This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
A Trump-bashing federal judge who is hearing one of the Democrat-launched cases against President Donald Trump has announced a stay in the case.
That means nothing more will happen, and no deadlines will pass until there's a ruling in an appeal before the U.S. Supreme Court.
WND reported that the pending appeals already have complicated the agenda of partisan special counsel Jack Smith to take Trump to trial in Washington, D.C., on claims he tried to "overturn" the 2020 election.
The results of that election were marred by the $400 plus million that Mark Zuckerberg handed out through foundations to officials who mostly used it to recruit Joe Biden's votes.
Further, that was the year the FBI interfered in the election, with its instructions to media corporations to suppress accurate – and devastatingly bad – reporting about the Biden family's business dealings contained in a laptop abandoned by Hunter Biden.
Subsequent polling showed that interference, alone, likely took the election away from President Trump and gave it to the now-octogenarian Joe Biden.
There are two appeals at issue. In one, the prosecutor, Jack Smith, has told the Supreme Court to rule – and quickly – on Trump's defense that he's protected by immunity for comments he made while president.
On the other, the justices agreed to review a challenge to prosecutors' vast use of an "obstruction" law to prosecute those who were at the Capitol during the protest-turned-riot on Jan. 6, 2021.
Hundreds were charged under the wide latitude adopted by prosecutors, including Trump.
Now the Epoch Times reports Judge Tanya Chutkan has announced a pause in proceedings in the case. She has refused Trump's motions to dismiss the case.
She claimed, "The court agrees with both parties that the defendant’s appeal automatically stays any further proceedings that would move this case towards trial or impose additional burdens of litigation on the defendant. The court hereby stays the deadlines and proceedings scheduled by its pretrial order."
She said, "If jurisdiction is returned to this court, it will—consistent with its duty to ensure both a speedy trial and fairness for all parties—consider at that time whether to retain or continue the dates of any still-future deadlines and proceedings, including the trial scheduled for March 4, 2024."
Prosecutors have told the Supreme Court to rule quickly so their demand for a March 4 trial date can be ordered.
In the other appeal, the Department of Justice used the now-questioned definition of the law of obstruction to charge nearly 330 defendants.
Chutkan, who reportedly once worked at the same law firm as Hunter Biden, has refused to hand the case off to someone else – after repeatedly attacking Trump verbally.
The evidence shows she made comments during several other Jan. 6 cases that she handled appearing to lash out angrily at Trump.
Statements Trump's lawyers cited include Chutkan telling Jan. 6 defendant Robert Scott Palmer in December 2021 "You have made a very good point, one that has been made before — that the people who exhorted you and encouraged you and rallied you to go and take action and to fight have not been charged" and telling Jan. 6 defendant Christine Priola that individuals who mobbed the Capitol showed "blind loyalty to one person who, by the way, remains free to this day."
Steven Cheung, a Trump spokesperson, released a statement on the issue: "Judge Chutkan has granted President Trump’s motion to stay proceedings pending the resolution of the appeal on President Trump's immunity for doing his job as president and protecting our elections from fraud and abuse. This is a big win for President Trump and our rule of law, as it derails Deranged Jack Smith’s rush-to-judgment strategy of interfering in the 2024 Presidential Election in support of Joe Biden’s campaign.
"They waited almost three years to bring this hoax 'case' and are now desperately trying, and failing, to rush it because they know President Trump is dominating the election. The Constitution should not be suspended in a baseless prosecution against the leading candidate for president. This stay stops the trial itself and all discovery obligations. The stay will remain in effect while President Trump continues to appeal his assertion of presidential immunity, which should result in the complete dismissal of this witch hunt in its entirety. The American people, not the courts, should decide who becomes president, and they are supporting President Trump in historic numbers."
