Business

Trump Couldn’t Find New Lawyers For Arraignment, Reports Say

June 17, 2023

Topline

Former President Donald Trump will be represented by two of his existing attorneys when he’s arraigned Tuesday on 37 felony counts after a last-minute search for a new lawyer proved fruitless, as a string of attorneys have reportedly declined to represent the former president after two of his lawyers quit last week immediately after his indictment.

Former President Donald Trump arrives at the Miami International Airport June 12 in Miami, Florida.

Getty Images

Key Facts

Trump will be represented in court in Miami by Todd Blanche, who Trump had already said would serve as his defense counsel in the documents case, and Christopher Kise, a Florida attorney who has already been serving on Trump’s legal team, Kise confirmed Tuesday as he filed a notice of permanent appearance with the court.

Trump said Friday on Truth Social he would be represented by Blanche and “a firm to be named later” after his attorneys James Trusty and John Rowland abruptly quit, saying his team “will be announcing additional lawyers in the coming days.”

Since then, Trump has been “scrambling” to find legal representation who can represent him in the Southern District of Florida, the Washington Post reported, with the Guardian reporting Trump spent Monday afternoon interviewing potential attorneys, only to eventually “settle” on Kise for now after none of the interviews panned out.

Multiple attorneys have declined to work with Trump, the Guardian and Post report, including David O. Markus, who recently defended former Florida gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum against corruption charges, and Howard Srebnick, who the Guardian reports “was not allowed” to represent Trump after talking to his legal partners.

Lawyers have been averse to working with Trump given the ex-president’s “difficult” reputation, including his history of using attorneys as “attack dogs or political aides,” refusing to heed legal advice and not paying his legal bills, the outlets report.

Kise has not yet responded to a request for comment.

What We Don’t Know

Who will eventually end up representing Trump. The Trump team has interviewed attorney Benedict Kuehne, the Post and Guardian report, an attorney experienced in corruption cases who was indicted in 2008 on money laundering charges that were eventually dropped. Attorneys William Barzee and Bruce Zimet, a former assistant U.S. attorney in Florida, have also interviewed for the job, the Guardian reports. In addition to a local attorney that can practice in Florida, Trump has also reportedly struggled to find an attorney that specializes in national security and could possess a security clearance, given the Espionage Act charges against him that involve classified national defense information, the Guardian reports.

What To Watch For

Trump is set to appear in federal court in Miami at 3 p.m. Tuesday, where he’s expected to be formally arraigned, and to plead not guilty to the 37 felony counts against him. It’s still unclear when his case could go to trial, though Trump’s attorneys and the Justice Department are likely to propose timelines for how the case should proceed on Tuesday.

Tangent

Trump’s case is being overseen by U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee who was widely criticized by legal experts for her decision appointing a third-party special master to review the White House documents federal agents seized at Trump’s Mar-A-Lago estate, which was later overturned. The hearing Tuesday, however, will be overseen instead by U.S. Magistrate Judge Jonathan Goodman. In a court filing Monday that outlawed any cameras or recording devices during Tuesday’s hearing, Goodman acknowledged his involvement with Trump’s case would “almost certainly end tomorrow.”

Key Background

Trump has been indicted on 37 counts including alleged violations of the Espionage Act, obstruction and false statements—which, if found guilty, could result in decades of prison time for the former president. The indictment follows a year-long investigation by the DOJ into Trump storing White House documents at Mar-A-Lago, including classified materials, and then allegedly obstructing the agency’s investigation by keeping documents from the government after he was subpoenaed to turn them over. Documents found at Mar-A-Lago “could put at risk the national security of the United States,” the DOJ noted in the indictment, detailing how Trump allegedly stored documents throughout Mar-A-Lago—including in his bathroom—showed them to others, and then allegedly tried to obstruct the DOJ’s investigation by concealing the documents when the agency issued a subpoena for them. Trump’s latest scramble to find new attorneys comes as the ex-president has a history of parting ways with his legal representation, such as lawyers who represented him during the 2020 election—including Rudy Giuliani—and his lead attorneys during his second impeachment trial.

Update: This piece was updated on June 14^th to remove a reference to Benedict Kuehne facing possible disbarment for contempt of court in a civil case. “Mr. Kuehne is a highly respected Florida lawyer and prominent federal practitioner who is not and has never been facing disbarment arising from a contempt in any civil case. U.S. District Judge Rodney formally vacated the order regarding court conduct of Mr. Kuehne’s trial team and dismissed all matters arising from that order,” Kendall Coffey, an attorney for Kuehne, told Forbes in a statement.