Former President Donald Trump can expect to be handed a legal loss by U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan on Monday by her setting an early 2024 trial date, former federal prosecutor Glenn Kirschner predicted.
Chutkan is presiding over Trump's case in Washington, D.C. where he was indicted earlier this month as part of special counsel Jack Smith's Department of Justice (DOJ) probe into alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election and for his alleged role in the January 6, 2021, Capitol riot.
The former president plead not guilty during his arraignment to the charges leveled against him in his second federal indictment, his fourth overall. The frontrunner in the 2024 GOP presidential primary has also accused Smith of election interference with his investigation. The indictment against Trump includes charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, conspiracy against rights, and obstruction of an official proceeding, pertaining to his various efforts to subvert his loss to Joe Biden in the 2020 election.
While speaking to MSNBC's Katie Phang on Saturday, Kirschner was asked what to expect from Chutkan in court next week after Trump's team asked for an April 2026 trial date instead, citing the large amount of information they will need to review as well as scheduling conflicts due to other trials, after the DOJ requested that the trial begin on January 2, 2024.
"This is not legitimate lawyering that is going on by Donald Trump's criminal defense attorneys. It feels more like they're acting as assistant campaign chairmen to Donald Trump," Kirschner, a staunch Trump critic, replied. "If the most reasonable voice in the room is Jack Smith and his team of federal prosecutors, and I believe those are the reasonable voices, then Judge Chutkan is likely going to go with their recommendation. I suspect you are going to see Tanya Chutkan set a trial date for some time in early 2024 so this case can be resolved well in advance of the November 2024 presidential election."
Newsweek reached out to Trump's campaign via email for comment.
Meanwhile, Palm Beach County State Attorney Dave Aronberg told Newsweek on Saturday that the former president's "legal strategy is to delay his trials until after the 2024 election, so any trial date before then is bad news for him and a win for Jack Smith."
Anthony Michael Kreis, law professor at Georgia State University, also told Newsweek, "As a political matter, it's a mixed bag. On the one hand, it keeps Trump in the news and in an acutely high-profile way in a critical period in the primary. On the other hand, that's an incredibly taxing experience to undergo as Trump will be fighting for his liberty and his political career. I suspect Trump would rather push this into late 2024 to keep his calendar free and avoid the inevitable discomfort of being on trial."
Trump was also arrested for the fourth time over allegations he broke the law while attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election result in Georgia. He has been indicted on 13 counts, but denies any wrongdoing and has described the case against him as election interference and a witch hunt on Truth Social, his social media platform. Fulton County authorities took Trump's mugshot during his booking, making him the first United States president to have a mugshot taken.
Update 08/26/23, 11:16 a.m. ET: This article has been updated with additional information.
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