Trump's lawyers, who have not made a single mention of Trump's dubious declassification claim in court documents, immediately balked at the special master's request, writing that the details could be used in a defense against potential future criminal charges.
"The special master is calling Trump's bluff and already they're objecting,"
tweeted national security attorney Bradley Moss.
"[T]he district court cited portions of Plaintiff's filings in which he suggested that he could have declassified those documents or purported to designate them as 'personal' records … But despite multiple opportunities, Plaintiff has never represented that he in fact took either of those steps—much less supported such a representation with competent evidence," the DOJ said in filing.
Legal experts hailed Dearie for calling out Trump's claim.
"Part of the reason Judge Dearie is doing this is I'm sure he saw what order he was given from Judge Cannon. I'm sure he looked at the filing and said 'enough is enough, I'm not dancing around this,'" Moss told
MSNBC. "It's really simple. Either you've got the evidence or you don't."
Other legal experts suggested that Trump's lawyers refused to turn over the details to avoid their own legal trouble.
"Trump's team is resisting,"
wrote Ryan Goodman, a professor at NYU School of Law. "Smells like they want to avoid lying to court."
Former federal prosecutor Andrew Weissmann, who served on special counsel Bob Mueller's team,
agreed that Trump's lawyers likely "don't want to lie and be disbarred and subject their client to a criminal false statement charge."
"Trump team ruing the day it proposed Judge Dearie,"
he tweeted.
"I've seen enough,"
wrote former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti. "Trump's team miscalculated by asking for Judge Dearie to serve as special master."
www.latimes.com
