Two hearings Friday, one in Georgia and the other in Florida, could hold significant implications for former President Donald Trump and the criminal charges he faces for his actions around the 2020 election and retaining classified information after leaving office.
In Georgia, Trump and his co-defendants are delivering final arguments in their effort to have Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis disqualified from the case. In Florida, meanwhile, a federal judge could push back Trump’s trial date in the classified documents case.
Here’s what to watch in each.
US District Judge Aileen Cannon has told both parties to be prepared to discuss scheduling in the Mar-a-Lago documents case, including a request from Trump’s attorneys to hold a hearing over whether they can demand additional information from an assortment of federal agencies as well as from Joe Biden’s White House.
Special Counsel Jack Smith and attorneys for Trump proposed moving the trial later into the summer in court filings Thursday. Smith said he believes that Trump and his two co-defendants, Walt Nauta and Carlos De Oliviera, should go to trial on July 8, 2024.
Attorneys for the three defendants proposed that Trump and De Oliviera’s trial begins on August 12, 2024, while Nauta’s trial begins September 9, 2024.
The Trump discovery gambit, if successful, could further push back the timeline for a trial while giving the former president more opportunity to promote his theories of political bias in the prosecution.
One of Trump’s primary legal strategies has been delay, and that includes playing his various cases against each other.
For Friday’s hearing in the documents case, scheduled for 10 a.m. ET, Cannon told both parties to be ready to…
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