Judge Aileen Cannon’s decision to postpone a trial in Donald Trump’s classified documents case could actually make it easier to move ahead with the former president's other criminal proceedings, legal experts say.
According to Neil Katyal, former acting U.S. solicitor general, Cannon’s decision could, in particular, allow special counsel Jack Smith to press ahead with the Jan. 6 case against Trump. The former president has been charged with plotting to overturn the 2020 election, a case that is being handled by a federal judge in Washington, DC.
“The one thing I will say that’s a positive is that if the Supreme Court allows Jack Smith’s other trial of Trump and Jan. 6 to go forward, Judge Cannon’s decision today has now cleared the docket for Trump,” Katyal said in an interview with MSNBC's Alex Wagner.
Katyal added that he believes it’s now “more possible” that a trial over January 6 could go forward, pending a Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity. That case, which centers on Trump’s alleged conspiracy to use a mob to stop the certification of the 2020 election, had been set to begin trial in March, before the Supreme Court took up Trump's claim of immunity.
Criminal defense attorney Bradley P. Moss, in a post on X, argued that Cannon’s decision indeed has “a silver lining” for other Trump trial efforts.
“She isn't blocking the DC or Georgia election cases from resuming in the late summer/early fall, pending SCOTUS ruling on immunity,” he wrote. The Georgia case, delayed by allegations of prosecutorial misconduct, likewise deals with Trump's efforts to overturn his 2020 loss.
It appears unlikely, though, that the documents case itself moves forward. Katyal noted that Cannon has already had 11 months to begin a trial; in the same amount of time, federal prosecutors tried and convicted Sam Bankman-Fried. That's "atrocious," Katyal argued, but unlikely to be enough for prosecutors to have Cannon removed.
