A federal judge in Washington, DC, yesterday regained control of the criminal case against former president Donald Trump for his attempts to overturn the 2020 election, leaving the historic case’s fate in her hands less than 100 days before the November election.
The case was returned to Judge Tanya Chutkan one month after the Supreme Court issued a game-changing ruling on presidential power.
Chutkan has long signaled she wanted the case presented to a jury before voters go to the polls in November, initially pushing for a March trial date.
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But the Supreme Court interceded earlier this year and put the case on pause to consider Trump’s claims of presidential immunity.
By granting Trump sweeping immunity for official acts as president, the Supreme Court’s ruling may gut special counsel Jack Smith’s case.
That leaves Chutkan with a number of crucial decisions to make, including whether Trump’s efforts to undo the 2020 election results count as official acts.
Attorneys working on the case believe that Chutkan will move quickly with the case back in her jurisdiction, according to sources familiar with their thinking. She could soon set the schedule for any upcoming hearings.
Meanwhile, prosecutors in Smith’s office have been preparing to move ahead with the case, even though they face a more difficult path as some evidence obtained in the investigation may be considered off limits because of the Supreme Court ruling, including testimony from former vice president Mike Pence and other close Trump aides who worked in the White House.
Any move she makes will be under extreme scrutiny, given that it’s the only remaining federal case against Trump after the Florida federal judge overseeing his classified documents case, Aileen Cannon, dismissed those criminal charges against Trump and his two co-defendants.
As one attorney who practices in front of her said Chutkan “is very aware that the eyes of the world are on her”.
‘I wish I could go somewhere until it’s over, but I can’t.’
Chutkan has been on the federal bench for a decade.
In the past three years, she has presided over dozens of January 6 criminal prosecutions, and is known as a harsh sentencer for those convicted of charges related to the US Capitol riot.
Seated in her courtroom just blocks away from the Capitol, she is intimately familiar with the violence that unfolded that day and has warned Trump supporters in her court such an the episode can never happen again.
“We’re running up against another bitterly contested election,” Chutkan told one riot defendant last month.
“I wish I could go somewhere until it’s over, but I can’t.”
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Since Chutkan was assigned the 2020 election interference case against Trump more than a year ago, she has kept Trump’s attorneys and the special counsel on a short leash in the courtroom and has often been quick to schedule hearings or rule on motions.
The judge already has decided 15 major pre-trial issues, ruling in favor of special counsel prosecutors in most of those.
She’s also rejected a series of motions by Trump’s lawyers, including refusing to strike language that Trump believed was “inflammatory” from the indictment and to dismiss the case entirely based on his First Amendment claims.
Chutkan also approved Smith’s request to place Trump under a gag order for the duration of the case, but in a few instances she has dinged prosecutors, most recently for submitting court filings while the case was supposed to be on hold for the Supreme Court’s deliberations.
Attorneys who have practiced in front of Chutkan and some who went up against her when she was a public defender described her as “fair minded” and said that she “holds herself to a really, really high standard”.
The attorneys spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the professional and ethical risks of speaking to press about a sitting federal judge.
“Tanya’s just above the fray,” one of the attorneys said.
“She doesn’t make it personal. If she disagreed with you, she tells you.”
Push to get the case moving
While it’s still not clear when – if ever – the case will go to trial, observers believe Chutkan will move quickly to move the criminal proceedings along given her judicial style.
“She likes to move cases along,” the same attorney told CNN of Chutkan.
“She doesn’t want to want a lot of talk, she’ll just rule.”
Five major motions are pending before the judge, four of which she could rule on immediately.
Sources say that some of the attorneys involved in the case believe Chutkan may have worked on writing opinions for outstanding motions while the case was paused, and that those motions could quickly appear on the court docket.
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Other attorneys have taken issue with her briskness in the Trump case, saying such a high-profile and complex prosecution should be treated differently, and that the former president shouldn’t be forced to go to trial before he is ready.
“The concept of any federal criminal case with that level of complexity being tried in under two years is really unheard of,” said Tim Parlatore, a former Trump attorney and CNN commentator.
Another one of the attorneys who practice in DC District Court told CNN they believe Chutkan “would try, if she could” to get Trump’s case before a jury before his inauguration in 2025, should he win the presidency and the case presumably goes away.
“In her defense, she likes to move her docket,” the attorney said of the fast pace Chutkan keeps in her courtroom.
“If in her mind she thinks that Trump is trying to run the clock out, she would try to not allow it.”
Chutkan v. Cannon
The scrutiny around Chutkan is particularly intense after Cannon, the federal judge in Florida, dismissed a separate indictment against Trump for his alleged mishandling of classified documents.
Chutkan and Cannon can appear diametrically opposed, from their careers to their demeanors.
Chutkan was a public defender earlier in her career, while Cannon was a prosecutor.
Cannon appeared to hold hearings on nearly every motion in the Trump case before her, but Chutkan often rules without hearing from the parties in person.
And while Cannon was criticised for moving too slowly, playing into Trump’s strategy of delay, critics say Chutkan moving so quickly through the case is unfair.
One person close to Chutkan told CNN that she does seek counsel in other judges, particularly from those in the same courthouse, while those around Cannon have described her as isolated and not prone to seek counsel on how to handle any complex matters.
But the two have been accused of the same thing: putting their thumbs on the scale during two of the highest profile and consequential criminal cases in recent American history.
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To be sure, the two Trump cases involve vastly different facts and legal issues.
And the attorneys are taking different approaches – most notably with the special counsel’s office.
In Florida, Trump’s lawyers argued that Smith’s appointment was unconstitutional – and won.
In Washington, Trump’s lawyers have said publicly they don’t plan to lodge such a challenge, so that’s one dispute Chutkan won’t have to decide.
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