Washington:

An appeals court on Tuesday granted a request by prosecutors to drop the case against US President-elect Donald Trump for mishandling classified documents.

Special Counsel Jack Smith had asked the court on Monday to dismiss the case because of a long-standing Justice Department policy of not prosecuting a sitting president.

A Trump-appointed district court judge in Florida threw out the documents case earlier this year, but Smith had appealed the ruling to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals.

The appeals court granted Smith’s request to dismiss the case without comment.

Smith is continuing, however, to pursue the case against Trump’s two co-defendants, his valet, Walt Nauta, and Mar-a-Lago property manager Carlos De Oliveira.

Trump, 78, was accused of removing large quantities of top secret documents after leaving the White House at the end of his first term and obstructing efforts to retrieve them.

The former president was also accused by the special counsel of conspiring to overturn the results of the 2020 election won by Joe Biden. A judge on Monday granted a request by Smith to drop that case.

The special counsel paused both federal cases this month after Trump defeated Vice President Kamala Harris in the November 5 presidential election.

The former and incoming president also faces two state cases — in New York and Georgia.

He was convicted in New York in May of 34 counts of falsifying business records to cover up a hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels on the eve of the 2016 election to stop her from revealing an alleged 2006 sexual encounter.

Judge Juan Merchan has postponed sentencing while he considers a request from Trump’s lawyers that the conviction be thrown out in light of the Supreme Court ruling in July that an ex-president has broad immunity from prosecution.

In Georgia, Trump faces racketeering charges over his efforts to subvert the 2020 election results in the southern state, but that case will likely be frozen while he is in office.

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

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.