Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump during a campaign rally.
| Photo Credit: AP

A Florida judge appointed by Donald Trump has dismissed the criminal case against the former president on charges of mishandling top secret documents, saying the way that Special Counsel Jack Smith was appointed was improper.

The decision is a huge victory for Trump, who had been accused of endangering national security by holding onto top secret documents after leaving the White House.

Also read | Prosecutors in Trump’s classified documents case sharply rebuke judge’s unusual and ‘flawed’ order

Judge Aileen Cannon made her ruling after lawyers for the 78-year-old argued for a partial stay of proceedings to allow for an assessment of a Supreme Court ruling that a former president has broad immunity from prosecution.

“Former President Trump’s Motion to Dismiss Indictment Based on the Unlawful Appointment and Funding of Special Counsel Jack Smith is GRANTED,” Judge Aileen wrote in her order.

“The Superseding Indictment is DISMISSED because Special Counsel Smith’s appointment violates the Appointments Clause of the United States Constitution.”

It comes as Trump is set to be annointed as his party’s champion at the Republican National Convention, days after surviving an assassination attempt at a rally in Pennsylvania.

In the Florida case, Trump was facing 31 counts of “willful retention of national defense information,” each punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

He also faced charges of conspiracy to obstruct justice and making false statements.

Trump allegedly kept classified documents – which included records from the Pentagon and CIA – unsecured at his Mar-a-Lago home and thwarted efforts to retrieve them.

Miami:

A Florida judge appointed by Donald Trump has dismissed the criminal case against the former president on charges of mishandling top secret documents, saying the way that Special Counsel Jack Smith was appointed was improper.

The decision is a huge victory for Trump, who had been accused of endangering national security by holding onto top secret documents after leaving the White House.

Judge Aileen Cannon made her ruling after lawyers for the 78-year-old argued for a partial stay of proceedings to allow for an assessment of a Supreme Court ruling that a former president has broad immunity from prosecution.

“Former President Trump’s Motion to Dismiss Indictment Based on the Unlawful Appointment and Funding of Special Counsel Jack Smith is GRANTED,” Aileen wrote in her order.

“The Superseding Indictment is DISMISSED because Special Counsel Smith’s appointment violates the Appointments Clause of the United States Constitution.”

It comes as Trump is set to be anointed as his party’s champion at the Republican National Convention, days after surviving an assassination attempt at a rally in Pennsylvania.

In the Florida case, Trump was facing 31 counts of “willful retention of national defense information,” each punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

He also faced charges of conspiracy to obstruct justice and making false statements.

Trump allegedly kept classified documents — which included records from the Pentagon and CIA — unsecured at his Mar-a-Lago home and thwarted efforts to retrieve them.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Republican presidential candidate and former U.S. President Donald Trump
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Federal prosecutors in the U.S. chided the judge presiding over former President Donald Trump’s classified documents case in Florida, warning her off potential jury instructions that they said rest on a “fundamentally flawed legal premise.”

In an unusual order, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon had asked prosecutors and defence lawyers to file proposed jury instructions for most of the charges even though it remains unclear when the case might reach trial. She asked the lawyers to respond to competing interpretations of the law that appeared to accept the Republican ex-President’s argument that he was entitled under a statute known as the Presidential Records Act to retain the sensitive documents he is now charged with possessing.

Alarming order

The order surprised legal experts and alarmed special counsel Jack Smith’s team, which said in a filing late on Tuesday that the 1978 law — which requires Presidents to return presidential records to the government upon leaving office but permits them to retain purely personal ones — has no relevance in a case concerning highly classified documents.

Those records, prosecutors said, were clearly not personal and there is no evidence Mr. Trump ever designated them as such.

Mr. Smith’s team said that if the judge insists on citing the presidential records law in her jury instructions, she should let the lawyers know as soon as possible so they can appeal.