A US appeals court on Thursday temporarily blocked the imminent release of Donald Trump White House documents that could implicate him in the January 6 attack on Capitol Hill. Last August, the House committee investigating the attack on the US Congress requested detailed records of the movements and meetings that then-President Donald Trump held that day. The majority Democratic commission required a series of documents from seven federal agencies to investigate the assault carried out by a mob of supporters of the Republican president with the aim of blocking the appointment of Joe Biden as president.
The Court’s decision gives the judges more time to examine Trump’s petition and has scheduled the presentation of the oral arguments of the appeal for next November 30. The three judges who have ruled the stoppage of the delivery of documents have wanted to specify that the measure “should not be interpreted in any way as a decision” on the merits of the case.
In a 15-page emergency motion, Trump’s lawyers asked to keep the documents secret for the time being and proposed that all parties report to the court next week on whether to keep them that way for as long (weeks or months) as it takes. an appeal in deciding. Trump’s legal team claimed in their lawsuit that the case raised important new questions, such as whether a former president can sue a successor to retain Congressional government records. In the opinion of Trump’s lawyers, the institution of the presidency would be irreparably damaged if the documents were published this Friday from 6:00 p.m., as planned.
Last Tuesday night, however, a federal judge ruled against Trump’s desire to keep those papers hidden. Magistrate Tanya Chutkan concluded that the House committee has the right to receive such documentation, as the White House also requests from Joe Biden. The judge defended that “Trump’s position that he can override the express will of the executive branch appears to be based on the notion that his power exists in perpetuity.” “But presidents are not kings,” said the judge.
Following Chutkan’s ruling, a Trump spokesperson said the motion would be appealed immediately. The former president’s lawyers have been blocking attempts by the House of Representatives to seize the documents of messages and calls from the Republican’s advisers for almost a month. The lawyers consider that the decisions made that day are protected by the discretion of the head of the Executive. President Joe Biden, however, said since early October that he would not invoke that power to protect information. “It is not in the best interests of the United States and therefore is not warranted for any of the requested documents,” wrote Dana Remus, Biden’s legal counsel to the National Archives.
The House has requested more than 770 pages of documents, including records of Trump’s top advisers and memos from his press secretary. Among the records are documents from Trump’s former chief of staff, Mark Meadows, his former adviser Stephen Miller and his former deputy attorney Patrick Philbin. Trump also hoped to block the publication of the White House Journal, a record of his activities, travel, briefings and phone calls.
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Earlier this week, the House committee issued subpoenas to Trump’s top aides who allegedly conspired to reverse his defeat in a war room at a luxury hotel in Washington, as well as some of his top lieutenants, including McEnany and Miller.
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