The latest on the Trump-related investigations: Live updates | CNN Politics (2024)

Federal prosecutors have proposed a January 2, 2024, start date for a criminal trial of former President Donald Trump in the special counsel’s case over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

Trump’s lawyers still must weigh in with their proposed date, and a judge will ultimately decide. That date would add to an already busy trial schedule for Trump as the former president faces a multitude of legal challenges.

This is his schedule so far:

These dates could change as proceedings continue.

Special Counsel Jack Smith’s office said that evidence in the 2020 election subversion case against former President Donald Trump may include a “small amount” of classified information — a development that adds a layer of complexity to the pre-trial process.

Smith raised the issue in a court filing that came just minutes after a separate trial schedule proposal from his office. He stressed that any extra steps that need to be taken under the Classified Information Procedures Act — which sets out the protocols for resolving how classified material can be used in public court cases — should not derail the January 2024 trial date he’s recommending.

The prosecutors asked US District Judge Tanya Chutkan to discuss the matter on August 28, when a hearing in the case is already scheduled. They emphasized that the amount of classified information that may be subject to discovery is “minimal” and noted that one of Trump’s attorneys has already received an interim security clearance.

How to handle the classified materials in the separate Mar-a-Lago documents case that Smith brought against Trump has already become a sticking point in that prosecution, which is unfolding in Florida.

The parties are still dueling over what rules should be imposed on the defendants for accessing the classified evidence — which is an early step in the CIPA process and one that must be resolved before the production of classified discovery begins.

US District Judge Aileen Cannon, the judge in the documents case, built in several weeks in the case’s schedule for resolving that dispute. Chutkan, however, has signaled she intends to move very quickly in settling certain disagreements between the parties.

Federal prosecutors who’ve brought the 2020 election interference criminal case against former President Donald Trump are seeking to start to the trial on January 2, 2024, days before the anniversary of the attack on the US Capitol and the Iowa caucuses.

The special counsel’s officesaid in a filing Thursdaythat its presentation of evidence in the trial would take “no longer than four to six weeks,” meaning that Trump may need to spend his weekdays in court before a jury in the crucial first two months of a presidential election year, as primary voting begins for Republicans.

The Iowa caucuses are scheduled forJanuary 15.Judge Tanya Chutkan of the federal court in Washington, DC, will ultimately decide the trial date, a decision she is likely to make by the end of this month.

JudgeTanya Chutkanof the federal court in Washington, DC, ultimately will decide the trial start date, a decision she is likely to make by the end of this month.

Trump’s team won’t need to tell the court their preferred date for a trial until next week. But in Trump’s otherfederal case related to classified records in Floridaafter his presidency, they wanted a trial to be put off until after the presidential election. That trial date has been set for May, and Trump has other trial dates in lawsuits and a New York criminal case related to his business records set throughout the first half of next year.

The January 6 federal case may ultimately be a quicker road to trial than the Florida federal documents case, given that Trump is the only defendant at this time and much of what’s charged in the indictment is already public and not classified.

Prosecutors say that Trump “was determined to remain in power” after losing the 2020 election, and that he and six unindicted co-conspirators orchestrated a plot to overturn the results on and leading up to January 6, 2021. He haspleaded not guiltyto all charges.

The prosecutors are also asking the federal court to try to select a jury for Trump in December this year, before the winter holidays.

That would put the beginning steps of a trial just four months away—an aggressive schedule in the DC federal court.

The special counsel’s office says it is ready to turn over “the majority” of evidence it has collected to Trump’s legal team for their trial preparations. That will include grand jury transcripts, witness interview records, evidence gathered through search warrants and information obtained from the US Secret Service as well as the House Select Committee that investigated the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol.

Trump’s team has already signaled they plan to raise legal challenges in the case related to the First Amendment and the presidency.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis watches proceedings during a hearing on January 24 in Atlanta.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is expected to seek more than a dozen indictments when she presents her case regarding efforts by Donald Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 presidential election results in Georgia before a grand jury next week, sources familiar with the matter told CNN.

Willis, a Democrat, has been eyeing conspiracy and racketeering charges, which would allow her to bring a case against multiple defendants.

