Amid summer chores, I’ve been reflecting further upon some of the comments in this original post.
Let’s start with a name game: John Sirica.
Doesn’t mean anything to you? In that case, I suspect that you’re a mere youngster 😉 . I would venture that that name will ring at least a vague bell for all Americans born in 1960 or before, and is well known to virtually all American lawyers of any age.
Judge John J. Sirica presided over the Watergate trials in the early 1970s in Washington, D.C. His administration of the trials was widely lauded then and since.
Judge Sirica died in 1992. The first sentence of his Washington Post obituary referred to the fact that he had presided over the Watergate trials.
I declared in this original post: “Judge Aileen M. Cannon, whom [former President Donald] Trump appointed to the bench in 2020, has been assigned to hear his case. … [I]t seems that by her earlier rulings [in the same documents case] Judge Cannon has proven herself to be incompetent, a partisan hack, or both. The judge’s ability to influence the trial’s course and perhaps outcome is obvious: it takes no prescience to predict the coming wrangling between Mr. Trump’s attorneys and federal prosecutors over jury selection, admissibility of evidence, and scheduling (with delay obviously favoring Mr. Trump).”
We’ll get back to the ramifications of a prolonged trial schedule below. As to Judge Cannon, I haven’t been able to find any rating by south Florida lawyers as to how ably she has performed in normal cases in her short judicial tenure – since she’s only been on the bench a couple of years, she obviously doesn’t have a lot of judicial experience – and she may indeed lack the competence to preside over such a high-profile matter. That’s to be determined, and if she doesn’t feel she’s professionally up to it, she should recuse herself. But as to predictions – including mine – of her pro-Trump leanings, I’m taking a pause. It’s seemingly possible that Judge Cannon is more horrified than anyone else by her random selection to hear this case. She’s in her early 40s – literally at the age of our children and of a number of those that read these pages. She has a husband and two school-aged kids. Federal trial judges don’t float upon hallowed pedestals. She undoubtedly goes to the grocery store. Her kids probably play soccer or engage in other like activities. She has the bulk of her career in front of her. She’s already been reversed in a rather humiliating fashion by United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Judicial Circuit, a conservative Circuit, for her earlier Trump-friendly rulings in this case. She can’t escape into the curtained hush the way U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas does. She may now believe that what looked like a sweet legal gig in 2020 has turned into a nightmare of being engulfed by the Trump Maelstrom. If advising her, I’d counsel as I would one of our own kids: You are where you are. Be careful. How you handle this case will literally be the first line of your obituary. Do the best you can. For your own good, play it straight.
Judge Cannon need look no further than the other defendant in the case – Walt Nauta, Mr. Trump’s “body man” and alleged co-conspirator — to realize that abiding by Mr. Trump’s wishes does not necessarily auger a comfortable life. Do I think that if Mr. Trump is found guilty by a jury, Judge Cannon will, as some wildly progressive pundits have suggested, disregard the jury verdict and issue a judgement of acquittal to Mr. Trump? No. Do I think that Judge Cannon will refuse to admit a lot of the government’s evidence now in the public domain? Even if she is so inclined, with the Eleventh Circuit looking over her shoulder, I don’t. (Although the evidence from Mr. Trump’s lawyers, obtained by the government through a piercing the veil of attorney-client privilege, is perhaps on the fence.) Is there a likelihood that she will provide Mr. Trump more leeway in jury selection and scheduling than the government prefers? Very possibly — these are areas in which appellate courts generally accord greater deference to trial judges — but the government’s case appears sufficiently strong to withstand these likely hindrances. If Judge Cannon is savvy – or unless her career aspiration is now to become a Fox News legal analyst — I expect her to play it straight enough.
All those middle-of-the road notions now expressed, I well recall that in February of 2019, considering the Senate’s confirmation process for then-Attorney General Nominee William Barr, I declared in these pages: “Partisans on both sides are currently all too-ready to impute ulterior motives to those with whom they disagree. … I am willing to believe, unless and until I have evidence to the contrary, that Mr. Barr will do what is necessary to protect the United States while conducting his duty.” We all saw how those Pollyannaish sentiments fared 😉 .
As noted above, in the original post I also suggested that a delay in the trial helps Mr. Trump politically – a sentiment echoed by others. I would now add a bit of a qualifier, at least in my own thinking. A delay seemingly aids Mr. Trump’s campaign during the Republican presidential nomination process and it certainly helps him if he wins the election and the case hasn’t been resolved prior to Inauguration Day, 2025. (I suspect that reelection is now at least as important to the former president as a way to avoid having jail be the final culmination of a 2016 branding exercise that went WAY wrong – from his perspective and our democracy’s – than it is for the actual return to power it represents.) At the same time, I have come to believe that any still-pending charges against him for the mishandling of classified documents will weaken his support in the general election among swing and moderate Republican voters in swing states.
Enough. The weekend is upon us. May all Dads, and those of any gender who provide fatherly love and guidance to others, have a wonderful Father’s Day.
McCoy's Noise 