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Chutkan rejects Trump request to step aside as judge in his D.C. trial

2023-09-28 00:00:00.0 华盛顿邮报-政治原网页

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U.S. District Judge Tanya S. Chutkan on Wednesday denied Donald Trump’s demand that she recuse herself from his federal election obstruction case, saying attorneys for the former president had applied a “hypersensitive, cynical, and suspicious” reading, of two of her statements in sentencing Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack defendants to accuse her of bias.

In a 20-page opinion, Chutkan wrote that “a reasonable person ... would understand that in making the statements contested here, the court was not issuing vague declarations about third parties’ potential guilt in a hypothetical future case,” or Trump, as his attorneys claimed. The judge continued, “Instead, it was fulfilling its duty to expressly evaluate the defendants’ arguments that their sentences should be reduced because other individuals whom they believed were associated with the events of January 6 had not been prosecuted.”

Trump’s defense can ask an appellate court to weigh in, but the standard for a federal appeals court or the U.S. Supreme Court to review the ruling is very high, requiring “clear and indisputable” proof a judge has failed her duty, and showing that assigning a new judge is “appropriate” considering all the circumstances and there is no adequate alternative.

“She gets to make the decision whether she’s recused,” said Stephen Gillers, an expert in legal ethics at the NYU School of Law. “An appellate court will defer to it unless it finds her decision to be an abuse of discretion, which means that even if an opposite ruling were also plausible, hers is upheld.”

Gillers said Trump could not appeal her decision until the trial is over; he could file for immediate review through a writ of mandamus, but that path is “very narrow” and not likely to succeed.

In asking for Chutkan to recuse herself earlier this month, Trump’s lawyers said the veteran jurist appeared to have prejudged the former president’s guilt, citing her statements when sentencing two defendants charged in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

In October, Chutkan alluded to Trump when she told a defendant that he and others at the Capitol “were there in fealty, in loyalty, to one man — not to the Constitution,” adding: “It’s a blind loyalty to one person who, by the way, remains free to this day.”

Trump attorney John F. Lauro wrote in a defense filing that the meaning of Chutkan’s statement “is inescapable — President Trump is free, but should not be.”

Prosecutors, however, said Trump’s defense had cherry-picked two of Chutkan’s statements out of context and misapplied the law to wrongly argue that the judge was biased against him. Far from presenting clear evidence of prejudice, they said, Chutkan’s statements were an appropriate response to the two defendants’ arguments that they deserved leniency because they were inspired by or less culpable than others who had not been held responsible.

“The Court’s statements addressing this sentencing mitigation argument were factually accurate, responsive to arguments presented to the Court, and evidenced no improper bias or prejudgment of the current case,” senior assistant special counsels Molly Gaston and Thomas Windom wrote.

A unanimous U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1994 that “opinions formed” through court proceedings would require a judge to recuse from a case only if those opinions “display a deep-seated favoritism or antagonism that would make fair judgment impossible.”

Gaston argued that a judge’s core duties at sentencing including responding to arguments and forming opinions based on facts in the case and that the higher standard for recusal is essential for statements “made by a judge while she is doing her job.”

Chutkan in her opinion agreed. She wrote that she “specifically withheld judgment on whether other people should be charged for conduct related to January 6, and ... did not recommend that the government investigate or charge any other individuals.”

Instead, Chutkan wrote that she was obligated to assess the claims of defendants and responded based on the facts and the arguments they raised. Even if Trump’s defense was correct and she was speaking based on information she learned outside her work as a judge, a reasonable person could not question her impartiality because she declined to say who, if anyone, she thought should still face charges in one case, and in the other case, she went no further than stating the fact that Trump had not been charged.

“It is the defense, not the court, who has assumed that the Defendant belongs in that undefined group,” Chutkan said. She added: “To extrapolate an announcement of Defendant’s guilt from the court’s silence is to adopt a ‘hypersensitive, cynical, and suspicious’ perspective rather than a reasonable one,” quoting from a federal appeals court ruling in D.C. generated by the Watergate scandal that prompted the resignation of President Richard M. Nixon.

There, the appellate court refused to disqualify Judge John Sirica for expressing a belief that criminal liability extended beyond an initial group brought to trial. The appeals court wrote that “disabling prejudice” necessary for recusal “cannot be extracted from dignified though persistent judicial efforts to bring everyone responsible for Watergate to book.”

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Trump is scheduled for a March 4 trial on charges of illegally plotting to undermine the federal government, subvert the legitimate results of the 2020 election and deprive citizens of the right to have their votes counted.

If the date holds, it would be the first of up to four criminal trials for the former president and current 2024 Republican front-runner. He is also charged with hoarding classified documents after leaving the White House and obstructing government efforts to get them back; participating in a conspiracy to obstruct the election results in Georgia; and falsifying business records in New York in connection with hush money payments during the 2016 presidential campaign. He has pleaded not guilty in each case.

Meanwhile, Chutkan is set to rule next month on a limited gag order requested by prosecutors, who say Trump’s public statements as he campaigns for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination are undermining public confidence in the judicial system and intimidating key players in the case, including potential jurors.

Some analysts said Trump’s recusal request was also a way to rally his supporters, even if the factual case presented by his lawyers seemed thin.

The examples cited by Trump were simply arguments advanced by defendants and acknowledged by the judge, and “there’s nothing about her statements that would cause a reasonable person to believe that the judge is unable to be impartial in Trump’s case,” said former federal prosecutor and University of Michigan law professor Barbara McQuade. She added: “For Trump, his strategy is delay and inflame. If he can speak out and convince enough voters that his prosecution is unfair and regain the presidency before trial, then he can appoint an attorney general who will dismiss the case.”

Trump has made similar recusal requests before, including in his New York criminal case. New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan last month denied Trump’s motion, which was based on three past political donations by the judge, totaling $35, and the work that his adult daughter’s digital marketing agency performs for Democratic Party candidates and organizations.

The Jan. 6 insurrection The report: The Jan. 6 committee released its final report, marking the culmination of an 18-month investigation into the violent insurrection. Read The Post’s analysis about the committee’s new findings and conclusions.

The final hearing: The House committee investigating the attack on the U.S. Capitol held its final public meeting where members referred four criminal charges against former president Donald Trump and others to the Justice Department. Here’s what the criminal referrals mean.

The riot: On Jan. 6, 2021, a pro-Trump mob stormed the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to stop the certification of the 2020 election results. Five people died on that day or in the immediate aftermath, and 140 police officers were assaulted.

Inside the siege: During the rampage, rioters came perilously close to penetrating the inner sanctums of the building while lawmakers were still there, including former vice president Mike Pence. The Washington Post examined text messages, photos and videos to create a video timeline of what happened on Jan. 6. Here’s what we know about what Trump did on Jan. 6.

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