The classified documents case against former President Donald Trump includes 1,545 pages of classified evidence, 1.1 million pages of unclassified evidence and at least three years worth of surveillance video — and no trial date yet.
These are among the revelations from the first pre-trial hearing Tuesday before US District Judge Aileen Cannon in Fort Pierce, Florida, since the indictment last month of Trump and his aide Waltine “Walt” Nauta on charges related to classified records found at the former president’s Mar-a-Lago resort.
Here are some key takeaways from the hearing:
One million pages
The evidence the Justice Department has provided so far to lawyers for Trump and Nauta includes more than a million pages of unclassified documents, according to Jay Bratt, a lead prosecutor in Special Counsel Jack Smith’s office. However, he told Cannon these included a large amount of “non-content” — for example, pages featuring only the sender and recipient of an email.
Within those documents, Bratt said the government identified 400 to 500 pages that it considers significant.
Bratt detailed the evidence turned over, including search warrant materials, witness statements, surveillance footage from Mar-a-Lago, and transcripts of grand jury testimony. Still to come: additional surveillance footage obtained after the charges were filed June 8 and data retrieved from two of Nauta’s phones. He said there were witness statements that postdated Trump’s indictment, confirming the probe remains active.
Trump’s lawyers argued that the volume of evidence bolsters their push to delay setting a trial date. His attorney Todd Blanche said there were 1,186 days worth of surveillance footage from a third-party vendor that they are still processing.
Blanche and Nauta’s attorney Stanley Woodward told the judge they can’t accept the government’s word about which documents and surveillance footage clips are significant and they have a duty to review everything.
Classified evidence rules
Before the US can provide the classified evidence to the defense, Cannon has to determine how it will be secured and set limits on how it can be used. All of the defense lawyers have received interim security clearances, but Bratt said it would take another 60 days for full approval.
There are 1,545 pages of classified material that the government is prepared to turn over, Bratt said. That includes about 80% of the documents sent from the White House to Mar-a-Lago after Trump left office. The evidence features a mix of pages that the National Archives retrieved in early 2022 that Trump’s lawyers had shared in June 2022 under a subpoena. Those documents were seized by the FBI during the August 2022 Mar-a-Lago search.
The government wants to control whether to grant Trump and Nauta access to classified information in the case. But Bratt told Cannon he expects Trump will be allowed to see evidence provided to his lawyers, suggesting an effort to head off potential objections from the defense.
The government may ask to withhold a “fairly minimal” amount of material from the defense, Bratt said.
Trump’s pre-trial challenges
In addition to seeking to delay the trial until after the 2024 presidential election, Trump’s lawyers outlined potential legal challenges, which involve search warrants and the use of grand juries and other court rulings that gave prosecutors access to evidence.
Trump’s lawyers said they could challenge whether a lower court correctly allowed the government to pierce attorney-client privilege, questioning Trump lawyer Evan Corcoran before a grand jury and obtaining his notes.
They also might dispute the lawfulness of the government’s search warrants for his Mar-a-Lago residence, phones and other electronic devices, and probe whether prosecutors improperly used a grand jury in Washington before asking a different panel in Florida to return an indictment.
Another area of contention is whether Trump’s broad authority to manage government records while he was in office undermines the government’s theory of the case.
Nauta’s own way?
Nauta’s attorney Woodward said he shared some of the Trump team’s concerns. He said he also needs time to go through all of the evidence to consider whether to ask the judge to sever his client’s case from Trump’s.
Both Trump and Nauta are charged with conspiring to obstruct the government’s efforts to retrieve classified information, but only Trump is charged with mishandling national defense information.
Prosecution pre-trial motions
The government has argued for a trial starting in December and said it doesn’t expect to file many motions in advance. Prosecutor David Harbach offered a few early rebuttals to anticipated lines of attack from the defense. He said the Justice Department would defend the lawfulness of the special counsel’s work, including rebutting Trump’s claim that his former authority as president offers grounds to dismiss the indictment.
Trump’s lawyers have been careful not to concede that key documents in the case are, in fact, classified. DOJ’s Bratt told Cannon that all of the documents had gone through a security review and there was no evidence of declassification.