Cannon's Special Master order is worse than you thought

[muriel_volestrangler]

Via Wonkette: "Oh, Judge Aileen Cannon's Special Master order for Donald Trump's stolen classified documents is actually worse than anyone realized upside down smile emoji!" https://www.wonkette.com/40-grandparents-that-prove-you-only-get-better-with-age-tabs-mon-sept-19-2022

(that has a gift link for the Talking Points Memo article, but I suspect I can't copy it to here and make it work, so better to go via Wonkette for the full article)

Normally, a special master would step in as a neutral party to sort out privilege matters — essentially, he would do the same thing that DOJ’s taint team did, but with the imprimatur of impartiality. This means a special master reviews the documents, identifies those where privilege might arise, and then consults with the party to come to a resolution on whether privilege exists or not (ruling on the matter if the parties can’t agree). Cannon’s this order subverts that setup, giving Trump’s counsel a lead role in the process and consigning the special master to a backseat role.

Pages 3-5 are worth a look. Cannon imposes an insane “precise workflow” that gives Trump’s team full access to all of the seized documents, including the classified ones, and then allows Trump to sort the documents into four buckets. The four buckets are designed to block the DOJ from continuing to make some of the major arguments raised in its briefing — namely, that many of the seized documents are government records not subject to the PRA. The special master only weighs in afterwards this review, and Cannon goes out of her way to make explicit that she will review all of his decisions de novo (aka without any deference to his recommendations). On top of all this, Cannon instructs the DOJ to secure all necessary clearances for Trump’s team — which, if WaPo’s reporting is to be believed, means reading his lawyers into a cabinet-level SCI compartment usually cleared for only a handful of people.

So it's not really a "Special Master" at all - it's ordering the DOJ to get security clearances for some of the least trustworthy Americans you can imagine (look what happened with Kushner), and then giving them the lead on what happens. And reserving to herself the right to ignore anything the Special Master says, in case he does his job properly.

[Joinfortmill]

1. Ha! Think they qualify? Not! She's an idiot.

[Pathwalker]

2. Wow! Totally insane. Thank you for posting this!

[edhopper]

3. When has a defendant

ever been in charge of evidence gathering? This is insane!!!

[Mister Ed]

4. Her "legal opinion" must have been written for her, verbatim, by Trump's lawyers. n/t

[Bettie]

10. No, by the Federalist society

they want the judiciary to be destroyed, so that they can do any illegal thing they choose with impunity.

[anti stupid]

5. this IS PURE CRAP

The GOP rot has permeated every part of our democracy from the pentagon to the courts not to mention congress. This is corruption at the heart of our government. This is how dictatorships protect themselves. This is how Hitler and the Nazi party slithered into complete control. This cannot continue. This country is supposed to be the greatest democracy on earth. The Republicans are destroying country.

[jalan48]

6. The longer this drags on the more "Special Master" situations Trump and his

team will put us in. We have to take charge and act in a way that acknowledges the extreme seriousness of the situation we are in. If the DOJ had arrested Trump at the time of the raid would we be going though this bullshit now?

[Orrex]

7. But whatever you do, don't express frustration at The System

[Bettie]

11. Oops, almost forgot

Of course the judiciary will hold. All of the judges are impartial arbiters, devoted to truth.....and so on.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

12. Or frustration about the lack of arrests of people totally not above the law.

[Pathwalker]

8. K&R

[tanyev]

9. How much you wanna bet she got some guidance writing that?

Federalist Society, Trump lackeys, etc.

[Novara]

13. She is clearly incompetent AND corrupt as hell

Those morons couldn't grab a security clearance if it was handed to them on a platter. There's no way we can let those fucking morons look at classified material.

Is this judge getting paid to tank her own career? Or is she simply utterly compromised and corrupt? Or both? Because I don't see how she comes back from such disastrous and wrong-headed rulings.

[G2theD]

14. Do we know when the appeals court will handle this case?

[Tadpole Raisin]

15. If the appeals court doesn't stomp on her ass I'll volunteer.

Can that court refer her for a disciplinary hearing or judicial misconduct? I don’t know how those things work but my God her actions could be taught in law school in a class titled:

Fuck up moves you don’t want to do as a judge

[NQAS]

16. Maybe...

This crap will be the incentive to move straight to indictment. Surely they have enough evidence. And they can add to the evidence, and add criminal indictments as new info becomes available.

Obviously I’m no lawyer, but would be one heck of a kick in the balls if these maneuvers work exactly as they weren’t expecting them to.