Florida judge dismisses Trump documents case

Donald Trump is driven from the Alto Lee Adams Sr. U.S. Courthouse on March 14, 2024 in Fort Pierce, Florida. Trump visited the courthouse for his case in front of District Judge Aileen Cannon regarding his criminal case related to taking classified records when he left the White House in January 2021.

Trump is now "unlikely to face another trial before Election Day"

(Image credit: Joe Raedle / Getty Images)

published 16 July 2024

What happened

Federal Judge Aileen Cannon on Monday dismissed the entirety of Special Counsel Jack Smith's classified documents case against Donald Trump. In her 93-page ruling, Cannon, a Trump appointee, argued that Smith's appointment as special counsel was unconstitutional.

Cannon's decision is a "surprise twist after a year of court proceedings that have been unpredictable — and slow-moving — from the start," The Wall Street Journal said. The Florida judge had previously given Trump "considerable room to make legal arguments challenging the validity of the charges, prompting repeated frustration from prosecutors and criticism from legal experts."

The ruling is a "triumph for Trump, even if it is eventually reversed on appeal," said The Washington Post. "Other courts have rejected arguments similar to the one that Trump's team made in Florida about the legality of Smith’s appointment."

This decision "rolls back nearly 30 years of how special counsels have gotten their jobs," The New York Times said. Despite Cannon's abundant leniency toward the Trump team, it's "fair to say that almost no one expected her to kill the documents case in quite this way at quite this moment."

Trump is now "unlikely to face another trial before Election Day," Axios said, after the Supreme Court ruled earlier this month that "presidents have immunity for 'official acts.'"

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Explore More

Rafi Schwartz has worked as a politics writer at The Week since 2022, where he covers elections, Congress and the White House. He was previously a contributing writer with Mic focusing largely on politics, a senior writer with Splinter News, a staff writer for Fusion's news lab, and the managing editor of Heeb Magazine, a Jewish life and culture publication. Rafi's work has appeared in Rolling Stone, GOOD and The Forward, among others.