Where Trump’s Legal Cases Stand After Jack Smith Moves to Drop Charges

The former president had faced four felony criminal cases.

(Left) Special counsel Jack Smith in Washington on Aug. 1, 2023. (Right) Former President Donald Trump in New York City on May 31, 2024. Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images, Alex Wong/Getty Images

With special counsel Jack Smith’s decision to drop his election case and classified documents appeal against President-elect Donald Trump, the soon-to-be 47th president’s legal woes appear to be mostly behind him.

Smith’s decision on Nov. 25 caps a tumultuous two-year period for Trump, who was charged in four separate jurisdictions with felony counts.

Washington: Prosecutor Moves to Dismiss

In a Washington federal court, Smith filed a motion to dismiss the election case, which has to first be approved by the judge, and cited longstanding Department of Justice policy stipulating that the criminal prosecution of a sitting president would violate the U.S. Constitution by undermining the ability of the country’s chief executive to function.

“Based on the Department’s interpretation of the Constitution, the Government moves for dismissal without prejudice of the superseding indictment,” the court documents filed by Smith on Nov. 25 state.

In the case, Smith had charged Trump in Washington over his alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election results and for his activity pertaining to the breach of the U.S. Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021.

The president-elect’s attorneys had sought to delay the release of case materials because of the proximity of the election. However, U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan denied their requests, allowing Smith’s team in October to unseal a 165-page filing in the case that outlined Trump’s alleged activities after the 2020 contest.

“Working with a team of private co-conspirators, the defendant acted as a candidate when he pursued multiple criminal means to disrupt, through fraud and deceit, the government function by which votes are collected and counted—a function in which the defendant, as President, had no official role,” Smith’s office wrote.

Trump had pleaded not guilty to the charges, arguing that they were politically driven and designed to interfere with the Nov. 5 election. At the time, Trump spokesman Steven Cheung said the brief was “falsehood-ridden” and accused Smith of being “hell-bent on weaponizing the Justice Department in an attempt to cling to power.”

On social media platform Truth Social, meanwhile, Trump said the case would end with his “complete victory” during the 2024 election.

The Smith case ultimately culminated in a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in July that found that presidents should be rendered partially immune from prosecution for their official acts and duties. But Smith ultimately retooled the indictment and argued that Trump was acting in his private capacity in the election case.

Florida: Prosecutor Moves to Drop Appeal

Also on Nov. 25, Smith filed papers in an appeals court asking to dismiss an appeal of U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon’s July order tossing the case that had accused Trump of illegally retaining classified documents after leaving the White House.

“Dismissing the appeal as to defendant Trump will leave in place the district court’s order dismissing the indictment without prejudice as to him,” Smith’s Nov. 25 filing states. However, his appeal concerning two other defendants in the case, Walt Nauta and Carlos de Oliveira, “will continue because, unlike defendant Trump, no principle of temporary immunity applies to them.”

Cannon dismissed the charges against Trump, Nauta, and de Oliveira, after agreeing with their arguments that Smith was not lawfully appointed under the U.S. Constitution.

“In ruling otherwise, the district court deviated from binding Supreme Court precedent, misconstrued the statutes that authorized the Special Counsel’s appointment, and took inadequate account of the longstanding history of Attorney General appointments of special counsels,” Cannon wrote at the time.

Weeks later, Smith filed an appeal in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit to reverse Cannon’s order; Trump’s lawyers had opposed the reversal in subsequent court filings.

Cannon wrote in her order, which came after U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas had cast doubt in July about Smith’s appointment, that Smith was an officer of the United States, which requires that Congress authorize the attorney general to appoint Smith as special counsel.

Before Smith was named special counsel, the FBI searched Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property in August 2022 in a bid to look for classified materials. At about the same time, Trump argued that, as president, he had declassified the documents.

After Smith brought the charges against Trump, the president-elect pleaded not guilty and also accused the Justice Department of launching a politically motivated case against him.

