A motion filed Wednesday by Special Counsel Jack Smith in Donald Trump’s January 6 investigation puts pressure on the former president’s lawyers, according to a legal analyst.
The former president and GOP frontrunner is facing a federal case brought by Smith alleging he worked to overturn the results of the election, won by President Joe Biden.
Former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance says that the in limine filing by Smith in association with Trump’s mindset on or around January 6, 2021, seemingly puts the onus on the ex-president’s legal team based on what they want and don’t want to be admissible in the trial, while simultaneously weighing their ultimate credibility with the jury.
In limine motions refer to pretrial motions requesting certain evidence to be deemed inadmissible and not referred to or offered throughout a trial, which Vance said is not uncommon but can invoke a judge’s decision based on how the prosecution and defense interpret such issues.
“Trump’s lawyers will be forced to decide between caving in to the demands of their audience of one—who will likely insist on fighting to the death for the ability to present clearly inadmissible material—or acting like professionals,” Vance wrote Wednesday on Substack.
Newsweek reached out to Vance via email for comment.
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It also requests the court to not permit Trump to use the courtroom as a forum to “propagate irrelevant disinformation” during the trial, saying the defense “has repeatedly used rhetoric that may be acceptable on the campaign trail but not in a trial.”
The newest filing “puts Trump’s lawyers in something of a box,” Vance added, due to requiring responding to the motion while waiting for an immunity appeal to be resolved and for the case to go back before Judge Tanya Chutkan.
In mid-December, the Washington, D.C., judge overseeing the federal election subversion case agreed to temporarily pause proceedings—including all pending deadlines and court dates—due to the chance that the U.S. Supreme Court may rule that Trump has presidential immunity from prosecution.
A Washington, D.C., jury is due to be selected in February and the trial is slated to begin on March 4, 2024.
Trump has pleaded not guilty to the charges, including conspiracy to defraud the U.S. government and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding.
“Either they will have to disavow their intent to offer the types of evidence Smith objects to, or confirm that they intend to offer it and explain why it’s permissible,” Vance said. “And if they do the latter, they are unlikely to win, at least much, of their argument while losing credibility with the court for making it.
She added: “In an ordinary case, prosecutors wouldn’t have to file a motion like this one because the defense wouldn’t be trying to relitigate purely legal issues in front of the jury or claiming some foreign phantom was responsible for the crime.”
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