Former President Donald Trump has tried to assert executive privilege over at least 750 sensitive pages. | Eva Marie Uzcategui/Getty Images
“We have one president at a time under our constitution,” said Patricia Millett, one of the three judges on the D.C. Circuit panel that heard arguments Tuesday in the high-profile fight. “That incumbent president … has made the judgment and is best positioned, as the Supreme Court has told us, to make that call as to the interests of the executive branch.”
As they questioned Trump’s lawyers, the judges repeatedly expressed skepticism that a former president could override a decision by the sitting president — in this case Joe Biden — to release documents to Congress, particularly when the incumbent has decided it’s in the national interest to release records to investigators.
During the three-and-a-half-hour argument session Tuesday, Millett and fellow judges Robert Wilkins and Ketanji Brown Jackson — all Democratic appointees to the appeals court — underscored deep concerns about allowing a former president to intervene in delicate negotiations between the sitting president and Congress.
Trump’s lawyers have indicated they plan to appeal if they lose. They could ask the full bench of the D.C. Circuit or the Supreme Court to take up the case, but it’s unclear if either would do so. It’s also unclear if the committee will attempt to fight any efforts to prolong the case while other courts review the matter.
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Article URL : https://www.politico.com/news/2021/11/30/trump-jan-6-appeals-court-523484