The MeidasTouch Podcast - DC Federal Judge Issues KEY RULING on Trump Criminal Trial Date

Episode Date: December 14, 2023

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas reports on the ruling by Washington DC federal judge Tanya Chutkan confirming the stay of all proceedings before her in the Donald Trump criminal case until Trump’s appeal on absolute presidential immunity grounds is resolved. Get 10% off plus free shipping of your estate plan documents by visiting https://trustandwill.com/Meidas Visit https://meidastouch.com for more! Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown Lights On with Jessica Denson: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/lights-on-with-jessica-denson On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Federal Judge Tanya Chutkin has just issued an opinion and order in the criminal case against Donald Trump in Washington, D.C., where she has confirmed that all proceedings before her are now stayed. All proceedings will come to a halt. That's all pretrial hearings, all deadlines, all discovery obligations, all of the dates, deadlines, obligations before her have now come to a halt. This as Donald Trump has filed an appeal to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals on Judge Tanya Chutkin's denial of Donald Trump's motion to dismiss the indictment on the grounds of absolute presidential immunity. Judge Chutkin

acknowledges here that under the doctrine in the case Griggs v. Provident Consumer, the district court is divested. It loses jurisdiction when an appeal is filed to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. Specifically, the Griggs case holds that filing a notice of appeal is an event of jurisdictional significance. It confers jurisdiction on the court of appeals and divests, removes the district court of its control over those aspects of the case involved in the appeal. So special counsel Jack Smith argued that under the Griggs Doctrine, the over those aspects of the case involved in the appeal related solely and exclusively to those issues regarding Donald

Trump's motion to dismiss the indictment on absolute presidential immunity grounds, which was rejected and denied in an order by federal judge Tanya Chutkin. Donald Trump argued, however, that the issue of absolute presidential immunity is all-encompassing over all proceedings. And as the D.C. Circuit recently held in the Blassing Game case, a former president's absolute immunity would constitute, quote, an entitlement not to stand trial or face the other burdens of litigation. And so if you're entitled to absolute immunity, that means that you do not have to stand trial or face the burdens of litigation, which include all of the other deadlines and pretrial hearings and discovery obligations.

Now, what Judge Tanya Chutkin is saying in this order is that she will not be vacating the trial date. She's keeping the March 4th, 2024 trial date, and she's keeping the other pretrial hearings, at least on calendar for now. Obviously, any of the motions for those, any of the work that needs to happen for those will not take place. And so the hearings will go off calendar if the court of appeals, the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, does not move expeditiously in its resolution of Donald Trump's appeal of federal judge Tanya Chutkin's order denying his motion to dismiss on absolute presidential immunity grounds. But Judge Chutkin said, look, number one, I'm not going to be vacating the trial date.

And as soon as this case gets back to me from the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, I will be moving swiftly. I will be moving efficiently. I will be moving and making sure that the ends of justice are served, basically implying that she's going to move this as fast as she can as soon as she gets the case back from the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. Another thing she states in the order is that she does not believe that this notice of appeal divests her of jurisdiction to enforce the terms of condition of Donald Trump's release, and it does not divest her of the gag order that was imposed on Donald Trump for the threats that he made and the gag order that was recently affirmed by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. Judge Chutkin says, I still have the ability to supervise that.

I have jurisdiction over that. But as to all of the other deadlines, at least while this absolute presidential immunity appeal is pending, I do not have jurisdiction anymore over this case. So not great news, to say the least So not great news, to say the least. Not good news, to say the least. If you want a silver lining in this order, it's that Judge Tanya Chutkin is not moving the trial date. She's indicated throughout this that she will be moving expeditiously when the case is sent

back to her. But ultimately, she felt constrained by the Griggs Doctrine, the recent D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals holding that while it rejected Donald Trump's claim to absolute presidential immunity in a civil case or civil cases regarding the January 6th insurrection, it did talk about how absolute presidential immunity would constitute an entitlement not to stand trial or face the other burdens of litigation. Now, I think special counsel Jack Smith has done everything within his power except one thing which I was surprised he didn't do here. So he went to the United States Supreme Court

right away, asked them to grant Sarshi Arori directly address the issue of Donald Trump's claim of absolute presidential immunity before there's even a D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals process taking place. So it went right to the Supreme Court and the Supreme Court granted an expedited briefing schedule regarding whether or not certiorari, whether oral arguments should take place there. Two, special counsel Jack Smith moved for an expedited briefing schedule before the DC Circuit Court of Appeals saying that DC Circuit Court of Appeals, you need to hear this case soon. There is a pro-democracy DC Circuit Court of Appeals panel. I do expect, especially in light of Judge Tanya Chutkin's order today, the DC Circuit Court of Appeals panel is going to move expeditiously and set deadlines,

