'Increasingly worried': Report shows how Judge Cannon 'started to change' after Trump case

A new report delves in Judge Cannon's style and how it has changed since she was assigned the criminal case involving defendant Donald Trump.

Raw Story recently reported that at least two Aileen Cannon law clerks recently quit. That was based on information from AboveTheLaw co-founder David Lat, who wrote on Thursday on his Substack that two of her clerks had resigned.

Now, Lat has a new article further elaborating upon Cannon and the clerks who have left her employ.

"Everything was going fine for Judge Cannon. And then, in August 2022, she was assigned Trump v. United States—the civil case that former president Donald Trump filed against the federal government, challenging the seizure of documents from his Mar-a-Lago estate and seeking the appointment of a special master to review them," according to the investigation. "In September 2022, Judge Cannon largely ruled in Trump’s favor, ordering the appointment of a special master. Her ruling was widelycriticized, and in December 2022, she was unceremoniously reversed by the Eleventh Circuit."

This, according to Lat, spurred the first clerk to depart.

"The Trump v. United States debacle seriously damaged Judge Cannon’s reputation—and it also created a clerk problem. An incoming clerk from a top-three school, worried about a Cannon clerkship being a drag on their résumé, withdrew from the clerkship shortly after the Eleventh Circuit smackdown," Lat wrote. "This left Judge Cannon with a clerkship slot to fill for the 2023-2024 judicial year. So she asked one of her 2022-2023 clerks, whom I’ll call 'Kari,' to extend her one-year clerkship into a two-year position."

But Kari, too, would ultimately quit, according to Lat's probe.

And another clerk purportedly made the same move.

"As fall turned to winter, conditions in chambers continued to worsen. Mary, whose clerkship had gotten off to a bad start, was working 80-hour weeks and having interpersonal conflict with the judge, whom she described to friends as 'mean,'" the report states. "Mary began plotting her escape."

Lat tells the story of a Florida federal judge who became "increasingly worried" and "started to change" after the Trump cases, and clerks who couldn't put up with her new "micromanaging" management style.

You can read the full report here.