District of Columbia Judge Tanya Chutkan released a redacted version of the appendix to special counsel Jack Smith’s immunity motion on Oct. 18, offering more insight into the evidence undergirding his prosecution of former President Donald Trump.
So far, the tranche of released evidence consists of four volumes and nearly 1,900 pages, although large portions of the files are sealed or redacted.
Trump described Smith’s motion as “falsehood-ridden” and said the Justice Department violated its policy on avoiding actions that could influence an election.
“This entire case is a Partisan, Unconstitutional, Witch Hunt, that should be dismissed, entirely, just like the Florida case was dismissed!” the former president said in a statement earlier this month in response to Smith’s filing.
Volume I consists of a series of interviews from the House Select Committee on Jan. 6 while Volume II is mostly tweets from the former president.
Volumes III and IV include a lot of publicly available information such as archived webpages from the White House, emails from the Trump–Pence campaign, and press releases. Volume III also shows highlighted portions of Pence’s book, “So Help Me God,” which he released in 2022.
Timing Before Election
It came after weeks of dispute over redactions and timing. Chutkan had authorized its release with an Oct. 10 order but delayed the effects of the release for seven days. Trump’s attorneys responded on Oct. 17 with a request to delay the release through Nov. 14, after the presidential election.The filing containing the request argued that Chutkan should concurrently release both Smith’s and Trump’s evidence appendices. Trump is expected to file his own lengthy immunity brief on Nov. 7. His initial motion to dismiss based on presidential immunity prompted Supreme Court intervention and a subsequent ruling in July that led to Smith filing a superseding indictment.
Smith’s immunity motion, filed on Oct. 2, represents an attempt to claim that the superseding indictment’s allegations don’t fall under any of the immune categories of behavior set up by the Supreme Court’s decision in July.
That decision led to the pre-trial process eventually restarting after months of delay as Trump’s immunity motion made its way through the appellate process.
Chutkan said in her order on Oct. 17 that if she followed Trump’s request to delay the release of Smith’s appendix, she would be engaging in a form of election interference.
“The court will therefore continue to keep political considerations out of its decision-making, rather than incorporating them as Defendant requests.”
It’s unclear how the evidence in Smith’s immunity motion and appendix will impact voters, if at all. Smith has offered copious details of communications among Trump, White House staff, and his campaign around the time of the 2020 presidential election.
Trump’s attorneys sought a concurrent release of their appendices to offer a “balanced” picture to voters.
Chutkan rejected this argument, stating on Oct. 17: “Setting aside the oxymoronic proposition that the public’s understanding of this case will be enhanced by withholding information about it, any public debate about the issues in this case has no bearing on the court’s resolution of those issues.”
