Trump's classified documents trial postponed indefinitely

WASHINGTON:  The official start of the trial against former US President Donald Trump in the affair surrounding the retention of secret government documents has been postponed indefinitely.

The previously planned start of the trial on May 20 has been cancelled, the judge in charge, Aileen Cannon, announced in a letter on Tuesday. She said unresolved legal issues were behind the postponement.

It is therefore unlikely that the trial will begin before the US presidential election in November.

The decision is a success for the Republican candidate, as he is trying to delay the start of a possible trial as much as possible. The 77-year-old hopes to move back into the White House after the presidential election.

Trump is currently also on trial in a court in New York in connection with hush money payments to a porn actress. But this trial is not Trump's only legal problem.

Trump was hit with federal charges in the document affair last year. He is accused of unlawfully retaining highly-sensitive information from his time as president between 2017 and 2021.

In August 2022, the FBI raided Trump's mansion in Florida and seized several sets of documents classified as top secret. Trump is also accused of conspiring to obstruct the investigation.

He is alleged to have tried to use associates to make footage from surveillance cameras disappear and to have boxes of documents taken away.

Trump pleaded not guilty when the charges were presented in Miami last year. His lawyers are still trying to avert the trial, invoking Trump's immunity as president. They argue that keeping the documents as personal records was an official act of the president.