First hearing on classified documents will be July 18 after special counsel accuses Trump co-defendant of seeking ‘unnecessary’ delay
By Tierney Sneed and Katelyn Polantz, CNN
(CNN) — The first hearing before US District Judge Aileen Cannon in the federal criminal case against Donald Trump will be on July 18, according to a court order.
The hearing will be about handling classified information in the case – the first of likely many proceedings on this topic – and may not be fully conducted in public because of the sensitivity around the issues.
The date was set after a fight on Monday where special counsel Jack Smith suggested Trump and co-defendant Walt Nauta were trying to create an “unnecessary” delay by moving it from this coming Friday.
The spat highlights how even the most incremental, procedural developments in the historic federal criminal case against Trump and Nauta could become mired in disputes – especially when it comes to scheduling as prosecutors want to go to trial in less than six months and Trump lawyers have been adept at delaying other legal fights he’s facing.
In Nauta’s filing requesting the delay, the Trump aide cited a bench trial that his main lawyer, Stanley Woodward, has in Washington, DC, this week as the reason for proposing a delay.
Smith fired back in his filing that Nauta has provided no reason why his Florida-based lawyer, Sasha Dadan, couldn’t handle the hearing.
“An indefinite continuance is unnecessary, will inject additional delay in this case, and is contrary to the public interest,” the Smith team said in their filing.
In a new filing later Monday, Trump’s defense team and the special counsel’s office said July 18 would be an agreeable date for the first appearance.
In the fight over when the coming hearing on classified procedures should take place, Nauta claims he had “little notice” that prosecutors were going to bring the charges in the Southern District of Florida – where he would be required to have an attorney licensed in the Sunshine State – and said his DC attorney’s initial inability to get notices from the docket until then hampered his efforts to flag the scheduling conflict.
Nauta also raised his defense team’s lack of security clearances as an issue, while claiming that it was not reasonable to expect his new Florida-based attorney to take the lead on the matters slated for discussion at Friday’s hearing “barely a week after she has been retained by Mr. Nauta.”
Smith’s team shot back that Woodward, the DC-based lawyer, has yet to fill out the form required in the security clearance process.
“Almost a month has passed since the grand jury returned its indictment. There is a strong public interest in the conference occurring as originally scheduled and the case proceeding as expeditiously as possible,” the Smith team said.
While Trump entered his not guilty plea in the case on June 13, Nauta was only able to enter his not guilty plea last week due in part to delays in retaining a Florida counsel.
This story has been updated with additional developments.
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CNN’s Katelyn Polantz contributed to this report.
