Aileen Cannon hasn’t had a great run at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, at least not when it comes to her handling of Donald Trump-related litigation. The federal appeals court that covers Florida, where the Trump-appointed trial judge sits, has chided her multiple times, most recently calling out the judge’s “undue delay” in ruling on motions seeking the release of former special counsel Jack Smith’s classified documents case report. 

Cannon issued another Trump-friendly ruling in response to the circuit court forcing her to finally rule, and now the circuit will have another chance to review her work. Though the appeals court’s past critiques of Cannon’s actions don’t mean it will necessarily reverse her again, the appellate judges will likely be taking a close look. 

Their latest opportunity to review the district judge comes from appeals brought by the groups American Oversight and the Knight First Amendment Institute, which are pressing for the report’s release. 

To recap the events leading to the latest appeal, Cannon dismissed the documents case against Trump and his co-defendants in July of 2024, on the grounds that Smith was unlawfully appointed. The Justice Department launched an appeal to the 11th Circuit, but Trump’s presidential election win that November led the DOJ to drop the appeal against him, due to the government’s policy against prosecuting sitting presidents.

Yet the appeal was still active against the two co-defendants, which Cannon had cited as a reason to keep the report secret. But then the Trump DOJ dropped the appeal against the co-defendants, thus removing that rationale for secrecy (and preventing the appeals court from ruling on whether Cannon was correct to dismiss the case on unlawful appointment grounds).

So, when Cannon finally ruled in December after her “undue delay,” she acknowledged that rationale “appears to no longer apply.” But she noted that Trump and his former co-defendants argued that the report still shouldn’t be released because it contains privileged and protected information and is the product of a special counsel she found was illegally appointed. She said that her injunction blocking the report’s release would expire Feb. 24, giving parties time to seek “appropriate relief” before then. 

In response to that invitation, Trump filed a motion through a personal lawyer asking Cannon to permanently block the release of the report, and the DOJ lodged its own court filing saying that it agrees with the president and his former co-defendants, Walt Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira, that the report shouldn’t be released outside the DOJ. Nauta and De Oliveira went even further in seeking an order from Cannon that all copies of the report be destroyed.  

American Oversight and the Knight First Amendment Institute then asked her to halt the proceedings in her court while they appeal to the 11th Circuit. Siding with Trump now would obstruct their appeal, they said in a joint filing on Monday, which also argues she lacks the authority to order the report’s destruction. Cannon hasn’t ruled on the matter as of Tuesday morning. 

Meanwhile, in the appeals court, American Oversight and the Knight First Amendment Institute filed their briefs on Monday, challenging Cannon’s denial of their motions to intervene in the case. 

American Oversight argued that it’s “critical” for the circuit court to reverse Cannon “because of the important, far-reaching interest at stake that American Oversight seeks to address as intervenor: whether the district court may bar release of — or take any other action regarding — a government report after the court’s legitimate reason for doing so, as well as its jurisdiction, no longer exists.” Likewise, the Knight First Amendment Institute urged the appeals court to reverse the Trump appointee’s latest actions and to order the redacted copy of Smith’s report in her possession to be posted on the public docket. 

Responses from the Trump side are due in the appeals court next month, after the court granted a motion to expedite the appeal, which the Trump side had opposed.

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