Judge rejects Trump's bid to dismiss classified documents case but agrees to strike an allegation in the charges

Washington — The federal judge overseeing special counsel Jack Smith's classified documents case against Donald Trump once again rejected requests by the former president's legal team to dismiss the charges against him, according to an order filed Monday evening. 

Judge Aileen Cannon denied numerous claims by Trump's defense attorneys and his co-defendants arguing the 2023 indictment was technically flawed, but she criticized prosecutors' description of one incident as unnecessary to the charges and agreed to strike a single paragraph from the charging document because she said it "improperly contained uncharged offense allegations." 

Smith charged Trump with 40 counts that include the unlawful retention of national defense information after investigators recovered hundreds of classified documents from his time in the White House at his Florida estate. The former president and his co-defendants — aide Walta Nauta and former Mar-a-Lago employee Carlos de Oliveira — are also accused of engaging in an alleged scheme to obstruct the federal probe.