The ruling by a three-judge panel of the appeals court marks a victory, at least temporarily, for the Justice Department in its legal battle with Trump over access to evidence in a high-stakes investigation into whether the former president or his advisers misbehaved. handled national security secrets or withheld or destroyed government records; It was the second legal setback of the day for Trump, who was sued Wednesday morning by New York Attorney General Letitia James. The lawsuit said Trump and his company grossly manipulated the valuations of real estate and other assets to defraud lenders, insurers and tax authorities. better rates and lower tax liabilities. In Wednesday night’s ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in Atlanta found fault with Trump’s reasoning that classified documents seized on Aug. 8 could be his property, not the government’s. The appeals court also disagreed with the reasoning used by U.S. District Judge Aileen M. Cannon in agreeing to classified documents being reviewed by a special master to determine whether they should be protected from investigators because of executive or attorney-client privilege. “For our part, we cannot discern why [Trump] would have a vested interest in or need any of the hundred classified documents,” the court wrote, noting that the stay it issued is temporary and should not be considered a final decision on the merits. The status of key investigations involving Donald Trump The lower court “abused its discretion in exercising jurisdiction … over the classified documents,” the panel wrote in a 29-page opinion. Two judges on the panel were appointed by Trump. the third was appointed by President Barack Obama. A spokesman for Trump did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The committee found particularly persuasive the repeated suggestions by Trump’s legal team that he may have declassified the documents – citing an appearance by Trump’s lawyers on Tuesday before special counsel Raymond Dearie, who pressed them to say whether the former president had acted for to declassify the materials in the question. “Plaintiff suggests that he may have declassified these documents when he was President. But the file contains no evidence that any of these files were declassified. And before the special master, Plaintiff resisted providing any evidence that he had declassified any of these documents,” the panel wrote. “In any event, at least for these purposes, the declassification argument is a red herring because declassifying an official document would not change its content or make it personal.” Last week, the Justice Department filed documents asking the appeals court to quickly review part of Cannon’s ruling in which it appointed a special master to review the seized documents. Prosecutors said two parts of her order — allowing the special master to review the roughly 100 documents marked classified and halting the criminal investigation surrounding those documents while the special master conducts a review — jeopardize national interests. security. Cannon, a federal judge in Florida, appointed Dearie, a federal judge in New York, to serve as a special master and review the roughly 11,000 documents and items seized in the FBI investigation. Donald Trump, 3 of his children sued by New York attorney general over business practices The Justice Department had previously asked Cannon to reconsider those two elements of her order, but she refused in a written order that repeatedly expressed skepticism about the government’s claims in the case. In particular, Cannon said a risk assessment of the case, conducted by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, could continue, while criminal investigators were not currently allowed to use the classified documents. The Justice Department said such a distinction was impractical because much of the DNI’s work would necessarily be done by FBI agents and the two duties were “inextricably intertwined.” Cannon did not accept this characterization and stuck to her original determination. But the appeals court rejected her reasoning on that issue, writing, “This distinction is untenable.” The committee also used its decision to provide a public overview of how the government classifies and declassifies government secrets and why that process is important. “For example, information that could reveal the identity of a confidential human source or that relates to weapons of mass destruction is exempt from automatic disclosure,” the judges wrote. Prosecutors said in court documents that some of the documents seized from Mar-a-Lago contained information about programs involving intelligence derived from human sources. The Washington Post reported that a document recovered by FBI agents described a foreign government’s military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities. The Justice Department told the appeals court it disagreed with Cannon’s decision, but asked the court to grant a stay of “only those portions of the order that cause the most serious and immediate harm to the government and the public,” characterizing the scope of its request “modest but extremely important.” Trump’s lawyers countered with their own filing, urging the appeals court not to intervene, suggesting that documents marked classified may not actually be classified and arguing that if they are, it’s up to the government to prove it. The appeals court decision simplifies the special master’s job by removing classified documents from the equation — although Dearie had indicated at a meeting Tuesday that he would likely avoid reviewing classified documents if he could. At Tuesday’s hearing, Justice Department lawyers indicated they could appeal the matter to the Supreme Court if it loses in the 11th Circuit. It’s unclear whether Trump’s legal team would file such an appeal now that the panel has ruled against them.
