Trump-appointed Judge Aileen Cannon handed prosecutors in his Mar-a-Lago case a shocking ultimatum on Monday.

TheĀ MAGA-friendlyĀ federal judge whoĀ keeps sidingĀ withĀ Donald TrumpĀ in his Mar-a-Lago classified records case has forced prosecutors to make a stark choice: allow jurors to see a huge trove of national secrets or let him go.

U.S. District JudgeĀ Aileen M. Cannonā€™sultimatum Monday night came as a surprise twist in what could have been a simple order; one merely asking federal prosecutors and Trumpā€™s lawyers for proposed jury instructions at the upcoming trial.

But asĀ sheĀ hasĀ done repeatedly, Cannon used this otherwise innocuous legal step as yet another way to swing the case wildly in favor of the man who appointed her while he was president.

Department of Justice Special CounselĀ Jack SmithĀ must now choose whether to allow jurors at the upcoming criminal trial to peruse the many classified records found at the former presidentā€™s South Florida mansion or give jurors instructions that would effectively order them to acquit him.

  • Neato@ttrpg.networkEnglish
    24Ā·
    8 months ago

    Another option for the prosecution is to redact classified info. It doesnā€™t actually matter what is in the document, just that itā€™s classified because a former President is disallowed to possess classified material.

    For more info: classified documents have extensive markets markings. The header and footer of every page with material is marked either, Unclassified (if present in docs with higher), CUI, Secret, Top Secret, etc. In addition, the document will have markings for each paragraph on if that particular paragraph or line contains classified material and at what level. So the prosecution could definitely just redact everything above Unclassified and the remainder of the text should paint a fairly clear picture of what the document contains without revealing specific classified details.

    Of course this treasonous judge would probably interpret as you did because she belongs behind bars not a bench.___

    • CosmicTurtle@lemmy.worldEnglish
      151Ā·
      8 months ago

      Playing a bit of devilā€™s advocate.

      We have a tendency to over classify things in general. When I was in a TS SCIF, we would mark things S/TS because we were lazy and didnā€™t want to go through the process to see if something was subject to disclosure.

      Assuming, with a great heaping serving of salt, that there is validity to Trumpā€™s claim, I can sort of understand putting to a jury to see if the files that Trump took were in fact classified. I can see him stealing the documents simply because it had a cover sheet and not because it was valuable. While Iā€™m sure that he absolutely took sensitive and classified information, Iā€™m equally sure that there is probably a take out menu or two in those boxes.

      The problem is that the run of the mill citizen isnā€™t equipped to properly classify a document. I donā€™t know what probative value exists in giving the documents to jurors outside of forcing the prosecution to put them in the public record.

      • dream_weasel@sh.itjust.works
        10Ā·
        8 months ago

        Jurors provide no value beyond the markings even if they are over-classified. I mean I guess you could beat out the security classification guides and a derivative classification courseā€¦ But even so, the president is only an OCA while in office so the point is kinda moot. I donā€™t think the specific document content matters, just whether or not updated SCG exists with same content, yeah?

        Basically, ā€œthis line is referencing this item in the guide, the guide still says classified, ergo this is a spillā€.

      • breadsmasher@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1Ā·
        8 months ago

        Im just trying to understand your experience there. So being lazy, documents could be marked S/TS. And then following on to allowing the jurybto see whether they were classified.

        This sounds to me youā€™re suggesting the jury should verify these documents, and assuming some are marked S/TS, come to a decision as to whether it should actually be that classification and not some lower classification allowing more general disclosure?

    • AbidanYre@lemmy.worldEnglish
      13Ā·
      8 months ago

      classified documents have extensive markets

      The markets for these ones were Saudi Arabia, Russia, and maybe China.