U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon ruled Thursday that Donald Trump does not have to comply with a special master’s order to release or suppress his claims that the FBI “planted” information among documents that agents confiscate at Mar-a-Lago. .
Special Master Raymond Dearie, a federal judge recommended by Trump’s own legal team, had given the former president’s lawyers until Friday to confirm or refute an inventory list of items taken by FBI agents provided by the Department of justice
Dearie’s order, in essence, demanded evidence of Trump’s claims that some White House files seized by agents at Mar-a-Lago had been “planted.” It was a claim his lawyers never made.
“This filing will be the plaintiff’s last opportunity to raise any dispute as to the completeness and accuracy of the itemized inventory of the property,” said Dearie, a former federal prosecutor and U.S. district judge in Brooklyn, N.Y. York, when he issued the order.
Trump said he and family members watched agents search sections of his Mar-a-Lago home and resort to surveillance cameras, raising questions about how the FBI could have secretly planted evidence at the same time. Two of Trump’s lawyers were also at Mar-a-Lago during the search, and one signed off on a list of boxes and “miscellaneous secret documents” that were removed.
In a letter written Sunday and made public Wednesday afternoon, Trump’s team sought to sidestep Dearie’s lawsuit.
“Because the master’s special case management plan exceeds the District Court’s grant of authority on this subject, plaintiff must object,” Trump’s lawyers wrote.
Cannon agreed to his order Thursday, saying Trump’s lawyers would not be required to affirm the accuracy of the FBI’s inventory of Mar-a-Lago before they had a chance to review the records themselves.
“There will be no separate requirement for the plaintiff at this stage, prior to the review of any of the seized materials. … The Court’s Appointment Order did not contemplate such an obligation,” Cannon wrote.
His order also extended the deadline for reviewing documents Trump took from the White House to keep at Mar-a-Lago from Nov. 30 to Dec. 16. The records, which belong to the public, are supposed to be in the hands of National. archives
Dearie is supposed to be going through the various boxes of documents to determine if any may be protected by attorney-client or executive privilege.
While Dearie appeared to be speeding up the process, Cannon, who was appointed to the bench by Trump, is slowing it down, which will delay the release of any damning information until after the midterm elections.
In a blow to Trump, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit ruled last week that the Justice Department can resume reviewing seized records, blocking part of a previously issued stay by Cannon. The appeals court also barred Dearie from examining documents marked classified.
After the ruling, Cannon, whose decision in favor of Trump to protect records seized at Mar-a-Lago has been criticized by several legal experts, modified his own order. It now states that the material subject to a special master review no longer includes “approximately one hundred documents bearing classification marks.”
