The final weeks of 2023 for are expected to set the trajectory of a series of legal challenges that will determine former President Donald Trump’s political and economic future.
Trump, the first former president to be criminally indicted, has been charged with 91 state and federal felony counts across four jurisdictions since April, and has pleaded not guilty to all charges. At the same time, a civil fraud trial threatens his New York business empire. He also holds a commanding lead in the GOP presidential primary race.
Key deadlines and decisions in the final weeks of 2023 are expected to set the trajectory of each of his legal challenges. Here is a look at what to expect in the weeks ahead:
Letitia James – New York
Before Trump’s civil fraud trial again, Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron expected the trial would conclude by Dec. 22, three days before Christmas. But Trump’s attorneys recently disclosed that they are at least a full week ahead of schedule, after wrapping up another week of their defense case.
After the long Thanksgiving weekend, Trump’s defense case will resume with the former president’s legal team recalling witnesses who testified earlier in the trial. New York Attorney General Letitia James previously called Trump Hotel’s chief accounting officer Mark Hawthorn and the Trump Organization’s ex-junior employee Patrick Birney. A queue of witnesses from Deutsche Bank will follow.
Deutsche was the largest single lender to Trump and the Trump Organization between 2011 and 2021, a time frame that includes his turn as a reality TV star of The Apprentice, as well as his tumultuous trajectory to, inside, and out of the White House. Though much changed during that time, Deutsche — a scandal-plagued German lender fined three years ago for its previous relationship with Russian oligarchs and late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein — remained a constant.
Ivanka Trump’s husband, Jared Kushner, arranged the introduction between the German lender’s managing director Rosemary Vrablic and Donald Trump Jr., with Kushner touting the bank’s “unparalleled” rates on loans, according to the New York attorney general’s complaint. Vrablic will be the first among the Deutsche witnesses. The attorney general has argued that Trump received favorable interest rates on loans by misleading Deutsche about his net worth on statements of financial condition, and the defense is expected to elicit testimony suggesting that German lender benefited from their business relationship with the former president.
Trump has not yet released his final witness list for early December through the end of the defense case, but his attorneys previously promised that the former president and his son Eric Trump would take another stint on the witness stand for the defense case, which kicked off earlier this month with testimony from Donald Trump Jr.
Jack Smith – Washington, D.C.
Parties in the Washington, D.C. election-subversion case against the former president are awaiting several rulings in the coming weeks which could alter the trajectory of the case.
The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals is expected to rule soon on whether to maintain, adjust or remove the partial gag order in the case following oral arguments on Nov. 20 on Trump’s appeal of the on-again, off-again limitations on public statements in the case. U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan issued the order Oct. 17, prohibiting not just Trump but all parties to the case from making statements that “target” prosecutors or their staff, defense lawyers or their staff, court staff and supporting personnel, and “any reasonably foreseeable witnesses or the substance of their testimony.”
Meanwhile, Chutkan is expected to issue rulings in the coming weeks on Trump’s motions to dismiss the case–one arguing Trump has absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions connected to his presidency, and another arguing his D.C. indictment violates the Constitution’s prohibition against “double jeopardy” because he was acquitted of incitement of insurrection at his 2021 impeachment trial. Prosecutors have urged Chutkan to rule quickly on the motions, noting that they could be subject to pre-trial “interlocutory appeals” which could lead to appellate proceedings that slow down the district court’s schedule.
Trump is charged with four federal felonies in the case alleging he obstructed the 2020 presidential election and has pleaded not guilty to all charges. His trial is scheduled to begin on March 4, the day before Super Tuesday when 14 states vote including California, Colorado, North Carolina, Texas and Virginia.
In the coming days, the case’s pre-trial schedule also calls for Trump’s legal team to file any motions to compel the prosecution to produce evidence or information relevant to the case by Nov. 27. Smith’s office can oppose those motions by Dec. 11, and the defense can file replies in support by Dec. 18.
Alvin Bragg – New York
As the year winds to a close, there has been a flurry of activity on the docket in the first case to produce an indictment against Trump, accusing the former president of falsifying business records to hide hush-money payments to pornographic film actress Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election.
