Former President Donald Trump carried the state of Florida twice — but that doesn't necessarily mean the jury pool is stacked in his favor if he is tried there in the federal Espionage Act case against him. After all, the alleged crime of stashing boxes full of highly classified defense information in unsecured rooms across his Mar-a-Lago resort took place in Palm Beach County, where Trump lost by 12 points in 2020.
But Palm Beach County may not be where the trial is going to take place. According to The New York Times, District Judge Aileen Cannon appears set to hold the trial at her courthouse in Fort Pierce — where jurors would potentially be drawn from more rural counties that Trump carried by enormous margins.
"She signaled that the trial would take place in the federal courthouse where she normally sits, in Fort Pierce, at the northern end of the Southern District of Florida. The region that feeds potential jurors to that courthouse is made up of one swing county and four others that are ruby red in their political leanings and that Mr. Trump won by substantial margins in both 2016 and 2020," reported Maggie Haberman, Jonathan Swan, and Alan Feuer. "She left open the possibility that the trial could be moved — and political leanings are not necessarily indicative of how a jury will decide — but the fact that the trial is expected to draw jurors who live in places that tilt Republican has caught the attention of Mr. Trump’s allies and veterans of Florida courts."
For example, Trump carried 71.5 percent of the vote in Okeechobee County, 66.8 percent in Highlands County, 61.8 percent of the vote in Martin County, and 60.2 percent of the vote in Indian River County — all places where jurors could come from in a Fort Pierce trial. Neighboring St. Lucie County is a swing area, where Trump won only with 50.4 percent.
"[Palm Beach County state attorney Dave] Aronberg suggested that Judge Cannon’s order allowing flexibility could be a signal of a change down the road," noted the report. "'I’m not convinced this case is going to go in Fort Pierce,' he said, predicting a potential move to West Palm Beach, which would put it in the county where Mr. Trump lives and where the classified documents in question were stored after he left office." However, if she chooses to move forward with a trial in Fort Pierce, it might be difficult for the prosecution to force a change of venue; some January 6 defendants tried to force a venue change out of Washington, D.C., arguing the jury pool would be too liberal to treat them fairly, but judges rebuffed them.
Cannon, herself a Trump appointee, is controversial due to her previous move to block FBI agents from reviewing the classified documents they seized from Mar-a-Lago, appointing a special master to review them and effectively creating extra barriers to investigating Trump that didn't exist for any other defendant. She was smacked down by a three-judge federal appeals court panel, including two judges also appointed by Trump.
She has given no indication she plans to recuse herself from the case despite calls to do so from legal experts, and there is no sign yet that special counsel Jack Smith, who is prosecuting the case, plans to ask to have her removed from the high-profile litigation.
