Donald Trump lawyer Evan Corcoran has reportedly quit the former president's legal team.
The development is potentially significant because Corcoran is considered a key witness in Jack Smith's classified documents case against Trump in Florida.
Corcoran was no longer part of Trump's legal defense in that case, but he was helping Trump with his other legal matters, which he has dismissed as one coordinated "witch hunt."
The Trump campaign promptly dismissed the reports of Corcoran's departure, which first broke through CNN, as misleading.
Corcoran "remains on the legal team and is continuing to help fighting the Biden Trial witch-hunts," Trump spokesman Steve Cheung said, adding, "Any assertion otherwise is fake news peddled by uninformed sources and untruthful reporting that seeks to leak disinformation and misinformation."
Smith accuses Trump of tricking Corcoran as part of an effort to illegally hoard classified documents, which were retrieved in a shocking FBI raid at Mar-A-Lago.
Corcoran was compelled last year to hand over his notes and testify to a grand jury in Washington D.C., where Smith began his investigation before the case was moved to Florida.
A judge in D.C. ruled that attorney-client privilege did not shield Corcoran from testifying under the "crime-fraud exception."
The classified documents case has yet to receive a firm trial date, owing to the complexity of the case, which involves multiple defendants, highly sensitive documents and unprecedented legal questions about presidential power.
The Trump-appointed judge overseeing it, Aileen Cannon, has faced furious liberal backlash and accusations of steering things in Trump's favor, despite rejecting Trump's efforts to dismiss the charges.
Trump is in New York this week for the beginning of his "hush money" trial, which is seen as comparatively much less serious.
The presumptive Republican presidential nominee has cited the conflicting court obligations in New York to push for a delay in the documents case, which one of four criminal cases he is facing.
"President Trump has a constitutional right to be present at the trial in New York and, as a result, cannot participate in this work relating to important parts of his defense," Trump's attorneys wrote to Cannon.
Smith has pushed furiously for a quick trial, leading Trump to accuse the prosecutor of election interference.
