Judge Blocks Release of Jack Smith's Trump Report

Aileen Cannon's move is temporary until an appeals court weighs in
By Jenn Gidman,  Newser Staff
Posted Jan 7, 2025 7:50 AM CST
Updated Jan 7, 2025 11:37 AM CST
Trump, Co-Defendants Push to Block Smith Report
Special counsel Jack Smith speaks to the media on Aug. 1, 2023, in Washington.   (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)
UPDATE Jan 7, 2025 11:37 AM CST

A federal judge on Tuesday temporarily blocked the release of special counsel Jack Smith's final report on his investigations into President-elect Trump, reports the AP. Judge Aileen Cannon's move keeps the report under wraps until an appeals court considers a challenge. Trump's legal team is attempting to prevent the report about Trump's handling of classified documents and his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results from being released publicly.

Jan 7, 2025 7:50 AM CST

The two criminal cases led by Jack Smith against Donald Trump—the classified documents and federal election conspiracy cases—may have been dismissed, but the special counsel had been set to release a two-volume report on the evidence he'd accumulated. Now, after having a chance to sift through the hefty report in Smith's office, the president-elect's legal team has penned a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland requesting that the report not be released, per Politico.

  • The lawyers argue that allowing the public to see Smith's findings would illegally interfere with Trump assuming the presidency and be nothing more than a political attack.

  • The attorneys aren't just concerned about how the report will make Trump look. "Equally problematic and inappropriate are the draft's baseless attacks on other anticipated members of President Trump's incoming administration, which are an obvious effort to interfere with upcoming confirmation hearings," they wrote in their letter to Garland, per Axios.
  • The lawyers also want Smith—whom they call an "out-of-control private citizen unconstitutionally posing as a prosecutor," per NBC News—removed from his post, even though he has already indicated he'll be stepping down before Trump takes office. "Because Smith has proposed an unlawful course of action, you must countermand his plan and remove him promptly," they wrote. Any decision to eventually release Smith's report should be left to Trump's incoming DOJ, they added.
  • Meanwhile, two of Trump's co-defendants in the dismissed classified-documents case, Walt Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira, also asked US District Judge Aileen Cannon in a motion filed Monday to block Smith's report, citing Cannon's previous finding that Smith being appointed as special counsel in the first place was unconstitutional, per NBC News.
(More Jack Smith stories.)

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