If the Trump classified documents case is reinstated, Judge Aileen Cannon would be difficult to remove
CNN
Prosecutors would face deeply unfavorable odds at getting the Donald Trump-nominated judge from the case if it is ever revived.
Even after a year of exasperating proceedings that featured several breaks from normal judicial procedure and that culminated in a shock ruling dismissing the classified documents indictment against Donald Trump, prosecutors would face deeply unfavorable odds at getting Judge Aileen Cannon removed from the case if it is ever revived. In theory, special counsel Jack Smith could ask the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals – which oversees federal appeals from Florida – to reassign the case to a different judge as part of his appeal of Cannon’s ruling to dismiss the charges against the former president. But several veteran attorneys who practice in that circuit told CNN that the appeals court would be unlikely to grant such a request, even though Cannon’s justification for throwing out the prosecution was widely panned by legal scholars. “What we have here are adverse rulings and her not resolving the case quickly,” said Jon Sale, a criminal defense attorney in Florida who served on the Watergate prosecution team. “The adverse rulings are not a basis for removal, and timing is in the broad discretion of the trial court.” That means Smith’s best possible outcome might be that the appeals court reverses Cannon’s ruling invalidating his appointment, the Supreme Court lets that stand and several months from now – assuming Trump is not elected to the White House this November – the criminal case can pick up right where it left off, in front of Cannon, a Trump-appointed judge in Fort Pierce, Florida, who has shown no eagerness to get the proceedings to trial. “There really just is no record supporting her removal from the case. They just don’t have any malfeasance to point to,” said CNN legal analyst Michael Moore, who served as an Obama-appointed US attorney in Georgia, another state covered by the 11th Circuit. “She’s been careful to not blindly issue rulings … and that has kept the record really shallow when looking for a removal rationale.”
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