US federal justice
Election 2020: Trump proposes 2026 as date for his trial
The lawyers of the ex-president estimate that to have time to prepare the defense of their client, his trial should not begin before the year 2026.
Updated18 August 2023, 02:23
Donald Trump in New Jersey on August 13, 2023.
AFP
Donald Trump’s defense on Thursday proposed that his trial in federal court in Washington for his alleged fraudulent attempts to reverse the 2020 election result be held in April 2026, well after the November 2024 presidential election.
A week ago, special prosecutor Jack Smith had proposed that the trial of the former American president begin on January 2, 2024, estimating that it “should not last more than four to six weeks”. The judge who will preside over the proceedings, Tanya Chutkan, has set a hearing for August 28 to determine the date of the trial, and had asked the two parties for their proposals before deciding.
“The public interest rests in a fair and equitable trial, and not in the haste of a judgment”, defended Thursday the lawyers of Donald Trump in their proposed timetable. According to them, the only examination of the documents constituting the file could take several years.
If the timetable proposed by the prosecution were chosen, “even assuming that we begin today to examine these documents, we would need to go at the rate of 99,762 pages per day (…) to finish on time” , they assure. And to continue: “it’s the equivalent of reading Tolstoy’s + War and Peace +, cover to cover, 78 times a day, and this every day, from today to the selection of the jury”, at the start of the trial.
The date of April 2026, in more than two and a half years, would allow them to prepare the fair defense of their client, and not to interfere with the other lawsuits against the ex-president, they plead.
Four indictments
Donald Trump, campaigning for the Republican primary to win back the White House in 2024, is the subject of four criminal charges, two at the federal level, in Washington and Florida (southeast), one in New York State and one in Georgia (southeast).
The real estate mogul systematically attributes his legal hassles to the administration of Democratic President Joe Biden, who he could find on his way in 2024 for a rematch of the 2020 election. he insists on his desire for these trials to be held after the ballot. “None of these trials should be allowed to begin before the election” scheduled for November 2024, he said again Thursday on his Truth Social platform.
The date of next January 2 “represents an appropriate balance between the defendant’s right to prepare his defense and the strong public interest in a speedy trial” in such an emblematic case, in which a former president is accused of having undermined the foundations of federal institutions, argued Jack Smith in his argument. Trial dates have already been set for New York and Florida: March and May 2024 respectively.
(AFP)Show comments
2023-08-18 00:23:30
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