The criminal trial against former US President Donald Trump for taking secret government documents to his private estate has been postponed indefinitely. Federal judge Aileen Cannon explained on Tuesday that the start that was actually planned for May 20th was not possible due to the many applications in advance of the proceedings. She did not give a new date for the start of the trial.
For Trump, who is currently on trial in New York in the criminal trial surrounding a hush money affair, the federal judge's decision in the state of Florida is a milestone success. It is now considered unlikely that the trial of the documents affair will begin before the presidential election in November, in which Trump is expected to run again against current incumbent Joe Biden.
Judge Cannon said a new trial date would be announced at a later date “consistent with the defendant's right to due process and the public interest in the fair and efficient administration of justice.” Cannon was nominated for the federal court position by Trump himself in 2020.
The postponement of the trial is a setback for special investigator Jack Smith, who secured the indictment against the ex-president in the documents affair. The 77-year-old right-wing populist is charged in the case with illegal storage of national security information, conspiracy to obstruct justice and making false statements and faces a long prison sentence. Trump has pleaded not guilty.
The ex-president stored secret government documents in his private residence Mar-a-Lago in Florida after leaving office in January 2021 and, according to the indictment, later hid them from the reach of the judiciary. The documents contained, among other things, information about military plans and nuclear weapons. They are said to have been stored unsecured at Mar-a-Lago. US presidents are required to hand over all official documents to the National Archives after they leave office.
Trump is the first former US president in history to be criminally charged – in four separate cases. However, the indictment in New York for allegedly falsifying business documents to cover up a hush money payment to former porn actress Stormy Daniels is the only one of these cases in which legal proceedings have already begun.
In addition to the charges in the documents affair, the ex-president is also being charged both in federal court in Washington and by the Georgia state prosecutor's office for his massive attempts to subsequently overturn his 2020 election defeat against Biden.
Trump is relying on delaying tactics in his legal disputes. If he returns to the White House, he could then instruct the federal judiciary to drop the charges against him – this would include the charges relating to the documents affair as well as the charges in Washington, which, among other things, relate to his role in the storming of the Capitol in Washington by fanatical Trump -Trailer in January 2021.