I think, concluding in January or mid-January on the appeal. By now you may know I'm going to be a dad. See, we build up our lives with bright moments of joy, pride, and success. And however you define those moments, securing your future should be part of the journey. The things we build our future around are things worth protecting. Making an estate plan now means gaining security of your assets and peace of mind for you and your loved ones. With Trust and Will, you can create and manage a custom estate plan starting at just $159. Go to trustandwill.com slash Midas for 10% off plus free document shipping. I know from my own experience that estate planning through other

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Secure your assets and protect your loved ones with Trust and Will. Get 10% off plus free shipping of your estate plan documents by visiting trustandwill.com. That's 10% off and free shipping at trustandwill.com. The one piece that I was surprised that special counsel Jack Smith didn't do, which I think he could have done, is try to certify Donald Trump's appeal as frivolous. The grounds that I would cite to say that Donald Trump's appeal was frivolous is the Blassingame case, where the DC Circuit Court of Appeals already rejected Donald Trump's claim to absolute immunity in a civil case regarding the insurrection. So you would say, look, the precedent is already there rejecting Trump's claim in the context of a civil case. So if it's rejected in the context of a

civil case, clearly it will be rejected in the context of a criminal case where the text, structure, and history of the Constitution even more compels against granting absolute presidential immunity as you just held in the Blassingame case, where you reached that decision about 10 days ago or so. But ultimately, I think what Judge Tanya Chutkin was doing as a law and order judge is she was not going to try to push the bounds of the law. And she made a safe call here. I think she could have said that if you apply the Griggs doctrine, when you refer to control over the aspects of the case involved in the appeal in terms of the power that's divested, that doesn't include, you know, SEPA hearings. It doesn't include other dates and deadlines.

But I think she said, look, the reality is, is absolute presidential immunity. If you have it, it means you're not subject to any of the burdens of litigation at all, which includes discovery and any deadlines and hearings. And she also said, look what the Supreme Court just said in the Coinbase case, or June 2023 case. Granted, that had to do with arbitration, did not have to deal with a question of absolute presidential immunity. But there, the Supreme Court said that it divests the district court of all jurisdiction when a challenge to a denial of arbitrability is made via a notice of appeal to a circuit court of appeals there. So she applied that logic here. And then she said, look, she will move expeditiously. She will continue to move this case along. But she felt that she was restricted by the law. And again, this is, you know, one of the,

one of the issues here that Donald Trump is banking on. Delay, delay, delay. Now, if you want to know what I think is ultimately going to happen here, I think you'll have the DC Circuit Court of Appeals set an expeditious briefing schedule. I think they'll set, you know, oral argument, as I said, sometime mid-January. I think they resolve the case by end of January, early February, you know, and then I think, though, you know, you're going to lose about 45 to 60 days right there, in which case, I think then Judge Tanya Chutkin resets the trial date probably for some time in April or May. Now the question becomes, what is Judge Cannon going to do? What happens on the March 1, 2024 status conference before Judge Cannon? Because her trial date is currently set for May, but she hasn't set the key hearing date. She

hasn't set the key SEPA dates, Classified Information Procedure Act dates. So can she keep her trial date? Will she try to keep her trial date there to try to block Judge Tanya Chutkin? And how will that even look if she hasn't set the SEPA hearing date? So that becomes a kind of critical question. And then will Jack Smith, before Judge Cannon, try to get an interlocutory appeal there, stay the proceedings before Judge Cannon, and then open up for Judge Tanya Chutkin to set the trial date there. So a lot going on here. Again, not a great ruling in terms of having this trial go on March 4th, 2024. I think the chances of this trial now going March 4th, 2024 are very slim, probably maybe 20%, 25%. I think more likely it'll get kicked a month or two,

and then we have to see how that impacts Judge Cannon. But look, go back to the hot take that I did on the issue regarding this appeal by Donald Trump. And as I said, Jack Smith's brief was not a slam dunk. The law in Griggs has these stays that get issued and Donald Trump is taking advantage of what the law says, but that's where we're at. Ultimately, do I think this case is still going to go in 2024? The short answer is yes. Do I think it's going to be delayed now? The short answer is yes. Do I think that Judge Chutkin made the right decision here? Safe decision to make.

She ran the risk if she didn't do this of possibly getting overturned or removed from the case if someone thought that she was trying to come up with kind of extraordinary relief where it didn't belong. But that's where we're at. That's the process right now. But what this does also open up for, now it looks like the Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg case, that criminal case may be the first one to go before Judge Juan Merchan. Keep you posted there. I'm Ben Micellis. This is the Midas Touch Network. Hit subscribe. We're on our way to 2 million subscribers thanks to your support. Hey, Midas Mighty. Love this report? Continue the conversation by following us on Instagram, at Midas Touch, to keep up with the most important news of the day. What are you waiting for? Follow us now.