Donald Trump’s lawyers are preparing to redirect their focus on the charges that the former president illegally retained classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, moving on after Trump was found guilty of 34 felonies in his New York criminal trial last month, The Guardian reports. With Trump’s other two cases indefinitely delayed with appeals, the Mar-a-Lago documents case is the only case with ongoing proceedings. Trumps’ legal strategy has been to push any trials until after the 2024 election.
That means Trump’s lawyers are principally occupied with only the documents case as they intensify efforts to have the presiding U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, dismiss the indictment or, alternatively, dramatically undercut the evidence prosecutors can present. The Guardian cited a recent ruling by Cannon that may be a sign of what’s to come. On Monday, the judge struck from Trump’s indictment a paragraph about an episode in which Trump waved around a classified map of Afghanistan at his Bedminster golf club.