Trump to make first court appearance in classified documents case

MIAMI — The eye of Donald Trump’s legal and political cyclone is hovering over this city, where he’s preparing to plead “not guilty” to a raft of federal felony charges — the first time in history a former president has been charged by the government he once led.

Trump will step into the Wilkie D. Ferguson Jr. federal courthouse here on Tuesday, accompanied by a legal team that remains in flux, and deny that he hoarded classified secrets in his Mar-a-Lago home and then concealed them from government investigators seeking to reclaim them. The arraignment will ignite a pitched and likely protracted legal battle that could result in a lengthy prison term — and that Trump has already sought to exploit to boost his prospects in the 2024 presidential election.

In the hours leading up to Trump’s arrival, a familiar tension was in the air, as security forces and police ramped up patrols around the courthouse and warned against street clashes and other potential dangers. The atmosphere was reminiscent of Trump’s other criminal arraignment, just 10 weeks ago in a separate case brought by New York prosecutors who say he falsified business records in connection to hush money payments. In that case, he was booked as a criminal defendant in Manhattan, entered a not-guilty plea and was released a few hours later.

Trump will reprise that procedure on Tuesday. Authorities were preparing to process Trump at the Miami courthouse after his expected arrival in the early afternoon. He will be fingerprinted but will not have a mugshot taken, according to an official with the U.S. Marshals Service.

Unlike his prior arraignment, though, this time Trump is a federal, not a state, defendant, and legal experts say the documents case carries far more legal risk to him than the New York charges. He is expected to enter his “not guilty” plea at a 3 p.m. hearing before a federal magistrate judge.

Reporters and interested members of the public began lining up on Monday night, expecting the courthouse to be filled to capacity. And the judges expected it too, setting up extra “overflow” rooms and adopting new, one-day restrictions on media carrying electronics. No cameras are allowed inside.

Also set to appear in court on Tuesday is Walt Nauta, Trump’s longtime valet, who is charged with conspiring with Trump to obstruct the grand jury investigation into his alleged retention of highly classified military secrets. Trump is facing 31 counts of “willful retention” of those documents, as well as six counts of obstructing and misleading federal investigators. Nauta faces six counts of conspiracy, obstruction and false statements, as well.

Trump has spent the days since last week’s indictment assailing the Justice Department and seeking, despite the evidence arrayed against him, to cast the prosecution as politically motivated. He has lobbed particularly pointed invective at special counsel Jack Smith, who is leading the investigation.

That continued Tuesday, with Trump suggesting — also without evidence — that investigators planted evidence in his home, a case he and his lawyers have notably refused to make in a courtroom.

“They taint everything that they touch, including our country, which is rapidly going to HELL!” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Tuesday morning.

Trump’s odyssey through the legal system is only beginning. The New York hush money case is slated for trial in March 2024, and he faces two other investigations into his role in 2020 election meddling.

Tuesday’s arraignment may provide clues on a crucial question: how swiftly the documents case might proceed to trial. Smith has said he hopes to pursue a “speedy trial” but the complexity of the evidence involved — much of which remains classified — may lengthen the time it takes to resolve pretrial matters.

Among the issues still in flux: Trump’s own legal team. He is being accompanied Tuesday by attorneys Christopher Kise and Todd Blanche, but he’s been actively looking for additional attorneys since the core of his team handling the documents case resigned. Tim Parlatore quit the team last month amid internal dispute, and two other lawyers — John Rowley and Jim Trusty — resigned around the time of Trump’s indictment.

Outside the courthouse, the tension and theatricality built slowly throughout the morning. As media entered the courthouse around 8:30 a.m., a handful of supporters — and a few detractors — of the former president began amassing.

Supporters wore shirts backing Trump, saying that he will "give you a war you can't believe" or "stop my flag and I'll stomp your face." There were also people carrying signs reading "lock him up" and "Orange is the new Trump," a reference to the Netflix show and memoir about a woman who goes to federal prison.

A Trump impersonator showed up, as did a man in an Uncle Sam getup who rode around on a hover board, singing remade lyrics to Elton John's hit "Rocketman" saying that Biden is a "puppet man." Dozens of journalists milled about outside the courthouse and multiple TV news trucks were parked around the Miami building.

Miami authorities on Monday said they were ready to handle between 5,000 and 50,000 demonstrators. Inside the courthouse, journalists were gathered in a fifth-floor jury room and a seventh-floor cafeteria awaiting the hearing. Some pressed up against windows to watch the demonstrations playing out in the plaza and street below.

Josh Gerstein and Andrew Atterbury reported from Miami. Kyle Cheney reported from Washington, D.C. Meridith McGraw also contributed to this report.