Her wide-ranging criminal probe focuses on efforts to pressure election officials, the plot to put forward fake electors and a voting systems breach in rural Coffee County, Georgia.

Trump acolytes who took part in each of those schemes believe they will face charges in Georgia next week, people familiar with their thinking said. Trump also believes he will be charged in the case, CNN has reported.

Willis’ office declined to comment.

The witnesses Willis has subpoenaed when she presents her case include former Republican Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, former Georgia Democratic state Sen. Jen Jordan and independent journalist George Chidi. All of them previously testified before a special purpose grand jury that was tasked with investigating the Trump case and heard from more than 75 witnesses.

More about the probe: Willis launched her investigation into Trump in early 2021, soon after he called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and pressured the Republican to “find” the votes necessary for Trump to win the state.

At a campaign event Tuesday, Trump continued to insist it was a “perfect phone call.”

Willis has been reportedly weighing racketeering charges in the Trump case. RICO is a statute the district attorney has spoken fondly of and used in unorthodox ways to bring charges against teachers as well as musicians in the Atlanta area.

Willis’ team has forged ahead with plans to make charging announcements in the coming weeks, even as special counsel Jack Smith charged Trump with four federal counts related to his efforts to stay in power after losing the 2020 presidential election.

A large chunk of the conduct in the indictment was related to efforts to flip the election results in Georgia. Trump has pleaded not guilty in that case.

The former president’s legal team believes he is likely to face his fourth indictment in the coming days, people familiar with the matter told CNN.

At a campaign stop in New Hampshire on Tuesday, Trump complained about the cases stacking up against him, adding, “I probably have another one.”

Gov. Brian Kemp speaks to voters during a campaign stop at Williamson Brothers Bar-B-Q on November 3, 2022 in Marietta, Georgia.

Georgia Gov. BrianKempcriticized former President Donald Trump on Thursday after the GOP frontrunner said he won’t sign the Republican National Committee’s loyalty pledge, whichKemplikened to “political games.”

Tension between the former president andKemphas been simmering for years. WhenKemprefused to overturn Biden’s 2020 win in Georgia, Trump demonized him and recruited former Sen. David Perdue to challengeKempin the 2022 GOP gubernatorial primary.

Those efforts failed and the governor won the primary overwhelmingly before handily defeating his Democratic opponent Stacey Abrams.

Kemp also testified last year before the Atlanta-area special grand jury probing efforts by Trump to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia.Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is expected to seek more than a dozen indictments as part of her investigation into Trump’s attempts to reverse his defeatin the Peach State with a public and private pressure campaign targeting Georgia election officials and other lawmakers.

Trump said Wednesday night that he wouldn’t sign the pledge to support whoever the Republican nominee is because “I can name three or four people that I wouldn’t support for president.”

Despite that,Kemprecently told CNN he will “certainly” endorse the 2024 Republican nominee, even if it is Trump.

According to a GOP source, the following GOP candidates have signed the Republican National Committee’s loyalty pledge that is required to participate in the presidential primary debate at the end of the month:

CNN’s Dana Bash contributed reporting to this post.

The 16 Michigan Republicans whoserved as fake electorsin 2020 have pleaded not guilty to the first-of-their-kind felony charges stemming from the Trump-backed election subversion plot.

Nine of the defendants were arraigned on the state charges Thursday at a virtual court hearing in Lansing. The other seven defendants already pleaded not guilty in the past few weeks.

The group of GOP activists werehit with state chargeslast month over their role former President Donald Trump’s seven-state plan to subvert the Electoral College and overturn the 2020 election results by supplanting lawful Democratic electors with fake Republican electors.

Each of the fake Michigan electors were charged with eight state felonies, including forgery, conspiracy to commit election law forgery, and publishing a counterfeit record. Some of their defense attorneys have already said they’ll challenge the novel prosecution and will try to get the charges dropped. The case is unfolding in Ingham County District Court.

The defendants were released on a $1,000 bond, after state judges determined that they weren’t a danger to the community and didn’t pose a flight risk. The next hearing in the case is scheduled for August 18, where prosecutors will need to show probable cause of the crimes.

