Former President Donald Trump lost his bid on Wednesday to recuse the federal judge presiding over his 2020 election subversion case after he claimed she couldn’t be an impartial jurist.
U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan rejected Trump’s request to remove herself from the second case brought by special counsel Jack Smith, which followed an indictment earlier this year over his alleged mishandling of classified documents.
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This undated photo provided by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, shows U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan.
Chutkan said that while recusal motions served an essential purpose, “justice also demands that judges not recuse without cause,” according to the 20-page decision, which cited a past court decision that stated recusal motions can be a “procedural weapon to harass opponents and delay proceedings.”
“Motions for recusal could also be wrongfully deployed as a form of ‘judge shopping,’” Chutkan added.
Ever since Trump was indicted in August on four charges accusing him of a scheme to subvert the 2020 election, he has clung to Chutkan’s past rhetoric and harsh sentences given to defendants involved in