Judge Chutkan denies Trump's request to recuse herself in federal election subversion case

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan said Wednesday she won't recuse herself from Donald Trump's 2020 election interference case in Washington, rejecting the former president's claims that her past comments raise doubts about whether she can be fair.

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan said Wednesday she won't recuse herself from Donald Trump's 2020 election interference case in Washington, rejecting the former president's claims that her past comments raise doubts about whether she can be fair.

Chutkan, who was nominated to the bench by President Barack Obama and was randomly assigned to Trump's case, said in her written decision that she sees no reason to step aside. The case, scheduled for trial in March, accuses the Republican of illegally scheming to overturn his election loss to Democrat Joe Biden.

There's a high bar for recusal, and legal experts had widely considered Trump's request to be a long shot aimed at undermining the legitimacy of the case publicly that could only sour the relationship between the judge and the defense in court.

In seeking Chutkan's recusal, defense lawyers cited statements she had made in two sentencing hearings of participants in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol in which they said she had appeared to suggest that Trump deserved to be prosecuted and held accountable. They said the comments suggested a bias against him that could taint the proceedings.

But Chutkan vigorously objected to the those characterizations of her comments.

"It bears noting that the court has never taken the position the defense ascribes to it: that former `President Trump should be prosecuted and imprisoned,"' Chutkan wrote. "And the defense does not cite any instance of the court ever uttering those words or anything similar."

It's the second time Trump has tried unsuccessfully to get a judge removed from one of the criminal cases against him. Judge Juan Manuel Merchan, who is overseeing Trump's New York hush money criminal case, rejected similar demands that he step aside, saying he is certain of his "ability to be fair and impartial."