New Delhi: Former US President Donald Trump’s trial over his alleged mishandling of classified documents is set to begin in May next year, months ahead of the presidential elections in November 2024, news agency AFP reported. According to the report, US District Court Judge Aileen Cannon set the date for the jury trial on May 20 next year.
Earlier on June 8, Donald Trump was indicted on charges that he unlawfully kept the national security documents when he left office and lied to officials who sought to recover them. Trump has pleaded not guilty.
While the prosecutors had sought for the trial to begin in December this year, Trump’s defence attorneys had urged the court to set the date after the November 2024 presidential elections, AFP reported.
According to the report, Cannon said she chose the start date in May in order to give both the sides the time to process more than 1.1 million pages of discovery evidence and confront the challenge of handling the classified documents at the core of the case.
"No one disagrees that Defendants need adequate time to review and evaluate it on their own accord," AFP quoted Cannon, a Trump appointee who was randomly assigned to the high-stakes legal battle, as saying.
Meanwhile, a Trump spokesperson welcomed the judge's decision not to start the trial in December this year, and termed it a "setback to the (Justice Department's) crusade to deny President Trump a fair legal process.
"The extensive schedule allows President Trump and his legal team to continue fighting this empty hoax," the spokesperson said, reported AFP.
According to the report, Donald Trump’s trial will be held at a federal courthouse in Fort Pierce, a city about 130 miles north of Miami in a part of Florida.