The classified documents criminal case against Donald Trump and others heats up again Monday with crucial hearings over access to evidence that could impact whether the former president is tried before the November election.
But even then, the proceeding before Judge Aileen Cannon in federal court in Fort Pierce, Florida, won’t be public.
On Monday, Trump and his attorneys will meet for several hours with Cannon in a closed-door hearing without prosecutors present to discuss the case “in detail,” according to court documents. Special counsel Jack Smith’s team will meet with Cannon afterward.
The defense lawyers will argue for access to classified evidence in the case they or their clients haven’t yet seen – and that prosecutors and intelligence agencies seek to keep from them, potentially giving them only summaries of the information because of how sensitive it is, according to the court record.
While many of the Mar-a-Lago documents case proceedings and filings have been kept out of the public’s view in recent weeks, the prosecutors and defense teams have been preparing for trial.
The defense teams have been furiously at work over the past several days – including on Super Bowl Sunday – preparing for the hearing Monday, writing motions and reviewing evidence in a sensitive compartmented information facility, called a SCIF, in Florida, according to multiple sources familiar with the team.
In addition to the upcoming hearing, they face a major deadline for court filings in less than two weeks, as they continue to strategize for ways to delay the trial. They are also fighting with prosecutors over making witness names public now, well before the trial.
Court cases with classified evidence such as this require careful oversight by the judge…
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