Judge blocks release of Smith's report on Trump classified documents case

A US judge has permanently blocked the release of former Special Counsel Jack Smith's report on his probe into President Donald Trump's handling of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago home.

Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump-appointee, granted a request from the president to keep the public from seeing the report, which detailed his alleged mishandling of sensitive files taken from the White House after his first term.

Trump was charged in 2023 with illegally retaining classified defence information, but the case was dismissed after he was re-elected.

The judge ruled that releasing the report would cause "irreparable damage" to Trump and "contravene basic notions of fairness and justice".

Dozens of classified files were found in Trump's Mar-a-Lago home in Florida, including in a shower and storage room, after he left the White House in 2021.

In 2024, Judge Cannon had granted the president's motion to dismiss the federal case on the grounds that the justice department's appointment of Smith as special counsel was unconstitutional and he therefore lacked authority to bring charges.

Smith, who was appointed by former Attorney General Merrick Garland to investigate Trump, first appealed against that decision.

But he later requested to dismiss the case in 2024 after Trump's re-election because the justice department is banned from prosecuting a sitting president.

At the end of 2024, Smith gave his report on his investigation into Trump to Garland, who made the first volume of it public. The report details the two-year probe into Trump's alleged mishandling of the classified documents along with collected evidence.

In her ruling on Monday, Cannon said Smith was "acting without lawful authority" when he charged Trump, noting that the case was eventually dismissed.

"As a result, the former defendants in this case, like any other defendant in this situation, still enjoy the presumption of innocence held sacrosanct in our constitutional order," Cannon wrote in her ruling. "For obvious reasons, the Court need not take actions in contravention of that protection."

One of Trump's lawyers told CBS News, the BBC's US partner, that Cannon "properly ruled that the broad disclosure of protected grand jury testimony and discovery materials related to a dismissed criminal case, along with the publication of opinions and unproven accusations by an unconstitutional prosecutor, has no place in the American judicial system".

The BBC has contacted Smith for comment.