James Trusty, attorney for Donald Trump, appears on “Meet the Press” in Washington, D.C. Sunday, April 9, 2023.
William B. Plowman: Nbc | Getty Images
Two lawyers who represented Donald Trump within the months before the previous president was indicted on federal charges over his handling of classified documents quit working for him Friday morning.
The attorneys, Jim Trusty and John Rowley, didn’t explain intimately why they’d resigned, apart from to say in a joint statement that “it is a logical moment” to achieve this given his indictment Thursday in U.S. District Court in Miami.
Trusty and Rowley also said they may not represent Trump in a pending federal criminal probe into his efforts to overturn his loss within the 2020 election to President Joe Biden.
Trusty had made multiple appearances on television news shows Thursday evening and Friday morning to debate the indictment of Trump in his capability as his lawyer.
Follow our live coverage of Donald Trump’s indictment within the classified documents case.
Trump first announced the 2 lawyers were leaving his cases in a post on his Truth Social platform.
He said he would now be represented by Todd Blanche, a Latest York lawyer who’s representing him in one other criminal case in Manhattan Supreme Court.
Trump is charged there in a state grand jury indictment with falsifying business records related to a hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels shortly before the 2016 presidential election.
He has pleaded not guilty in that case.
“We will likely be announcing additional lawyers in the approaching days,” wrote Trump, who’s because of appear Tuesday in Miami court on the indictment charging him with several crimes.
Blanche didn’t immediately reply to CNBC’s request for comment.
Trump is charged over his retention of lots of of classified government documents at his residence at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida, after he left the White House, in addition to with obstruction for his failure to return those records within the face of demands from U.S. officials.
In a joint statement, Trusty and Rowley wrote: “This morning we tendered our resignations as counsel to President Trump, and we’ll not represent him on either the indicted case or the January 6 investigation.”
“It has been an honor to have spent the last 12 months defending him, and we all know he will likely be vindicated in his battle against the Biden Administration’s partisan weaponization of the American justice system,” the attorneys said.
“Now that the case has been filed in Miami, it is a logical moment for us to step aside and let others carry the cases through to completion,” they wrote. “We now have no plans to carry media appearances that address our withdrawals or every other confidential communications we have had with the President or his legal team.