The defendants includecurrent and former Michigan Republican Party officials, a member of the Republican National Committee, a mayor, a school board member and a town clerk. Some have said they were tricked into signing the fake elector certificates and didn’t intend to break the law, while others are still peddling the lie that Trump won a second term.

Remember: Two weeks after Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced the state charges, Justice Department special counsel Jack Smithindicted Trump on federal chargesstemming from his attempts to overturn the 2020 election. The sweeping indictment accused Trump of trying to “subvert the legitimate election results and change electoral votes” with the fake elector plot.

Trump has pleaded not guilty to the federal indictment, which was filed in Washington, DC.

Some of the Michigan defendants have claimed Nessel, a Democrat, is wrongly targeting political opponents. She has denied these allegations, and instead argues it would have been “political” if she hadn’t filed the charges despite “overwhelming evidence of guilt.”

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has recently been assigned additional security protection near her Georgia residence, according to a source with direct knowledge of Atlanta law enforcement movements.

Willis, who is investigating former President Donald Trump and his associates for interfering with Georgia’s 2020 election results, has recently urged local officials to stay vigilant about possible security threats.

In an email less than two weeks ago obtained by CNN,the Fulton district attorneyshared a racist and sexualized message she received and said similar obscene messages had been left via voicemail.

Trump once again attacked Willis on Tuesday at his New Hampshire campaign event, calling the black District Attorney a “racist,” while defending his actions in Georgia around the 2020 election.

Willispreviously said that security concerns have been escalated by Trump’s rhetoric.

In early 2022, she asked the FBI for help inproviding security for buildings and staff one day after Trump called prosecutors investigating him “racists.” The former President asked his supporters to hold “the biggest protests we have ever had” in cities like Atlanta if the prosecutors “do anything wrong or illegal.”

Willis is likely to present her 2020 election interference case to a grand jury next week and could seek several racketeering indictments against Trump and his associates for their actions in Georgia following the 2020 election.

Walt Nauta arrives at the Alto Lee Adams Sr. US Courthouse in Fort Pierce, Florida, on August 10, 2023.

Donald Trump’s body-manWalt Nautapleaded not guilty to new criminal charges brought by special counsel Jack Smith in the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case, while the arraignment for his co-defendant Carlos De Oliveira has been postponed because he still doesn’t have a Florida lawyer.

The former president previously waived his appearance in court and his lawyers officially entered a not guilty plea.

De Oliveira, the property manager at Trump’s Florida resort, and Nauta appeared in federal court in Fort Pierce, Florida. They have been charged with multiple offenses related to Trump’s allegedly unlawful retention of documents after leaving office, including classified material.

Carlos De Oliveira arrives at the Alto Lee Adams Sr. US Courthouse in Fort Pierce, Florida, on August 10, 2023.

Trump and Nauta were first indicted in this case in June. De Oliveira was added as a co-defendant in a superseding indictment last month, along with new charges against Trump and Nauta.

De Oliveira is now scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday, August 15.

More background: The charges Nauta and De Oliveira face include making false statements, conspiracy to obstruct justice and corruptly altering, destroying, mutilating, or concealing documents.

According to the superseding indictment, in the summer of 2022, Nauta – at Trump’s direction – helped to conceal documents from a grand jury subpoena by moving boxes, some of which contained classified information, out of a storage room which was later searched by a Trump attorney to comply with the subpoena.

The special counsel investigation into Donald Trump secured a search warrant of the former president’s Twitter account,@realDonaldTrump, according to a newly unsealed court filing.

The search was so secret that Twitter was initially barred from telling Trump the search warrant had been obtained for his account, and the company, now known as “X,” was fined $350,000 because it delayed producing the records sought under the search warrant.

The search warrant special counsel Jack Smith obtained sought “data and records related” to Trump’s account, and ultimately, the platform was allowed to share some information about the search warrant with the former president.

The special counsel’s office, which is now working on the criminal case against Trump in DC District Court related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, sought the warrant in January 2023.

