Judge in Trump classified docs case grants Jack Smith request to redact witness names

U.S. District Court Judge Aileen M. Cannon on Tuesday relented to special counsel Jack Smith in a long-running dispute over the names of government witnesses in the classified documents case against former President Trump, agreeing to shield their identities from the public eye.

Cannon only partially granted prosecutors’ request in agreeing to keep the names of FBI agents, Secret Service agents and other potential witnesses in the case under seal. In a 24-page order, the judge refused to categorically block witness statements from being disclosed, saying there was no basis for such a "sweeping" and "blanket" restriction on their inclusion in pretrial motions.

Cannon rejected a request by Smith's team to seal from pretrial motions the substance of all witness statements, except for information that could be used to identify witnesses.

"As for legal authority, the cases cited in the Special Counsel’s papers do not lend support to this sweeping request; nor do they appear to have been offered as such," Cannon wrote. "And based on the Court’s independent research, granting this request would be unprecedented: the Court cannot locate any case — high-profile or otherwise — in which a court has authorized anything remotely similar to the sweeping relief sought here."

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The disagreement between Smith’s team and lawyers for Trump, which had been pending for weeks, was one of many that had piled up before Cannon and had slowed the pace of the case against Trump. Tuesday’s order was the second time this month that Cannon was critical of Justice Department prosecutors, yet the judge still ruled mostly in their favor, The Washington Post