‘Incompetent’ Aileen Cannon Will Be Taken Off Case: Ex-Trump Lawyer

A lawyer who worked in Donald Trump’s White House has predicted that Judge Aileen Cannon will be removed from the former president’s classified documents case.

In an appearance Wednesday on CNN’s Erin Burnett OutFront, Ty Cobb, who led the Trump White House response to the Russia election interference investigation, said that evidence of Cannon’s bias toward Trump is “pretty palpable.”

Trump is charged with 40 felony counts in Florida that accuse him of willfully retaining dozens of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida after he left the White House and obstructing government efforts to give them back. He has denied any wrongdoing, and his lawyers have asked Cannon to dismiss the case.

Cannon, a U.S. district judge in Florida who was appointed to the federal bench by Trump in 2020, has repeatedly come under scrutiny for judgments that have favored the former president.

In a court filing earlier this week, special counsel Jack Smith wrote that her proposed jury instructions rest on a “fundamentally flawed legal premise.” This came in response to Cannon’s instructions suggesting that Trump was entitled under the Presidential Records Act to declare presidential records as personal property after leaving office.

Cannon has yet to rule on multiple defense motions to dismiss the indictment and other disagreements between the two sides, and she has not set a trial date. The case is one of four criminal prosecutions that Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, is facing as he seeks reelection. He has sought to delay the cases until after November’s election.

Asked why he thought Cannon was stalling the case, Cobb told CNN’s Burnett: “I recognize that many commentators today have tried to be polite about Judge Cannon’s missteps here, you know, and suggesting that they relate somehow to her inexperience or incompetence. I think the evidence of her bias is pretty palpable at this stage of the game.”

He said it is “remarkable” that Cannon has not yet set a trial date.

“Her delays here are extraordinary,” Cobb said. “She ignored the government’s request months ago to set the schedule under the Classified Information Procedures Act…. There are multiple steps that have to be gone through, and she hasn’t completed step one. I think that alone frankly doomed the case to not start before the election or the next year’s inauguration of whomever wins.”

Cobb also said he believes Smith will seek Cannon’s removal from the case.

“I think that Jack Smith—I think the filing today makes it plain that she has to rule,” he said. “And if she doesn’t rule under either scenario, they’ll be in a position to take her up to the 11th Circuit. And I think the 11th Circuit will likely take her off the case.”

The special counsel’s office declined to comment to Newsweek on whether Smith will seek to have Cannon removed from the case. Attorneys for Trump have been contacted for comment via email. Cannon has been contacted for comment through an email to a spokesperson for the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.

On CNN, Cobb was asked to clarify if he thought that Cannon’s actions were “just incompetence or inexperience.”

“No,” he replied. “I think the evidence is just too overwhelming. I mean, yes, she may be incompetent, but at this stage of the game her incompetence is so gross that I think it clearly creates the perception of impartiality—of partiality—and her attempt to put her thumb on the scale. So I think that should disqualify her.”

But even if Cannon is removed from the case, Cobb does not think it would go to trial before November.

“I think she’s successfully achieved what appears to be her goal of favoring the president to the point where this cannot get to trial,” he said. “There’s just so much to be done.”