Left: 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals Chief Judge William Pryor (U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida); Center: Donald Trump (AP Photo/Julia Nikhinson, Pool); Right: U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon (U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida)
The federal judge overseeing former president and convicted felon Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago documents case has been a lightning rod of scorn and controversy for the government, legal commentators, and court watchers alike — largely due to the pace of the pretrial process. The public recently formalized its disdain by filing over 1,000 separate judicial ethics complaints in the span of one week.
That effort was rebuked by another federal judge who drew attention to the sheer volume of the complaints in a May 22 general order.
“These complaints appear to be part of an orchestrated campaign,” 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals Chief Judge William Pryor wrote. “The Chief Circuit Judge of the Eleventh Circuit has considered and dismissed four of those orchestrated complaints as merits-related and as based on allegations lacking sufficient evidence to raise an inference that misconduct has occurred.”
Throughout the pendency of the case, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon has been dogged by complaints that she is allowing the three co-defendants and their allies wide latitude to delay, file frivolous legal documents that push untenable legal theories, push back deadlines, and otherwise engage in dilatory tactics — with an eye toward making sure there is not a trial before the 2024 presidential election.
According to Pryor, before May 16, “multiple” complaints of judicial misconduct or disability were filed against Cannon.
“Some of those complaints have been acted upon, and others will be acted upon in due course,” the judge explains.
Then, during the week of May 16, the number of complaints filed against Cannon exponentially increased.
Pryor takes stock of some of the latest complaints received by the appellate court — before rubbishing them as misplaced.
“Many of the complaints against Judge Cannon also question the correctness of her rulings or her delays in issuing rulings in the case,” the order reads. “Although many of the complaints allege an improper motive in delaying the case, the allegations are speculative and unsupported by any evidence. The Complaints also do not establish that Judge Cannon was required to recuse herself from the case because she was appointed by then-President Trump.”
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The chief judge also says such complaints are misdirected.
“Many of the complaints against Judge Cannon request that the Chief Circuit Judge remove her from the classified-documents case and reassign the case to a different judge,” the order goes on. “But neither the Chief Circuit Judge nor the Judicial Council has the authority to take this action under the Rules for Judicial-Conduct and Judicial-Disability Proceedings.”
On top of that, Pryor says, most of the complaints filed against Cannon are duplicative and “would not provide any benefit to the adjudication of the merits of the allegations.” Rather, the judge says, the “over 1,000 judicial complaints” lodged against Cannon are “substantially similar to the allegations raised in previous complaints.”
The judge’s order also cites a court rule that allows him to recommend to the Judicial Council that complaints found to be “part of an orchestrated campaign” against a judge not be accepted.
The rule reads:
Orchestrated Complaints. When many essentially identical complaints from different complainants are received and appear to be part of an orchestrated campaign, the chief Judge may recommend that the Judicial council issue a written order instructing the circuit clerk to accept only a certain number of such complaints for filing and to refuse to accept additional complaints. The circuit clerk must send a copy of any such order to anyone whose complaint was not accepted.
In turn, Pryor directed the clerk court to do exactly that — to reject any of the complaints against Cannon that “are similar to” any of the other previously-filed complaints. The four accepted complaints, however, resulted in a technically different outcome: they have been adjudicated and were formally dismissed.
The judge offers one small salve for Cannon’s critics.
“Although the judicial-complaint process is not the appropriate way to seek review of Judge Cannon’s orders, her orders are nevertheless subject to appellate review in the normal course,” the order reads.
That review process has not been kind to Cannon in the past.
In December 2022, Pryor was part of a three-judge panel that harshly overturned her appointment of a special master to oversee the documents culled from Trump’s Palm Beach estate.
“This appeal requires us to consider whether the district court had jurisdiction to block the United States from using lawfully seized records in a criminal investigation. The answer is no,” the panel wrote. “The law is clear. We cannot write a rule that allows any subject of a search warrant to block government investigations after the execution of the warrant. Nor can we write a rule that allows only former presidents to do so.”
Cannon was appointed by Trump in 2020 and received her judicial commission that year; Pryor received his commission in 2005 after a lengthy confirmation battle fueled by numerous controversies after he was appointed by then-president George W. Bush in 2003.
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