UNITED States officials have announced plans to release only part of a report detailing federal investigations into President-elect Donald Trump, following a court decision to block some of the findings.
On Wednesday, the Department of Justice indicated that the published report would focus on Special Counsel Jack Smith’s probe into Trump’s efforts to undo the results of the 2020 election.
It would not, however, delve into a second federal investigation that looked at Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents while out of office, following the end of his first term in 2021.
The announcement means that certain insight into classified documents investigation is unlikely to reach the public in the foreseeable future.
Trump is set to take office for his second term in less than two weeks, on January 20, at which point the Justice Department will fall under his control.
The classified documents investigation was once considered the most threatening to Trump, who has been embroiled in a sprawling web of legal cases. He is the first US president to be convicted of felony crimes.
Trump, however, has denied wrongdoing in all the cases. He has repeatedly criticised the investigations as politically motivated and “fake”.
While the classified documents section of the report will not be unveiled to the public, the Justice Department has indicated it would make its contents available to the chairmen and ranking members of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees.
Those members must agree not to make the section public while legal proceedings over the classified documents case continue.
“This limited disclosure will further the public interest in keeping congressional leadership apprised of a significant matter within the Department while safeguarding defendants’ interest,” the Justice Department wrote in its court filings.
Those proceedings were at the crux of the decision to nix the publication of the classified documents section of the report.
On Tuesday, a federal judge, Aileen Cannon, temporarily blocked its release, citing the continuing legal fight.
While the charges against Trump in the classified documents case were dropped in November, his two co-defendants — Trump employees Walt Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira — continue to face the possibility of a criminal trial.
Nauta, an aide, and De Oliveira, a maintenance employee at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, have been accused of helping the president-elect withhold and conceal the classified documents, despite a subpoena to turn them over.
