Former President Donald J. Trump's lawyers on Monday fought a request from federal prosecutors to limit what he could say about a new flare-up in a case in which he was accused of illegally withholding classified documents after leaving office.
In an angry lawsuit, attorneys pushed back hard against the request from special counsel Jack Smith's office reviewing Mr. Trump's release conditions by banning him from making public comments that could endanger federal agents working on the prosecution.
On Friday evening, Mr. Smith's team sought what amounted to a limited silence order against Mr. Trump, following what they called “highly misleading” social media posts the former president posted last week in which he falsely claimed that the F.B.I. had been given permission to kill him. when agents searched Mar-a-Lago, his club and residence in Florida, in August 2022.
The former president's statements were based on a recently released operational warrant for the search, which included standard language specifying that the use of deadly force should only be used in an emergency, a standard provision that applied to all searches conducted by the office were carried out.
In their request to Judge Aileen M. Cannon in Federal District Court in Fort Pierce, Florida, Mr. Trump's lawyers said Mr. Smith's request was “an extraordinary, unprecedented and unconstitutional censorship request” that “improperly targets at President Trump's campaign speech while he is the leading candidate for president.”
Mr. Trump's legal team said Mr. Smith's request should be struck from the docket and that he and his accusers would face contempt sanctions if they filed it in the first place.
The lawyers accused prosecutors of presenting the request to them over a holiday weekend, further claiming that Mr. Smith was “seeking media coverage instead of justice.” They did not elaborate on how their client started this latest fight in the case by distorting the facts in an explosive social media post that Mr Trump has since turned into a fundraising appeal.
Mr. Trump's lawyers also asked Judge Cannon to hold a hearing to determine Mr. Smith's “motives and purpose” in filing the request to ban the former president from saying anything that agents who could jeopardize working on the case.
Mr Trump's lawyers have already succeeded several times in convincing the judge to schedule proceedings on issues that do not necessarily require arguments in court, as part of their strategy to delay a trial for as long as possible.
As in many high-profile cases, the defense and prosecution in the classified documents case have been waging a legal battle on several fronts since charges against Trump were first filed last June.
But the bickering has intensified in recent days as Mr. Trump's lawyers filed a complaint serious allegations of misconduct against Mr. Smith and his deputies last week, and Judge Cannon changed the schedule of the case but make sure it doesn't go to trial before the November elections.
The language Trump's lawyers used in their request to Judge Cannon reflected this new hostility.
Referring to Mr. Smith and his team as “the Thought Police,” the lawyers attacked prosecutors for being “biased and reckless” and “driven by political animus against President Trump.”
Mr. Trump’s legal team spent much of his 15-page motion admonishing Mr. Smith for a procedural error: failure to comply with a rule requiring opposing parties in the case to “meet and confer” with each other. before requests are sent to Judge Cannon.
The lawyers said they planned to oppose Mr Smith's decision at a later date on “substantial grounds”.
For now, they complained that the special counsel's office first notified them of its intention to request a restriction on Trump's public comments at 5:30 p.m. on the Friday before Memorial Day. Prosecutors submitted their request to Judge Cannon two and a half hours later, after several email exchanges, they said.
In an email attached to Mr. Trump's filing, Todd Blanche, one of the defense lawyers, told prosecutors: “There are rules. You violated them.”
Mr. Smith's filing on Friday evening, defense lawyers said, was part of “a pattern of unprofessional conduct in this case.” The attorneys reminded Judge Cannon of other cases in which prosecutors failed to adequately consult with them before filing requests.
They also noted a dramatic episode Wednesday in a judge's courtroom in Fort Pierce, when a prosecutor lost his temper, leading to Judge Cannon to instruct him to “calm down.”