Judge shuts down Jack Smith report on Trump

A South Florida decide completely blocked the Justice Department from releasing the second quantity of particular counsel Jack Smith’s report that investigates President Donald Trump’s alleged mishandling of delicate authorities paperwork and whether or not he interfered with the federal investigation.

District Judge Aileen Cannon accredited the requests from Trump and his legal group last month to block “current, former, and future” Justice Department officers from releasing the report. The order prohibits Attorney General Pam Bondi and her successors from releasing or sharing the second quantity of Smith’s report. The report was meant to be launched on Tuesday.

Bondi said the report’s second quantity shouldn’t be out to the public, because of concern about Smith’s legality as particular counsel. Then-Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Smith an unbiased particular counsel in November 2022, three days after Trump announced his run for the 2024 presidential election.

The same district decide, Cannon, ruled in July 2024 that Smith was unlawfully appointed particular counsel. She was overseeing the prosecution of the president in the paperwork case and dismissed expenses against Trump, too.

Cannon was appointed to the U.S. District Court by Trump in his first time period. “Special Counsel Smith, acting without lawful authority, obtained an indictment in this action and initiated proceedings that resulted in a final order of dismissal of all charges,” wrote Cannon.

“As a result, the former defendants in this case, like any other defendant in this situation, still enjoy the presumption of innocence held sacrosanct in our constitutional order,” Cannon added. “For obvious reasons, the Court need not take actions in contravention of that protection absent a statutory or other lawful directive to do so.”

Smith appealed the July 2024 case but deserted the appeal after Trump gained the 2024 election. In Cannon’s most current choice to block a portion of Smith’s report, she wrote that it incorporates “voluminous discovery” that has a protecting order issued from the early phases of the case.

“Moreover, while it is true that former special counsels have released final reports at the conclusion of their work, it appears they have done so either after electing not to bring charges at all or after adjudications of guilt by plea or trial,” Cannon wrote. “The Court strains to find a situation in which a former special counsel has released a report after initiating criminal charges that did not result in a finding of guilt, at least not in a situation like this one, where the defendants contested the charges from the outset and still proclaim their innocence.”

Trump’s lawyer, Kendra Wharton, agreed with the decide and said it was “properly ruled that the broad disclosure of protected grand jury testimony and discovery materials related to a dismissed criminal case, along with the publication of opinions and unproven accusations by an unconstitutional prosecutor, has no place in the American judicial system. Judge Cannon’s courage and judicial resolve on these important due process issues should be recognized and taught in law school classrooms across America.”

The Justice Department had backed Trump’s request from last month to prohibit the release of Smith’s second report. “The potential, improper release of Volume II would constitute an irreversible violation of this Court’s constitutional rulings in the underlying criminal action and of bedrock principles of the separation of powers,” Trump’s attorneys said.

Lawyers from the Justice Department also said Smith’s place as particular counsel was not legal. “Smith not only weaponized the Department of Justice against a leading presidential candidate in pursuit of an antidemocratic end, but he did so without legal authority and while targeting constitutionally protected activity,” they wrote.

“Put simply, Smith’s tenure was marked by illegality and impropriety, and under no circumstance should his work product be given the full weight and authority of this Department,” they added. After Smith was employed, he had two felony instances against Trump in 2023.

One associated to the president’s efforts to overturn the 2020 elections and the second on handling delicate authorities paperwork after the end of his first time period. Trump pleaded not guilty to all expenses. Before Smith left his place (he resigned before Trump was sworn in for his second time period), he submitted a two-part report about his investigations on Trump to former Attorney General Merrick Garland.

A portion of the report on the 2020 elections was launched before Trump’s inauguration. Initially, Garland didn’t release the second half of the report on the mishandling of paperwork because there have been ongoing legal issues with Trump’s former co-defendants, Walt Nauta and Carlos de Oliveira. But the case against the defendants was dropped after a federal appeals court accredited the Justice Department’s request to do so.

According to federal law, particular counsels must present the Attorney General with a report that explains the counsels’ choices surrounding prosecution or declination. Previous remaining studies from particular counsels have been launched before.