Trump’s bid to postpone documents case until after 2024 election ‘distorted and exaggerated’: feds

Special Counsel Jack Smith slammed former President Donald Trump’s arguments for postponing his classified documents trial until after the 2024 election “distorted and exaggerated” in a court filing Monday.

Prosecutors in Smith’s office asked a Florida judge to reject the frontrunner Republican presidential candidate’s bid, saying the request would give Trump’s side roughly 14 months until trial – far more than is needed to prepare a defense.

Lawyers for Trump, 77, on Thursday had requested that his May trial date be pushed off “until at least mid-November 2024,” claiming that Smith’s office had yet to fulfill its obligation to hand over discovery evidence in the case – which accuses the 45th president of hoarding troves of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate.

Trump’s lawyers claimed that 25% of classified documents set to be used at trial were still not turned over to them, and that there weren’t enough secure facilities where they could review the records.

Smith’s office, however, said prosecutors have promptly handed over all unclassified documents to Trump’s camp, according to the court papers. Classified materials – except for ones that are subject to more stringent security measures – were all made available to the defense on Friday, they said in the filing.

The materials that are extremely sensitive and require “special measures” only “constitute a tiny subset” of all the classified documents that will be used at trial, prosecutors claimed.

“The defendants’ allegations regarding clearances and secure facilities vastly overstate the impact on their access to classified discovery and their ability to prepare for trial, and do not justify a continuance,” the filing states.

The arguments from Trump’s camp are “unfounded” and their claims of being unable to view classified documents “are distorted and exaggerated,” the feds said.

They also noted that Trump already unsuccessfully tried to postpone the trial just three months ago.

Trump’s lawyers argued last week that Smith’s office failed to exchange all the evidence from “day one” as they said they would.

The feds then loaded them with a slew of evidence after filing a superseding indictment against Trump in July, they claimed.

Trump’s attorneys also noted that the Florida trial would bump up against the ex-president’s March federal trial in Washington DC – related to his alleged attempts to overthrow the 2020 election result.

Last week, the real estate tycoon made a series of moves to push off civil and criminal cases he faces around the country including a failed attempt to halt the ongoing $250 million civil fraud case in New York.

The embattled former president also made a motion to dismiss the Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s criminal “hush money” case against him last week.

He also faces criminal charges in Georgia for allegedly interfering in the 2020 election in the Peach State.

Trump has denied wrongdoing in all of the cases and has claimed he has been targeted in the cases as part of a political witch hunt.

His lawyer Todd Blanche declined to comment Monday.