Trump’s doc case trial set to start in Aug.

The federal judge presiding over the prosecution of former President Donald Trump in the classified documents case set an aggressive schedule Tuesday, ordering a trial to begin as soon as Aug. 14.

The timeline set by Judge Aileen Cannon is likely to be delayed by extensive pretrial litigation — including over how to handle classified material — and its brisk pace seems in keeping with a schedule set under the Speedy Trial Act. In each of four other criminal trials the judge has overseen that were identified in a

New York Times review, she has initially set a relatively quick trial date and later pushed it back.

The early moves by Cannon, a relatively inexperienced jurist who was appointed by Trump in 2020, are being particularly closely watched. She disrupted the documents investigation last year with several rulings favorable to the former president before a conservative appeals court overturned her, saying she never had legal authority to intervene.

Brandon Van Grack, a former federal prosecutor who has worked on complex criminal matters involving national security, said the trial date was “unlikely to hold” considering that the process of turning over classified evidence to the defense in discovery had not yet begun. Still, he said, Cannon appeared to be showing that she intended to do what she could to push the case to trial quickly.

“It signals that the court is at least trying to do everything it can to move the case along and that it’s important that the case proceed quickly,” Van Grack said. “Even though it’s unlikely to hold, it’s at least a positive signal … in the sense that all parties and the public should want this case to proceed as quickly as possible.”

But it is not clear that the defense wants the case to proceed quickly. Trump’s strategy in legal matters has long been to delay them, and the federal case against him is unlikely to be an exception. As president, Trump could, in theory, try to pardon himself — or direct his attorney general to drop the charges and wipe out the case.