As Trump’s Documents Case Crawls Along, Questions About Judge Abound

The prosecution of Donald Trump over his retention of classified documents has moved so slowly that some legal observers have questioned whether the judge overseeing the case is in over her head.

The actions of U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, from her courthouse two hours north of Miami, have only added to the mystery.

At a hearing on Friday, she took the unusual step of allowing a Texas law professor and two other lawyers unaffiliated with the case to argue on whether the special counsel behind the prosecution, Jack Smith, was unlawfully appointed. She cut off the law professor, Josh Blackman, as he quoted a line from the Spider-Man comics and later nudged him to finish his argument. “I do want to let you wrap up,” she said.