Twitter ultimately produced the records,according to the filing, now public in the US Circuit Court of Appeals.

Read more.

Former President Donald Trump speaks to supporters during a political rally while campaigning for the GOP nomination in the 2024 election at Erie Insurance Arena on July 29, 2023 in Erie, Pennsylvania.

Former PresidentDonald Trumpargued in court filings Wednesday that he should not be required to go to a so-called SCIF — a sensitive compartmented information facility — to discuss with his lawyers the classified evidence in the documents case that special counsel Jack Smith brought against him in Florida.

Instead, he is proposing that he be allowed to discuss those materials at a facility “at or near his residence” that was previously approved for discussing classified information when he was president.

Trump’s lawyers did not specify which residence, arguing that doing so in a public filing would pose security concerns, and stressed that they aren’t seeking to physically take the documents to the facility.

Prosecutors had raised concerns about a proposal from Trump’s lawyers that they be allowed to discuss classified material with the former president at his “office at Mar-a-Lago, and possibly Bedminster.”

Allowing such discussions at a private residence would amount to “exceptional treatment.”

Prosecutors also noted that Mar-a-Lago — Trump’s Florida resort — is whereTrump’s alleged crimes took place.

With his response Wednesday, the Trump team asserted that his residence is “a highly protected location guarded by federal agents that previously housed a secure facility approved for not only the discussion but also the retention, of classified information.”

Trump’s lawyers argued that requiring the former president to travel to the SCIF at the Miami federal courthouse — where the classified evidence would be housed — just to discuss the materials would create “immense practical and logistical hurdles.”

Read more.

Walt Nauta and his lawyer Stanley Woodward arrive at the James Lawrence King Federal Justice Building in Miami, Florida, on July 6.

Former President Donald Trump’s aide and co-defendant Walt Nauta argued that he should be allowed to review the classified evidence in special counsel Jack Smith’s Mar-a-Lago documents case, with a court filing late Wednesday that opposed prosecutors’ proposal that access to those materials be limited to the Nauta lawyers who have received a security clearance.

Nauta’s lawyers argued that permitting their client to view the materials himself did not pose the national security risks the government claims. They laid out the reasons that his ability to review the classified evidence is necessary for their preparation for his defense, with hints that they might challenge prosecutors’ assertions that the materials Trump is accused of mishandling were never declassified.

Nauta and another co-defendant Carlos De Oliveira are set to be arraigned in federal court in Fort Pierce, Florida, Thursday morning on a new round of charges brought by Smith, including conspiracy to obstruct justice. The hearing – which will be before a magistrate judge – is not expected to dig into the dispute over the protective order for classified information.

Under Smith’s proposal for the protective order over classified information in the case, Trump would be allowed to view that evidence, with prosecutors acknowledging his special status as a former president who previously had access to the nation’s most sensitive secrets, including the documents at the heart of the criminal case.

But prosecutors have argued that Nauta should not have access to the materials, particularly because he is being charged with only obstruction-related crimes and does not face the charges of willful retention of national defense information that Trump faces.

Prosecutors have until August 14 to respond to Trump’s and Nauta’s objections to their proposal for how classified evidence in the case should be handled. US District Judge Aileen Cannon has set aside August 25 for a potential hearing on the matter.

Fani Willis, the District Attorney of Fulton County, Georgia inside her office chambers in the Fulton County Justice Center Tower in Atlanta, Georgia on Tuesday, September 20, 2022.

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis slammed a Trump campaign ad as “derogatory and false” and warned her staff that it would be airing in the Atlanta media market, according to an email obtained by CNN.

In the note Wednesday, Willis did not directly mention former President Donald Trump or his campaign, but she denounced the ad and instructed her staff not to comment on it or any other criticismthat may be directed toward her, her staff or her office in the coming months. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution first reported on the email.

Willis is expected to go before a grand jury next week and seek charges against more than a dozen individuals in her long-running criminal investigation into efforts by Donald Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 presidential election in Georgia.

Willis added: “Your instruction from me is to ignore all the noise and keep doing your job with excellence.”

