DOJ wins at appeals court over Trump judge's controversial rulingOn Wednesday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit stayed a controversial ruling by a Florida district court judge that had effectively blocked the Justice Department and national security agencies from reviewing highly classified documents seized by the FBI at former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort.
That order, by Trump-appointed Judge Aileen Cannon, had found that the former president had a compelling interest to those documents not being accessed by the executive branch until a special master had reviewed them for privilege, including executive privilege on behalf of Trump — even though no court has ever ruled former presidents have such privilege or that this privilege outweighs the U.S. government's interest in preventing breaches of classified information.
In the 11th Circuit order obtained by POLITICO, a panel of three judges — including two who were also appointed by Trump — put that order on hold, suggesting that the Justice Department is likely to prevail against Trump on the merits.
According to the ruling, Trump "has not even attempted to show that he has a need to know the information contained in the classified documents. Nor has he established that the current administration has waived that requirement for these documents."
Other parts of Cannon's ruling, including that appointing the special master, were left in place, as the Justice Department did not object to those measures.
This comes one day after the special master Cannon appointed, Senior Judge Raymond Dearie, harshly grilled Trump's attorneys in his first hearing on the classified documents, demanding that they take a position on the former president's repeated public claims that he had retroactively declassified that information — noting that the DOJ has already provided "prima facie" evidence the documents should in fact be presumed classified.
https://www.rawstory.com/11th-circuit-trump-doj/"Judge Cannon" completely bungled her job — and got rightly smacked down: Former prosecutor
On MSNBC Wednesday, former federal prosecutor Harry Litman broke down the new Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals ruling placing a stay on right-wing Judge Aileen Cannon's order that effectively prohibited the Justice Department from investigating the classified documents former President Donald Trump had stashed at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida.
The decision, Litman argued, was a victory for justice, and a rebuke of Cannon's poor legal analysis.
"This ruling just came out, the three-judge panel — we should, say two of them, those judges appointed by Donald Trump," said anchor Chris Hayes. "All three finding that for the government, give us a rundown of what they said?"
"You know, couldn't be more definitive," said Litman. "There is a matter-of-fact tone to it. You read it, and really what comes through is that this is so obvious. It's like waking from a nightmare. We have people who looked at these other opinions by Judge Cannon, trying to explain that these were not in some subtle way arguably right. They were completely off the reservation. And you read these 27 pages — it is a per curiam by the way, the three judges decide to show their unity being together. They almost surely have been writing it over the course of the week. So clear was it what she did was wrong."
"They just settle down and rebuke everything she said," continued Litman. "'We cannot discern' — that's not what you want to hear in the court of appeal — 'we cannot discern a reason why there is a possessory interest.' Any injury for having to be subject of a criminal investigation, like anyone else. She had given him special treatment. Forget about it. One after the other, very methodical."
"I am dramatic. But when you of course take a step back and see how comprehensive it is, it just completely rebukes everything she did," added Litman. "You know? It's some restoration of faith after a truly heart-stoppingly bad set of opinions from her. What they get, by the way, is exactly what she refused to give them in her second opinion. They now have the hundred classified documents. They have taken other things off the table. It argues poorly for her continued mischief in the case."
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