(Photo
by
Michael
M.
Santiago/Getty
Images)
On
Friday,
Special
Counsel
Jack
Smith
moved
to
file
a
document
under
seal
in
the
election
interference
case
in
DC.
This
motion
was
consistent
with
—
in
fact
mandated
by!
—
the
protective
order
signed
by
the
court
back
in
August
of
2023
and
Local
Rule
of
Criminal
Procedure
49(f)(6)(i).
If
either
party
includes
sensitive
discovery
material
in
a
filing,
it
must
file
the
document
under
seal
along
with
a
redacted
version
for
the
public
docket.
And
yet
Donald
Trump’s
lawyers
have
seized
upon
this
mundane
occasion
to
throw
a
shrieking
tantrum,
accusing
the
Special
Counsel
of
deliberately
putting
protected
information
on
the
public
docket
in
advance
of
the
election.
“The
true
motivation
driving
the
efforts
by
the
Special
Counsel’s
Office
to
disseminate
witness
statements
that
they
previously
sought
to
lock
down
is
as
obvious
as
it
is
inappropriate,”
they
fulminate.
“The
Office
wants
their
politically
motivated
manifesto
to
be
public,
contrary
to
the
Justice
Manual
and
longstanding
DOJ
norms
in
cases
not
involving
President
Trump,
in
the
final
weeks
of
the
2024
Presidential
election
while
early
voting
has
already
begun
throughout
the
United
States.”
The
issue
here
is
that,
after
giving
Trump
every
little
thing
his
heart
could
desire
with
respect
to
presidential
immunity,
the
Supreme
Court
remanded
the
case
to
Judge
Tanya
Chutkan
to
determine
what
to
do
in
light
of
its
ruling
that
presidents
can
do
crimes
now.
The
trial
judge
asked
the
parties
for
their
thoughts
on
how
to
proceed,
and
Trump
said
he’d
like
to
do
functionally
nothing
until
2025.
The
Special
Counsel
responded
that
his
office
was
prepared
to
immediately
defend
its
newly
procured
superseding
indictment,
particularly
the
decision
to
include
the
pressure
campaign
to
convince
Vice
President
Pence
to
accept
fraudulent
swing
state
ballots
on
January
6.
And
given
the
choice
between
NEVER
and
NOW,
the
court
chose
to
get
on
with
the
matter.
Perhaps
realizing
their
strategic
error
(or
maybe
because
flopping
is
their
favorite
tactic)
Trump’s
lawyers
responded
with
multiple
motions
demanding
that
the
court
reconsider
its
order
that
the
special
counsel
defend
his
charging
decisions,
although
none
of
these
protests
has
actually
been
denominated
as
a
motion
to
reconsider.
Instead
Trump’s
counsel
just
screamed
bloody
murder
about
it
in
a
response
to
a
motion
to
exceed
page
length
and
a
motion
to
compel.
And
now
they’re
yelling
because
Jack
Smith
didn’t
redact enough,
and
Donald
Trump
is
still
under
a
gag
order,
and
that
is
NO
FAIR!
President
Trump
has
abided
by
these
restrictions
for
over
a
year.
Yet
now,
in
advance
of
predictable
national
news
coverage,
the
Office
seeks
to
disseminate
protected
content
of
Sensitive
Materials,
including
direct
quotations
and
summaries,
while
the
gag
order
restricts
President
Trump’s
ability
to
fully
address
the
details
of
the
filing
on
the
campaign
trail.
They
whine
that
the
Special
Counsel
objected
to
putting
unredacted
grand
jury
material
on
the
public
docket
in
Florida,
even
going
so
far
as
to
school
Judge
Aileen
Cannon
on
the
difference
between
protected
discovery
materials
(presumptively
not
public)
and
evidence
at
trial
(presumptively
public).
And
boy
did
she
ever
show
them!
“The
Office
believes
President
Trump’s
Constitutional
rights
to
impartial
jurors
and
fair
proceedings—to
say
nothing
of
witness
privacy
and
even
safety—all
take
a
back
seat
to
the
Office’s
political
goals,”
they
fume,
seemingly
impervious
to
the
irony
of
arguing
that
Trump
has
a
constitutional
right
to
attack
witnesses
at
a
campaign
rally
while
simultaneously
accusing
the
prosecution
of
poisoning
the
jury
with
“impotent”
redactions
that
fail
to
anonymize
job
titles.
And
although
the
brief
only
spanned
seven
pages,
Trump’s
lawyers
still
managed
to
squeeze
in
an
ad
hominem
attack
on
his
enemies.
“While
the
Presidential
immunity
filing
contains
few,
if
any,
new
allegations
not
already
covered
in
other
politically
motivated
and
inaccurate
lawfare
efforts
that
President
Trump’s
opponents
have
improperly
funded
and
disseminated,
it
is
irresponsible
for
the
prosecutors
to
so
quickly
abandon
the
safety
and
privacy
interests
that
they
previously
assigned
great
weight
in
this
case
and
in
the
Southern
District
of
Florida,”
they
whine,
while
demanding
to
chew
more
clock
with
another
round
of
briefing
on
the
proposed
redactions.
“Accordingly,
the
Court
should
require
the
Office
to
make
consistent
redactions
regarding
identity-related
information
and
to
show
cause
why
their
proposed
public
disclosure
of
voluminous
purportedly
sensitive
witness
statements
will
not
pose
risks
to
potential
witnesses
and
unfairly
prejudice
the
adjudication
of
this
case.”
It’s
a
lot.
And
considering
Judge
Chutkan’s
irritation
the
last
time
they
tried
this,
it
seems
unlikely
to
succeed.
US
v.
Trump [Docket
via
Court
Listener]
Liz
Dye lives
in
Baltimore
where
she
produces
the
Law
and
Chaos substack and podcast.