A group of former officials, legal experts, and advocacy organizations is urging for the removal of Judge Aileen Cannon from the criminal case concerning classified documents against former President Donald Trump, citing actions that suggest she may be biased.

The critics include notable figures such as former Republican Missouri Representative Tom Coleman, former Republican New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman, and various officials from previous Republican administrations. They are appealing to the US Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit to not only overturn Cannon’s dismissal of the case but also to assign it to a different judge.

In a brief filed on Tuesday by the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and others, they stated that Cannon’s rulings imply a belief that former presidents should not be subjected to regular legal processes.

“Her decisions and behavior suggest a firm belief that holding a former president to standard criminal procedures is an unacceptable violation of his dignity,” they commented.

Cannon, appointed by Trump, ruled on July 15 that the appointment of special counsel Jack Smith by US Attorney General Merrick Garland was unlawful, stating that this invalidated the entire case against Trump regarding classified documents.

This decision was contrary to the conclusions of other courts, which have upheld the independence of special and independent counsels in politically sensitive matters through both Democratic and Republican administrations. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas echoed concerns about the legality of special counsels in a statement related to presidential immunity on July 1.

‘Series of Inconsistent Rulings’

A brief signed by Coleman, Whitman, and other former officials, alongside the nonprofit State Democracy Defenders Action, accused Cannon of following a “series of inconsistent rulings” that suggest bias. They specifically referenced her dismissal of the case and a prior ruling that blocked investigators from examining documents taken from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate.

The 11th Circuit had previously overruled Cannon’s earlier decision in a sharply critical 2022 ruling, which described it as a “radical reordering of our case law” and a breach of fundamental separation-of-powers principles.

A second brief was also filed on Tuesday by CREW, alongside former federal Judge Nancy Gertner and legal scholars Stephen Gillers of New York University and James J. Sample from Hofstra University, who specialize in judicial ethics.

This group not only highlighted the two earlier rulings but also criticized the nearly year-long delay caused by Cannon, during which time she agreed to hearings for “almost every argument proposed by Trump’s legal team,” before quickly dismissing the case following Justice Thomas’s comments on July 1.

This is not the first instance of Cannon’s handling of the case being questioned.

Reports indicate that Cannon disregarded advice from two other judges to recuse herself at the onset of the case, with Chief Judge Cecilia Altonaga of Cannon’s Southern District of Florida urging her to step aside due to concerns about the negative perception stemming from her earlier decision that limited investigators’ capabilities.