The Florida judge over former President Donald J. Trump's classified documents case engaged in a tense exchange with federal prosecutors on Wednesday over a minor but hotly contested issue, once again highlighting just how bogged down the trial has become.
The case was the subject of unproven accusations by Trump's legal team that prosecutors tried to intimidate lawyers early in the investigation to get one of his co-defendants to cooperate against Trump.
The exchange occurred during a hearing in which prosecutor David Harbach angrily denied the charges and Judge Eileen M. Cannon asked for details. The dispute concerned a meeting at the Justice Department about two years ago. Lawyers for co-defendant Walt Nauta claim that prosecutors have hinted that failing to persuade Nauta to side with Trump could derail the judgeship he seeks.
“The story of what happened at that meeting is fantasy,” Harbach once told Judge Cannon. “It never happened.”
The awkward conversation ended with Judge Cannon advising Mr. Harbach to calm down. It was a symbol of the growing frustration that prosecutors in Special Counsel Jack Smith's office have shown not only with the defense attorneys in the case but also with the judge himself.
The controversy comes amid two allegations Trump's defense team disclosed Tuesday, including several aggressive and some unsubstantiated allegations of prosecutorial misconduct and political maneuvering against Smith. It happened right after I did it.
It also comes amid growing tensions with Judge Cannon, who recently rescheduled the case, all but ensuring that it will not be tried before the November election.
The hearing was held in U.S. District Court in Fort Pierce, Florida, to consider Mr. Nauta's claims that he is the victim of persistent prosecution by the Office of Special Counsel. Mr. Nauta, who served as Mr. Trump's personal aide in the White House and is still employed by Mr. Trump, moved boxes of documents around in a plot to thwart government efforts to recover classified materials from Marua. He has been accused of -The former president's private club and residence in Largo, Florida.
Nauta's lawyer, Stanley Woodward Jr., presented evidence alleging the prosecution was retaliatory, telling Judge Cannon that during his first meeting with the government in August 2022, prosecutor Jay I. Blatt said he had recently read that Woodward had applied for a judgeship in Washington and hoped Woodward would not “do anything to screw it up.”
Woodward explained that Blatt followed up that statement by claiming that the government wanted Nauta to cooperate with the investigation. Because Nauta refused to attack Trump and testify before a grand jury, Woodward claims prosecutors punished him with the charges.
Woodward initially asked Judge Cannon in papers to dismiss the charges on those grounds, but the judge scaled back that request in court on Wednesday, instead asking for another hearing in which witnesses, including Woodward, could be called to determine exactly what happened in the meeting with Blatt.
Judge Cannon seemed to recognize that such a process could easily become time-consuming and distracting, likening it to going down a “rabbit hole.” . But the defense has so far been surprisingly successful in persuading judges to schedule hearings on a number of legal issues that many judges would have summarily dismissed.
As Blatt listened in the prosecutor's chair, Harbach immediately attacked Woodward, calling his vindictive prosecution case a “shitty argument.” Mr. Harbach said that even though Mr. Blatt had shown hostility toward Mr. Woodward (and he did not admit that it happened), such feelings were not clear to prosecutors because his client Mr. Nauta He pointed out that it had nothing to do with how they were treated.
Harbach also noted that Woodward never reported Brat's alleged comments to any legal ethics agency, and that in fact it was Trump's lawyers who first raised the allegations, nearly 10 months later, around the time they met with Smith and other key prosecutors at the Justice Department in their failed attempt to block the indictment.
Judge Cannon seemed aware that Mr. Woodward's argument missed the point, but he seemed intrigued nonetheless.
She asked Harbaugh whether it was true, as Woodward claims, that Brat began the meeting by pointing out that Woodward was not “Trump's lawyer” in an attempt to appease Trump.
“Should such a comment be made?” Judge Cannon asked. “Is it consistent with the highest standards of professionalism?”
Mr. Halbach eventually acknowledged that language to that effect had indeed been used at the meeting. But he was adamant there was no attempt to intimidate Woodward into turning Nauta against Trump.
“That's obviously false,” he said, adding in an almost pleading voice. “That's not correct.”