(Photo by PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)
That didn’t take long. Less than 24 hours after Trump docketed his screaming tantrum masquerading an opposition to a routine request to file an overlong brief, Judge Tanya Chutkan has already batted it down.
“For the second time in a week, Defendant urges reconsideration of the current pretrial schedule in a brief intended to respond to a separate issue, and without actually filing a motion to that effect,” she wrote tartly, adding that “For completeness, however, the court will address more broadly Defendant’s new and sundry arguments about the pretrial schedule, none of which articulate a cognizable prejudice.”
First, she explained, as if to a small child, that criminal prosecution is necessarily an adversary process:
[A]llowing a brief from the Government is not “contrary to law procedure, and custom,” as Defendant claims, id. (citing no authority); it is simply how litigation works: Each side presents arguments and proffers evidence on disputed issues—here, whether Defendant’s charged conduct involved official acts and receives immunity. Indeed, Defendant appears to embrace a similar approach.
Then she noted that Trump himself proposed briefing on the very same topics, albeit at a glacially slow pace that deferred substantive motions until after the election.
“Defendant’s concern with the political consequences of these proceedings does not bear on the pretrial schedule,” she scoffed.
The judicial eye-roll fairly wafts off the page in a paragraph dealing with Trump’s contention that it is NO FAIR to let the special counsel file stuff when he is still barred by the gag order from calling in troll storms on potential witnesses.
“[T]he former contention mischaracterizes the court’s order, and even so identifies potential political consequences rather than legal prejudice,” she wrote incredulously. “The court likewise rejects Defendant’s unsupported assertion that publicly docketing nonsensitive materials during the immunity briefing would impermissibly ‘impact potential witnesses and taint the jury pool.’”
Judge Chutkan finished by swatting aside Trump’s complaint that, by filing a brief under court order, the special counsel will violate the DOJ’s internal policy against taking legal actions this close to an election. (It doesn’t — the policy pertains to charging and investigatory decisions, and Trump was indicted in 2023.)
“Defendant does not explain how those putative violations cause him legal prejudice in this case, nor how this court is bound by or has jurisdiction to enforce Department of Justice policy,” she concluded.
It was a vicious smackdown, preserving for the record exactly how shitty and unserious Trump’s arguments are. And so on Thursday, or shortly thereafter depending on how long it takes to vet the redactions, we’ll get the special counsel’s brief explaining why the amended indictment included the pressure campaign against Mike Pence and how that is entirely consonant with the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling.
Which is exactly what Trump was desperate to head off, since it reminds us that the Republican nominee for president tried to mount a coup less than four years ago.
US v. Trump [Docket via Court Listener]
Liz Dye lives in Baltimore where she produces the Law and Chaos substack and podcast.