In early October, Trump’s legal team submitted the motions seeking to dismiss the case, ridiculing the prosecution as a “discombobulated package of politically motivated charges marred by legal defects.” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg countered with a 98-page defense of the charges portraying Trump’s defense as an effort to use his status as a former president and current GOP frontrunner to shield himself from prosecution.
“This argument is essentially an attempt to evade criminal responsibility because defendant is politically powerful,” the DA’s counsel Matthew Colangelo wrote earlier this month.
In a side battle, Trump’s ex-fixer Michael Cohen is fighting to quash what he calls a “wildly overbroad” subpoena that he says amounts to “witness intimidation.”
“Ever since Mr. Cohen accepted criminal responsibility for his actions including actions taken on behalf of, at the direction of, and in coordination with Defendant Trump — and began providing information to authorities in numerous investigations of Defendant Trump and his various business entities, Defendant Trump has repeatedly abused the judicial system in an effort to silence Mr. Cohen,” Cohen’s attorney Danya Perry wrote.
In a separate criminal case in 2018, Cohen pleaded guilty to executing a complicated system of $130,000 hush money payments to Daniels’ attorney, via a home equity loan funneled through a shell company. Prosecutors say that Trump reimbursed Cohen by grossing up the interest to $420,000, an amount which included $60,000 in supposed “tech services.”
Trump paid out that amount in $35,000 installments, allegedly falsifying records dozens of times to keep the public from learning about the scandal before Election Day. Arguments on the pending motions are not expected until early next year, and the trial, originally scheduled for March, is likely to be delayed because of overlap with the federal election-obstruction case.
Jack Smith – South Florida
In the Florida documents case against the former president, the pre-trial schedule shifted dramatically–and the practicality of the May trial date was cast into doubt–with a Nov. 10 order from U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon.
The order delayed several critical pre-trial deadlines regarding discovery and pre-trial motions by a matter of months.
Under Cannon’s new schedule, important pre-trial litigation that was previously scheduled for the final months of 2023 has been shifted to early 2024. The deadline for pretrial motions previously set for Nov. 3, 2023 is now Feb. 22, 2024.
Although May 20, 2024 is still the official trial start date, Cannon provided a clear indication that the date is likely to shift, legal experts said, in a Nov. 16 procedural ruling denying prosecutors’ motion to set a deadline for a key classified records filing. Cannon is slated to reconsider the trial date at a scheduling conference on March 1, 2024.
Trump was indicted in June on federal charges in South Florida for alleged willful retention of sensitive national security information at his Mar-a-Lago resort. After a superseding indictment in late July related to alleged obstruction efforts, Trump is now facing 40 felony counts in the case.
Fani Willis — Georgia
Georgia’s sweeping election racketeering case against Trump and 14 other remaining co-defendants has a new timeline coming into focus. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis this month signaled that she wants to head to trial by August and expects the case may drag on past the 2024 general election. Trump’s attorneys have opposed the proposed August 5 start date and have requested a hearing before Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee.
So far four of the 19 co-conspirators originally indicted have taken plea agreements and turned state’s witnesses. They are Georgia bail bondsman Scott Hall, and pro-Trump attorneys Sidney Powell, Kenneth Chesebro and Jenna Ellis.
Chesebro and Powell pleaded guilty within a day of each other, just as their cases were set to go to trial on Oct. 20. The two had invoked their right to a speedy trial, severing their case from the remaining co-defendants.
The window to demand a speedy trial for the remaining defendants has closed, and Willis has set June 21, 2024 as a deadline for considering plea deals for the remaining defendants. After that, prosecutors say they will seek the maximum sentence for the charges at trial.
Immediately following the Thanksgiving recess, a number of critical hearings are set to take place.
Former Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, ex-DOJ official Jeffrey Clark, ex-Georgia GOP chairman David Shafer, State Senator Shawn Still and ex-GOP chief for Coffee County Cathy Latham are seeking to move their cases from state court to federal court. They all failed to do so before US District Judge Steve Jones but have appealed to the US Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit.
Meadows’ appeal hearing is scheduled for Dec. 15.
Both Clark and Meadows have asked Judge McAfee to give them extensions on their pre-trial deadlines. Meadows attorneys in their request proposed the extension question be heard on Dec. 1 when a number of defendants’ pretrial motions are also scheduled to be argued.
Defendants discovery deadline is otherwise set for Dec. 4 and the deadline to file pre-trial motions is Jan. 8, 2024.
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