In a late Monday filing, Trump's defense attorneys said the case was “extraordinary," with a large volume of documents and footage to be reviewed as the former president leads the race for the Republican nomination to unseat President Joe Biden. They cited challenges to select jurors and concerns about whether he would get a fair trial if scheduled before the November 2024 election.
“The government’s request to begin a trial of this magnitude within six months of indictment is unreasonable, telling, and would result in a miscarriage of justice,” said the document filed by Chris Kise, one of Trump's lawyers.
The Justice Department had previously proposed to set the trial date for Dec. 11.
Earlier on Monday, Trump's lawyers filed paperwork saying they agreed with federal prosecutors to delay to next week a pretrial hearing that specifically discusses how classified information is handled in court.
The hearing to discuss the Classified Information Procedures Act had previously been set for Friday. But an attorney for Trump's valet Walt Nauta, who was charged alongside the former president, said he has another bench trial this week in Washington preventing him from appearing Friday in South Florida.
The attorneys said in their filing that they can appear at the pretrial conference to go over the 1980 law on July 18, adding they had also checked with U.S. attorneys on moving the date.
The judge in the case, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, still needs to agree to the new date.
Trump and Nauta were charged in a 38-count indictment with conspiring to hide classified documents at Mar-a-Lago from federal investigators. Both men have pleaded not guilty.
Trump has denied any wrongdoing and has slammed the prosecution as an effort to hurt his bid to reclaim the White House in 2024.
A legislative package to end the government shutdown appears on track. A handful of Senate Democrats joined with Republicans to advance the bill after what's become a deepening disruption of federal programs and services. But hurdles remain. Senators are hopeful they can pass the package as soon as Monday and send it to the House. What’s in and out of the bipartisan deal has drawn criticism and leaves few senators fully satisfied. The legislation includes funding for SNAP food aid and other programs while ensuring backpay for furloughed federal workers. But it fails to fund expiring health care subsidies Democrats have been fighting for, pushing that debate off for a vote next month.
Sabrina Siddiqui, National Politics Reporter at The Wall Street Journal, joins to break down the SNAP funding delays and the human cost of the ongoing shutdown.
Arguments at the Supreme Court have concluded for the day as the justices consider President Donald Trump's sweeping unilateral tariffs in a trillion-dollar test of executive power.
President Donald Trump said he has decided to lower his combined tariff rates on imports of Chinese goods to 47% after talks with Chinese leader Xi Jinping on curbing fentanyl trafficking.
The Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate Wednesday for a second time this year as it seeks to shore up economic growth and hiring even as inflation stays elevated. The move comes amid a fraught time for the central bank, with hiring sluggish and yet inflation stuck above the Fed’s 2% target. Compounding its challenges, the central bank is navigating without much of the economic data it typically relies on from the government. The Fed has signaled it may reduce its key rate again in December but the data drought raises the uncertainty around its next moves. Fed Chair Jerome Powell told reporters that there were “strongly differing views” at the central bank's policy meeting about to proceed going forward.
