The internet erupted with jokes Thursday in response to reports that former President Donald Trump has requested an April 2026 trial date in his federal case regarding his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, with many legal experts mocking the quadruple-indictee for the "absurd" proposal.
The request to U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan came in a filing made Thursday evening and presents a lengthy time differential from special counsel Jack Smith's proposal of a January 2024 trial date. According to CNN, the former president's legal team rejected Smith's suggestion, arguing that Smith "seeks a trial calendar more rapid than most no-document misdemeanors, requesting just four months from the beginning of discovery to jury selection."
Trump's attorneys also argued in the filing that Smith's requested timeline would conflict with their client's other ongoing criminal proceedings and that, in proposing a January date, the government is attempting to "deny President Trump and his counsel a fair ability to prepare for trial," citing, in part, the 11.5 million pages of documents the Justice Department presented to them.
"Trump doesn't try to invoke the election in asking for a 2026 trial date. He knows that Chutkan took it off the table," former U.S. Attorney Harry Litman wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter. "Instead," Litman said Trump "argues 1) lots of discovery; 2) complicated cast; 3) some classified materials. Then lays out a comically leisurely schedule. e.g basically all of 2025 taken up w/ 3 discovery conferences."
In the filing, Trump's legal team offers what they call a "more reasonable schedule" that's "equal to the government's time spent investigating" for the case. Under their proposed timeline, three initial discovery conference and motions hearings would occur between Dec. 4, and the week of Aug. 5, 2024, and four others would take place between Dec. 2, 2024, and the week of Dec. 1, 2025. The timeline also asks the judge to set the motions hearing for the week of March 2, 2026, and the pretrial conference for the week of March 23, 2026.
"Trump attorney's saying they must have 3 years to do a page by page review of docs is not how any civil or criminal lawyer does doc review," former Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Weissmann tweeted. "It's all computer search terms. If otherwise, no case wd ever be tried."
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Other legal experts responded with disbelief to the former president's proposed trial date.
Neal Katyal, a Georgetown University Law professor, said on X, "I'll eat my hat if Judge Chutkan agrees with Trump to start this trial in 2026."
"Absurd," the former principal deputy solicitor general continued. "He's just afraid to stand trial. Nothing more."
Katyal repeated these sentiments during an appearance on MSNBC's "The ReidOut" Thursday evening, telling host Joy Reid that the term "laughable" gives Trump's request "so much credit."
"I don't actually have adjectives in my vocabulary — at least no words I can say on television," he said of how he'd describe the proposal, adding, "I've never in my 20-plus years of practicing law seen a request anything like that, and I'll eat my hat if Judge Chutkan accepts it because justice delayed is justice denied."
Katyal went on to ponder what the proposed schedule reveals about how Trump views the merits of the government's case against him, arguing that an "innocent" person accused of what the former president is accused of would want the trial to happen "right away" in order to clear their name.
"But not this guy. This guy's scared of going to trial," Katyal surmised of Trump. "He talks all the gluster he wants outside of the courtroom, but he is terrified of actually being in a courtroom, and when he is in one he clams up."
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"To me, this is just further indicative of his own consciousness of guilt," he concluded, adding, "I think it tells us a lot about his own state of mind."
National security lawyer Bradley Moss reacted to the request with a gif captioned, "You are not serious people," before questioning the four to six weeks Trump and the government predicted the presentation of his defense would take during trial.
"I will put good money on Trump's defense taking no more than a day at most. Assuming he even bothers putting up one," he tweeted.
"This is actually funny. 2026. Good luck with that," former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance quipped.
"What will come first: Professor Kreis gets engaged or Donald Trump's proposed trial dates?" Georgia State Law professor Anthony Kreis added, poking fun at himself.
Conservative lawyer George Conway reacted by reformatting Trump's request into a knock-knock joke.
"'Knock, knock.'
"'Who's there?'
"'April.'
"'April who?'
"'April 2026.'
"{endless, hysterical laughter}."
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