Judge Grants Special Counsel Jack Smith’s Motion to File ‘Oversized’

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She also denied Trump’s attorneys’ arguments that it would be too close to the November election.

A judge on Tuesday evening granted special counsel Jack Smith’s motion to file an “oversized” brief on presidential immunity in former President Donald Trump’s election interference case.

Smith had asked the court to file a brief up to 180 pages in length in response to the Supreme Court’s ruling in July that presidents have some immunity from prosecution for their official acts and duties.

“The length and breadth of the Government’s proposed brief reflects the uniquely ‘challenging’ and factbound nature of those determinations,” U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan wrote in her ruling, referring to the special counsel’s effort to apply the high court’s ruling in the case against Trump.

The judge also responded to arguments presented by Trump’s legal team that such a large motion would be potentially damaging to Trump as he is campaigning for president in the upcoming November election.

“For the second time in a week, Defendant urges reconsideration of the current pretrial schedule in a brief intended to respond to a separate issue, and without actually filing a motion to that effect,” Chutkan wrote in the ruling. “The court has already addressed the scheduling objections Defendant raised when he was given an opportunity to do so.”

Earlier this month during a hearing in Washington, in response to Trump’s attorneys’ arguments that the case is too close to the election, Chutkan said the court is not “concerned with the electoral schedule” and that “there needs to be some forward movement in this case, regardless of when the election is held.”

Her ruling Tuesday also said that Smith’s brief would resolve problems relating to the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity decision during the early stages of the trial. “That is reason enough to grant the present motion,” Chutkan wrote.

“Allowing a brief from the Government is not ‘contrary to law procedure, and custom,’ as Defendant claims,” she added. “It is simply how litigation works.”

Trump’s lawyers said earlier this week that Smith allegedly wants to file a “180-page false hit piece” targeting the former president, adding that such a brief “would be tantamount to a premature and improper Special Counsel report.”

“The Special Counsel’s Office is seeking to release voluminous conclusions to the public, without allowing President Trump to confront their witnesses and present his own, to ensure the document’s public release prior to the 2024 Presidential election,” Trump attorneys Todd Blanche and John Lauro wrote to Chutkan.

His attorneys also cited statements made by former FBI Director James Comey and former Attorney General Loretta Lynch regarding an “unwritten, 60-day rule” that the Department of Justice (DOJ) usually follows during elections. Smith’s proposed filing, they suggested, would violate that unwritten rule because it would come well within 60 days of Nov. 4.

They quoted Comey as saying that “we avoid taking any action in the run up to an election, if we can avoid it” before the 2016 election as well as Lynch’s comment that the DOJ doesn’t take “actions that might have an impact on an election, even if it’s not an election case or something like that.”

In August, Smith’s office filed a revised indictment in the case against the former president, charging him with conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding, and conspiracy against rights.

The latest indictment stated that Trump had “no official responsibilities” in how the election was certified but instead had a “personal interest as a candidate in being named the winner of the election.”

During a court appearance in September, Trump’s attorneys entered a not-guilty plea to the latest charges. The former president still faces a Nov. 26 sentencing date for his New York criminal case and 2020 election-related charges in Georgia.

A separate Smith case that charged Trump with improperly retaining classified documents and obstructing an investigation in Florida was dismissed by a federal judge in July. Smith has since filed an appeal of the decision to dismiss the matter.