Trump end game in question as he asks SCOTUS to reverse 11th circuit ruling on classified docs

Former President Donald Trump has asked the Supreme Court to reverse the 11th Circuit’s decision regarding the classified documents obtained in the Aug 8 raid of his Mar-a-Lago home.

Trey Gowdy brought in John Yoo, former deputy assistant attorney general, to break down the strategy of the Trump team. Yoo summed up Trump’s purpose, saying, “I think that President Trump is playing for more time.”

(Video: Fox News)

Gowdy and Yoo reviewed the issue from the appointment of a special master, to the 11th Circuit’s reversal of that order, to Trump’s request for SCOTUS review.

Judge Aileen Cannon, who was a Trump appointment to the Southern District of Florida, appointed Judge Raymond Dearie to review the 11,000 documents seized from Mar-a-Lago to identify any that might be protected by attorney-client privilege or executive privilege, among other things.

Cannon’s Sept 15 order was challenged at the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals on Oct 5. The appeals court, not surprisingly, sided with the Department of Justice which wanted to expedite its challenge to the legality of having a special master review the documents.

The appeals court also said that the DOJ can continue to use in their investigation the 100 classified documents they found among the trove of hoovered files. Those files don’t have to go through the special master’s review process. This is the part of the decision Trump is appealing.

“So now, the Trump lawyers have gone to the U.S. Supreme Court and said, please reverse that one piece, that hundred classified documents part of the order that have been accepted from the general view by the special master,” summarized the former Assistant AG.

Such a “reversal of a reversal” would refer those 100 documents back to the authority of the special master.

Gowdy wondered whether Trump’s lawyers could have asked for more, which begged the question of Trump’s goal in this bit of strategy.

John Yoo pointed out that Judge Dearie’s work continues on the other approximately 10,900 documents and that a SCOTUS review of the 11th Circuit decision on the classified documents wouldn’t matter much. In fact, he guessed that SCOTUS would most likely not be interested in such a narrow matter.

“Even if you were to win at the Supreme Court, Judge Dearie, the special master, he’s doing his review as to all the other documents. He may will be finished in about a month or so. It might not mean that any appeal of the Supreme Court will make that big of a difference. So, I think… both the Justice Department and Donald Trump are testing each other, because they know they will be back in court about something else, probably something more do with January 6 investigation. I don’t think that there is really any important legal issue that has nationwide significance that was draw will attention of Supreme Court. I think that President Trump is playing for more time.”

 

For emergency actions by the Supreme Court in regard to circuit court decisions, there are justices appointed to each district. For the 11th Circuit (which includes Florida), it is Justice Clarence Thomas.

Thomas would make “an initial decision, and then he usually on an important case will send it to the Supreme Court for all 9 justice to decide, and the only thing they would decide at this point is, is this important enough to stop the appeals court and bring the case up all the way to the US Supreme Court… They usually do that only in the most important, time sensitive cases where something nationally significant is at stake.”

Would Justice Thomas escalate this case? The professor doubts it.

“I would be actually very surprised to see Justice Thomas or the Supreme Court reach down and intervene into this case. I think they would rather the 11th Circuit and Judge Cannon and Judge Dearie figure it all out.”

Trump’s concern that this raid constitutes illegal search and seizure is very understandable and has a lot of merit. But this particular request could be much ado about nothing in the end.

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