Left: Then-special counsel Jack Smith speaks to the media about an indictment of then-former President Donald Trump, Aug. 1, 2023, at an office of the Department of Justice in Washington (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File). Center: U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon (U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida). Right: Donald Trump speaks to members of the media before departing Manhattan criminal court, Monday, May 6, 2024, in New York (AP Photo/Julia Nikhinson, Pool).
Attorneys for “former defendants” Donald Trump, his valet Walt Nauta, and Mar-a-Lago property manager Carlos De Oliveira praised U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon’s “great care” in issuing a broad injunction that ensured no one, FBI agents included, “could feign a right to speak freely” about the “conclusions” of ex-special counsel Jack Smith’s final report.
The filing comes days after the Trump administration’s Justice Department weighed in with the same position, asking the Trump-appointed judge who dismissed Trump’s classified documents indictment to confirm that there’s nothing for her to clarify.
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FBI agents, many of whom were “abruptly and unlawfully fired” by FBI Director Kash Patel after his return from the Olympic Games, have said that they want to testify in the DOJ’s “grand conspiracy” probe and that the contents of Volume II might come up — leaving them exposed to legal peril.
The “experts in the handling of classified information” said they could face “court-imposed sanctions” for which they “could be held in contempt” unless Cannon clarified her order barring all disclosures about Volume II.
The DOJ countered that this was no motion for “clarification” at all, but an “intervention” meant to “chip away at this Court’s straightforward prohibition against the disclosure of Volume II and the improperly derived information and conclusions contained in the so-called Special Counsel Report.”
Cannon permanently buried Smith’s report on the probe after she tossed then-candidate Trump’s indictment, reasoning that all of “private citizen” Smith’s acts were invalidated as a consequence of an unlawful appointment.
When Smith testified publicly before Congress, he said nothing about the substance of Volume II, fully aware of Cannon’s orders.
On Wednesday, the lawyers for Trump, Nauta and De Oliveira said the effective silencing of Smith and anyone in the DOJ “demonstrated” the “need for the Court’s great care and specificity” in burying an “unlawfully prepared” report.
“Absent the breadth of this Court’s February 23 Order, nearly anyone involved in the underlying criminal investigation and prosecution or otherwise having knowledge of Volume II could feign a right to speak freely,” the filing said.
“The Court has clearly and appropriately enjoined the Attorney General and his successors, the DOJ, its officers, agents, officials, and employees, and all persons acting in active concert or participation with such individuals,” the former defendants added. “The Court’s ‘active concert’ language reflects the settled principle that an injunction binds not only the parties, but also those aiders and abettors who could otherwise nullify the Court’s decree.”
The post Judge Cannon’s ‘great care’ in burying Mar-a-Lago report ‘appropriately’ ensured no one ‘could feign a right to speak freely,’ Trump lawyer says first appeared on Law & Crime.
