by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg that he participated in an illegal hush money scheme in 2016.
Trump had sought discovery from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York about his former attorney Michael Cohen, who was prosecuted by that office in part for the same hush money incident for which Trump was indicted. The U.S. attorney’s office only this month provided Trump with the discovery, amounting to tens of thousands of pages of material, related to Cohen, whom Bragg is expected to use as a key witness in the case. Trump implored Judge Juan Merchan to delay the trial, originally scheduled for March 25, by 90 days because of the eleventh-hour productions and to hold a hearing on the discovery process, which Trump accused Bragg of violating.
Bragg, in a surprise filing, was agreeable to Trump’s review request but asked the judge for a 30-day delay instead. Merchan on Friday announced that he would allow for a delay of 30 days from Friday, effectively resetting the trial to begin in mid-April. Merchan also scheduled a hearing for March 25 to hear arguments Trump has filed about the discovery in the case, and the judge said he would confirm a new trial date at the hearing.
Trump’s campaign celebrated Merchan’s decision in a statement, saying the hearing would allow Bragg to be held “accountable for misconduct.”
“President Trump and his counsel have been consistent and steadfast that this case has no basis in law or fact, and should be dismissed. Today, after the Manhattan DA conceded violations by his office, the judge, in adjourning the trial, ordered a hearing to hold DA Bragg accountable for misconduct,” spokesman Steven Cheung said.
Florida
Trump appeared in court in Florida for a hearing this week related to two of several requests he has made to dismiss the case brought by Smith related to the former president’s alleged mishandling of classified documents.
Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, drew criticism from Trump’s detractors for even scheduling the hearing, which took place Thursday.
“Judge Cannon setting aside an entire day for these flimsy claims is still more evidence of her partisan lean,” left-leaning legal analyst Norm Eisen stated.
Trump has also asked Cannon to push the trial in the case until after the presidential election, while Smith has asked for a July trial. The trial was originally scheduled for May.
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While Smith has signaled he wants the case to progress rapidly, Cannon has shown no signs of urgency in it.
The judge on Thursday gave no orders related to deadlines and furthermore signaled she had much material she still needed to review, according to reports from the courtroom. And while she did later deny one of Trump’s four motions to dismiss the case, she has yet to rule on the others, including a complex presidential immunity argument that the Supreme Court is now weighing in Trump’s other federal criminal case.