New York: Postponed Indefinitely

A case brought against Trump in Manhattan by District Attorney Alvin Bragg, an elected Democrat, resulted in the president-elect being convicted by a jury on May 30 of 34 counts of falsifying business records. Trump had pleaded not guilty in the case and accused prosecutors, the presiding judge, and the judge’s staff of holding a bias against him.

During most of the trial, Judge Juan Merchan had a gag order in place that barred Trump from speaking about certain witnesses, the judge’s family, court staff, and Bragg’s staff—which Trump said was election interference. The president-elect had written on social media that Merchan’s daughter was a consultant for several Democratic Party heavyweights, including Vice President Kamala Harris.

On Nov. 22, Merchan indefinitely delayed sentencing for Trump in the business records case, after the president-elect’s attorneys called for its immediate dismissal because of the election results.

“Immediate dismissal of this case is mandated by the federal Constitution, the Presidential Transition Act of 1963, and the interests of justice, in order to facilitate the orderly transition of Executive power following President Trump’s overwhelming victory in the 2024 Presidential election,” Trump’s attorneys stated in a letter dated Nov. 19.

Sentencing in the case was initially scheduled for mid-July but was postponed until Nov. 26. In his order on Nov. 22, Merchan wrote that he was granting a request to adjourn that sentencing date as well.

Trump was charged with falsifying business records in connection with payments that he made years ago to adult film actress Stormy Daniels, which prosecutors alleged were designed to interfere in the 2016 election. During the trial, Daniels gave testimony in the case about an alleged affair, which Trump has categorically denied.

Georgia: Still Unclear

In Fulton County, Georgia, Trump and more than a dozen others were charged with election interference-related charges and racketeering in 2023 for their activity following the 2020 election. While several of his co-defendants, including lawyers Sidney Powell and Jenna Ellis, entered into plea agreements with Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’s office, a Trump co-defendant in January filed court papers revealing that Willis was in a relationship with her top prosecutor in the case.

Other notable co-defendants listed in the Georgia case include several former Trump advisers and lawyers, including former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows.

During a contentious court hearing, Willis confirmed that she was in a relationship with her special counsel in the case, Nathan Wade, but the pair denied claims that either had financially benefited from the arrangement. They also denied claims that their relationship took place before Wade was named as special prosecutor by Willis, although a witness who had been Willis’s landlord had testified otherwise.

Months later, Fulton County Judge Scott McAfee ruled that either Willis or Wade must leave the case, resulting in Wade’s departure soon after. In his ruling, McAfee wrote that several outstanding claims made against Willis and Wade were not resolved, saying that an “odor of mendacity“ remained over the case.

Trump and several of his co-defendants appealed McAfee’s order to the Georgia Court of Appeals, which placed the matter on pause while it hears arguments on whether to dismiss Willis.

On Nov. 18, the state appeals court canceled upcoming oral arguments that were scheduled for next month.

New York: Civil Case Still Pending

In addition to Trump’s four criminal indictments, a judge earlier this year ordered Trump to pay a $454 million penalty, ruling in a civil fraud lawsuit that he had lied about his wealth for years as he built the real estate empire that vaulted him to stardom and the White House.

Trump had appealed Judge Arthur Engoron’s Feb. 16 decision. The judge found that Trump, his company, and executives, including his sons Eric and Donald Trump Jr., schemed to pad his net worth by billions of dollars on financial statements given to banks, insurers, and others to make deals and secure loans.

In oral arguments held in September, several New York appeals court judges signaled that Engoron’s ruling could be reversed.

Members of the five-judge panel on the Appellate Division, the mid-level state appellate court hearing arguments in Trump’s appeal, had appeared concerned about possible overreach by New York Attorney General Letitia James, who brought the case.

“Every case that you cite involves damage to consumers, damage to the marketplace,” Justice David Friedman told Judith Vale, the attorney arguing on behalf of James’s office.

“We don’t have anything like that here,” Friedman said, saying that nobody “lost any money.”

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.