New York Times reports that Judge Aileen Cannon plans to make another pro-Trump ruling, but experts say she likely lacks jurisdiction to make such a move

Lisa Rubin (MSNBC)

The New York Times reported this morning that U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, of Florida, intended to issue an order that would temporarily block Special Counsel Jack Smith from releasing his report on the criminal investigation of President-Elect Donald Trump. The order would be in line with Cannon's history of making dubious rulings that favor Trump, the president who nominated her for the federal bench. By this afternoon, legal experts were stating that Cannon probably does not have authority to make such a ruling, according to a report at Raw Story (RS) under the headline "'No basis': Experts believe Aileen Cannon may not have power to block Jack Smith report." RS's Brad Reed writes:

MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin on Tuesday (1/7/25) questioned whether Judge Aileen Cannon has the authority to block the United States Department of Justice from releasing special counsel Jack Smith's report on his two criminal investigations into President-elect Donald Trump.

"It is not clear... whether she has jurisdiction because earlier this year, she threw out the Mar-a-Lago documents case explaining that, from her reasoning, Jack Smith did not have constitutional authority to bring that prosecution under the appointments clause of the Constitution," Rubin said.

"And so there is no basis here to block the report in part because it is not clear there is a case or controversy in front of her, but if there were, the argument that Trump is making -- that presidential immunity also precludes the release of the report -- is a stretch of the Supreme Court's ruling that a president cannot be prosecuted for acts having to do with his presidency while he is a sitting president."

 Rubin was not the only expert to take issue with Cannon's plans. Reed reports:

Legal analyst Barbara McQuade, meanwhile, speculated that Cannon's move was simply to help Trump run out the clock until his inauguration on January 20th.

"I don't think she has any jurisdiction, but delay is the name of the game," she said. "If they can stop the clock until January 20th. then the Department of Justice will be a Trump appointee, and they will kill the whole thing. That's the goal here."