Former President Donald Trump's ex-campaign manager Corey Lewandowski told Newsmax on Friday that special counsel Jack Smith was forced to move his case out of Washington, D.C.
U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, will oversee the indictment on felony charges of mishandling classified documents. The former president is scheduled to appear in Federal District Court in Miami on Tuesday.
"I think the reason that Jack Smith, the special prosecutor, moved this to Florida is because they know that the case in Washington, D.C. was not going to stand," Lewandowski said on "John Bachman Now," "and the attorneys that met earlier this week with the special counsel told them they had grave concerns about the procedural matter of bringing this case in Washington, D.C. where we know Donald Trump wouldn't get a fair hearing."
Lewandowski predicted a "very rudimentary procedure" at the Miami courthouse when Trump appears before Cannon.
"Donald Trump is going to go in, he's going to plead not guilty, and the judge will hear that and then he will be sent on his way," Lewandowski told Bachman and co-host Bianca de la Garza.
During Lewandowski's Newsmax appearance, news broke that Trump had announced a shakeup of his legal team, saying the case going forward would be handled by Todd Blanche, a lawyer representing him in a separate prosecution in New York, and not by James Trusty and John Rowley, two lawyers who had worked the classified documents case for months.
"What we're seeing right now is the selective prosecution of an individual who, if really at anything, violated the Presidential Records Act which carries no criminal penalty to it at all," Lewandowski said.
Trump's initial 2016 campaign manager, Lewandowski said the Biden administration's Department of Justice is out to extend its case against the former president for as long as possible.
"What we have now seen is the political prosecution of not only a former president, but the leading candidate for president for the Republican party in the 2024 election," Lewandowski said.
"And don't forget, Donald Trump, as a citizen of this great country, is innocent until proven guilty. He has a right to defend himself."
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