Special counsel Jack Smith’s team withdrew Monday from the Justice Department’s appeal of the classified documents case brought against President-elect Donald Trump’s co-defendants.
Last month, Smith formally dropped charges against Trump in both the classified documents case, brought in Florida, and the 2020 election interference case, filed in Washington, D.C.
Smith cited the long-standing Justice Department policy that sitting presidents cannot be criminally prosecuted.
However, Smith’s team had filed an appeal at the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta that is still active regarding Trump aide Walt Nauta and Mar-a-Lago employee Carlos De Oliveira in the documents case.
Both Nauta and De Oliveira had pleaded not guilty to conspiring “to obstruct justice by attempting to delete Mar-a-Lago surveillance footage that prosecutors say showed employees moving boxes around, in order ‘to conceal information from the FBI and grand jury,’ according to the indictment,” ABC News reported.
Federal district court Judge Aileen Cannon ruled in July that the DOJ’s appointment of Smith as special counsel was unconstitutional, concluding the move needed congressional approval.
The DOJ then appealed her decision to the 11th Circuit in August.
Smith’s team has now referred the case to the DOJ’s Southern District of Florida