The Department of Justice (DOJ) on Thursday filed a notice of intent to appeal a ruling by a judge granting former President Trump’s request for a special master, asking the judge to partially stay a ruling blocking them from accessing the classified materials seized during a search of his home.
“Without a stay, the government and public also will suffer irreparable harm from the undue delay to the criminal investigation,” the DOJ writes in its filing.
“Any delay poses significant concerns in the context of an investigation into the mishandling of classified records.”
The motion for a partial stay would allow the government to continue its review of the classified records recovered from Trump’s home, removing from review by a yet-to-be-appointed third-party special master some 100 documents of roughly 10,000 taken in the Aug. 8 search.
The appeal itself will continue to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, which includes six Trump appointees on the bench.
The filing digs into District Judge Aileen Cannon’s logic on a number of areas, pointing to many of the same issues in a ruling legal scholars largely panned as troubling.
But the bulk of the argument for a partial stay of her ruling granting a special master relies on the impact her decision could have on national security.
Cannon allowed an intelligence community-led review of the documents to continue so that national security leaders could work to mitigate any fallout from the mishandling of records.
But the DOJ’s brief argues the intelligence community’s damage assessment and its own criminal investigation “are inextricably intertwined.”
“Before the Court’s Order, the same personnel from the FBI involved in the criminal investigation were coordinating appropriately with the IC in its review and assessment,” the agency wrote.
“The application of the injunction to classified records would thus frustrate the government’s ability to conduct an effective national security risk assessment and classification review and could preclude the government from taking necessary remedial steps in light of that review—risking irreparable harm to our national security and intelligence interests.”
