During a recent interview on MSNBC’s “The Last Word” with Lawrence O’Donnell, popular former federal prosecutor Andrew Weissmann discussed the ongoing case against scandal-plagued former President Donald Trump regarding his blatant mishandling and misuse of classified government documents, being overseen by Trump-appointed and clearly Trump-sympathetic U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon.
Cannon, who has been publicly chastised a number of times since taking this case for making rulings that appear to blatantly side with the man who got her her job, is in a particularly tricky situation with this specific case, as it has so many potential national security implications due to the nature of the materials stolen by Donald Trump and stashed away at his Mar-a-Lago golf resort turned post-White House home.
Given the sensitive nature of the entire case and the delicate damn Cannon must do around national security implications, Weissmann noted that a “screw up” on Judge Cannon’s part could ultimately hand a massive gift to DOJ-appointed Special Counsel Jack Smith, who’s prosecuting the case against the former president.
“If she screws this up, to be blunt, this is the kind of issue that I would imagine the government would take an appeal so that they could have the 11th circuit hear it,” Weissmann pointedly explained.
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Last week, a closed-door hearing in the case only saw attendance by Smith’s team and one court reporter. According to MSNBC’s legal contributor Katie Phang, the hearing lasted approximately three hours.
In his recent interview, the former federal prosecutor explained why Donald Trump’s legal defense team was not permitted to be present at this highly sensitive, closed-door hearing.
“This is a way for the judge to hear from the government about what proposed redactions or summaries they are planning to use. By definition you do not have the defense there, because if you have the defense there, the whole point is to keep the classified information classified and away from people who do not have classification approval,” Weissmann explained.
The former federal prosecutor went on to outline additional ways that the federal government could be preparing their appeal, including the possibility that the Trump-appointed judge attempts to further delay the former president’s trial, indefinitely. According to Weissmann, if that happens, “then the government has to decide at what point are they going to try to do something.”
Weissmann also added that Smith’s team would have grounds for a solid appeal, should Judge Cannon share any sensitive information with the former president’s lawyers.
“That’s something they could appeal prior to that going to the defense,” he explained.
Lastly, if Cannon were to decide to overrule the government’s requests for redactions to protect national security and the overall integrity of intelligence in this case, yet another door would be opened for a brutal appeal by Smith and his team.
Weissmann explained that if any of the documents in this case contained “nuclear secrets” or “military plans” then “that is the kind of data that you of course the government would be saying ‘I do not want that to be revealed.'”
See Weissmann’s MSNBC interview here:
Featured image via Flickr/Gage Skidmore, under Creative Commons license 2.0
