A judge on Friday suspended proceedings within the criminal election interference case against President-elect Donald Trump, a move that reflected the expected end to prosecution.
The pause was requested by special counsel Jack Smith, whose team is suing Trump in federal court in Washington, DC
Smith told Judge Tanya Chutkan earlier Friday that lifting the schedule of remaining pretrial deadlines would give his team “time to assess this unprecedented circumstance” of Trump's election victory and determine the suitable path forward Ministry of Justice Policy.”
“By December 2, 2024, the government will file a status report or otherwise inform the court of the outcome of its deliberations,” Smith wrote in a filing Friday.
Chutkan endorsed this deadline in her order repealing the other deadlines.
Trump's victory over Vice President Kamala Harris earlier this week was seen as a death knell for Smith's prosecution against him.
On Wednesday, NBC News reported that DOJ officials were present It is examining how the electoral process and another criminal case against Trump can be completed before he is sworn in as president.
Trump has said he plans to fire Smith and is expected to force the Justice Department to drop prosecutions.
And Justice Department policy prohibits the department from prosecuting a president while in office because the department is in the executive branch of government. The attorney general, who leads the DOJ, is appointed by the president.
Trump is accused within the Chutkan case of crimes related to his efforts to overturn his loss to President Joe Biden within the 2020 election, when the Republican was the incumbent president.
Trump was also charged by Smith in federal court in Florida with crimes related to his retention of confidential government documents after he left the White House in early 2021 and obstructing officials' efforts to get better those documents.
The case was dismissed in July by Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump nominee, who said Smith's appointment as special counsel by the DOJ violated the Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution.
Smith has appealed that dismissal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the eleventh Circuit.
But this appeal, just like the criminal election case in Washington, is seen as doomed by Trump's election victory.
Trump can also be being charged in Georgia State Court in Atlanta with racketeering and other crimes related to his try to reverse Biden's White House victory in 2020.
However, Trump shouldn’t be expected to face trial within the case during his term as president, despite the fact that the DOJ has no control over the prosecution filed by the Fulton County District Attorney's Office.
The president-elect can also be scheduled to be sentenced Nov. 26 in New York state court in Manhattan on nearly three dozen felony counts of falsifying business records related to a 2016 hush-money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels.
Trump faces possible prison time within the case, but he shouldn’t be expected to serve such a sentence during his term as president.
He is being prosecuted by the Manhattan District Attorney's Office within the hush money case.
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