More about the ad: The Trump campaign ad takes aim at a handful of prosecutors investigating Trump, including Willis. It notes – accurately – that she was disqualified from investigating Georgia Lt. Gov. Burt Jones due to a conflict of interest after she held a fundraiser for one of his political opponents.

But it also includes a salacious andbaselessallegation that Willis hid a relationship with a gang member she was prosecuting. The Trump campaigncites a Rolling Stone articlethat does not back up claims of an improper relationship and instead focuses on Willis’ prior legal representation of the local rapper when she was in private practice.

Medium Buying, which tracks political ad buys, posted on social media that the Trump campaign paid $79,000 for the ad to air on cable networks in Atlanta from Aug. 9 to Aug. 13.

Carlos De Oliveira arrives at the James L. King Federal Courthouse in Miami, Florida, on July 31, 2023.

A Mar-a-Lago property manager and former President Donald Trump’s personal aide are set to be arraigned Thursday morning in Fort Pierce, Florida, onnew chargesbrought by the special counsel in the case regarding the mishandling of classified documents.

Carlos De Oliveira, the Florida property manager, and Trump’s body-manWalt Nautahave been charged with multiple offenses related to Trump’s allegedly unlawful retention of documents after leaving office, including classified material.

Nauta, who was charged alongside Trump earlier this summer, pleaded not guilty to the charges he faced in the original indictment.

De Oliveira was charged in a superseding indictment against Trump in Nauta late last month and was released on a $100,000 bond following his initial appearance days later.

The charges Nauta and De Oliveira face include making false statements, conspiracy to obstruct justice and corruptly altering, destroying, mutilating, or concealing documents.

Trump submitted a waiver of appearance for Thursday’s arraignment on the new charges earlier this month,entering a plea of not guilty. The former president has been charged with retaining and concealing documents from investigators that he was required to turn over following his presidency.

According to the superseding indictment, in the summer of 2022, Nauta – at Trump’s direction – helped to conceal documents from a grand jury subpoena by moving boxes, some of which contained classified information, out of a storage room which was later searched by a Trump attorney to comply with the subpoena.

De Oliveira, according to the indictment, helped Nauta move some but not all of the boxes back to the storage room prior to the search. The rest, however, were kept at Trump’s residence, away from his attorney’s search.

The indictment also alleges that Nauta and De Oliveira had asked an employee if they could delete security footage at Mar-a-Lago. The two men also made false statements to investigators regarding their involvement in moving Trump’s boxes, prosecutors allege.

Former President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump attends a campaign event in Council Bluffs, Iowa, on July 7.

Donald Trump’salready daunting legal predicament gets grimmer by the day as new details emerge of the depths to which he was prepared to stoop to reverse his defeat in the 2020 election.

It’s rare for any criminal defendant to face the kind of ever-widening stack of indictments, potential trials and investigations that Trump is confronting. It’s unprecedented for a former president and front-running presidential primary candidate to be stuck in such a vise.

And as the former president’s legal team juggles court dates in different cities this week, their task in defending Trump is getting ever more complex.

Trump’s next possible indictment could belooming in Georgia, where Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is now expected to seekmore than a dozen indictmentsnext week in what could be the broadest sweep against Trump and his associates yet. The former president believes he will be among those charged, sources told CNN.

Heightened security and expectations around the Atlanta-area prosecutor are competing for attention with special counsel Jack Smith’s moves in Washington. The special counsel has already indicted Trump twice – over the mishandling of classified documents and, separately, over efforts to subvert the 2020 election. But the intrigue around that second case thickened Wednesday with the revelation, from a newly unsealed court filing, that prosecutorssecured a search warrantof the former president’s Twitter account during a secret court battle that underscored just how much of Smith’s investigation remains under wraps.

Adding to the daily drumbeat of disclosures about Trump’s legal cases,The New York Timesreported the contents of a memo thatrevealed new detailsabout how the Trump campaign initiated its plan to subvert the Electoral College process and install fake GOP electors in multiple states. The report underscores the stunning, anti-democratic audacity in Trump’s camp – even after his multiple challenges to the fairness of the 2020 election were rejected in many courts.

Read the full analysis here.