Judge Grants Jack Smith’s Request for Pause in Jan. 6 Case After Trump’s Election

by · NY Times

Judge Grants Jack Smith’s Request for Pause in Jan. 6 Case After Trump’s Election

The special counsel asked for time to assess how to proceed now that Donald Trump is returning the White House, triggering a Justice Department policy against prosecuting a sitting president.

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Jack Smith has not made a similar request to pause efforts to revive the other federal case he pursued against Donald J. Trump, in which he was accused of illegally holding on to classified documents after he left office.
Credit...Doug Mills/The New York Times

By Devlin Barrett and Alan Feuer

Devlin Barrett reported from Washington, and Alan Feuer from New York.

A judge on Friday granted a request from the special counsel, Jack Smith, to pause all filing deadlines in the federal case accusing President-elect Donald J. Trump of plotting to overturn the 2020 election.

Mr. Smith asked earlier in the day to freeze the case for nearly a month as prosecutors mull whether to pursue the proceeding at all now that Mr. Trump is returning to the White House. Judge Tanya S. Chutkan of Federal District Court in Washington quickly granted Mr. Smith’s request.

The defendant, Mr. Smith’s filing said, “is expected to be certified as president-elect on Jan. 6, 2025, and inaugurated on Jan. 20, 2025.”

“The government respectfully requests that the court vacate the remaining deadlines in the pretrial schedule,” Mr. Smith’s deputies went on, “to afford the government time to assess this unprecedented circumstance and determine the appropriate course going forward consistent with Department of Justice policy.”

The prosecutors asked for a new deadline — Dec. 2 — for the government to file “a status report or otherwise inform the court of the result of its deliberations.”

A longstanding Justice Department policy bars the prosecution of sitting presidents. Mr. Smith has already opened discussions with department leaders about how best to wind down both the election interference case and the other federal case he pursued against Mr. Trump — the one in Florida in which he was accused of illegally holding on to classified documents after he left office.

The request to pause the case in Washington was the first overt sign that Mr. Smith and his team are in the throes of figuring out how to shut down the two prosecutions.

Judge Chutkan’s decision to grant the request spares Mr. Trump’s lawyers from a Nov. 21 deadline to file a significant pretrial legal document.

In that filing, Mr. Trump’s lawyers were expected to lay out a detailed argument for why Mr. Trump should not face trial at all on the election interference charges because of the Supreme Court’s ruling this summer granting him a broad form of immunity against prosecution for official acts he took in office.

For the moment at least, Mr. Smith and his team have not made a similar request to pause efforts to revive the classified documents case, which was dismissed in its entirety this summer by Judge Aileen M. Cannon. Judge Cannon, who was appointed by Mr. Trump, tossed out all of the charges on the grounds that Mr. Smith was unlawfully appointed to his post as special counsel.

Mr. Smith’s team has appealed Judge Cannon’s ruling to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta. His deputies are currently scheduled to file an additional round of court papers this month.

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