Trump arrives at Florida court to try to dismiss classified documents case

Donald Trump has arrived at afederal courthouse in Florida for a hearing on his attempts to throw out criminal charges stemming from his retention of classified documents stashed at his Mar-a-Lago property.

In two of their motions to dismiss the case, the former president’s attorneys argued that his charges under the Espionage Age are unconstitutionally “vague” and that the Presidential Records Act protects him from prosecution.

US District Judge Aileen Cannon, who was appointed to the judiciary by Mr Trump, is presiding over Thursday’s hearing in Fort Pierce, where the former president faces a 40-count indictment alleging violations of the Espionage Act, obstruction, and the illegal removal of federal records.

The motions to dismiss the case add to his growing list of attempts to evade the 91 criminal charges against him in four separate criminal cases in four jurisdictions.

Mr Trump’s attorneys have argued in court filings that Mr Trump had “virtually unreviewable” authority to designate presidential records as personal ones, and that the National Archives and US Department of Justice were unauthorized to retrieve records that Mr Trump was given “unreviewable discretion” to label “personal” before he left the White House.

Prosecutors with the office of special counsel Jack Smith have argued that those documents are “indisputably presidential,” and that the Presidential Records Act (PRA) would still apply to any classified information discovered at his residence. The former president is not charged for violating the PRA.

Donald Trump arrives at a federal courthouse in Florida on 14 March for a hearing on his attempts to dismiss criminal charges in a classified documents case.

Mr Trump’s lawyers argued in a separate