Former President Donald Trump's defense team has once again requested a judge to throw out the case involving classified documents, alleging that investigators tampered with evidence by mishandling and rearranging documents during the FBI's search of Mar-a-Lago in 2022. This motion, filed on Monday, brings to light allegations that have previously been raised in court, claiming that exculpatory evidence was destroyed by the Justice Department.

Trump's co-defendant had previously sought a delay in the case, citing difficulties in understanding the order of documents within the dozens of boxes seized by the FBI. Special counsel Jack Smith's team has admitted that some documents may be out of order, acknowledging inaccuracies in their scans. Prosecutors emphasized in a previous court filing that the shifting of documents did not warrant prolonging the case proceedings and attributed the disorder to a third-party review ordered by Judge Aileen Cannon after the Mar-a-Lago search.

Trump's defense lawyers argue in their motion that classified documents found during the search were mixed with the former president's personal effects and were buried within the boxes. They claim that Trump was unaware of the contents of the boxes, including whether there were classified documents present. The defense attorneys further allege that investigators made no effort to maintain the order of documents or document their location, displaying a "callous attitude toward President Trump's rights and a disregard of basic professionalism."

Furthermore, Trump's lawyers accuse the government of prioritizing staged and manipulated photographs released to the press over the preservation of key exculpatory evidence that is now alleged to have been lost forever. If the charges are not dismissed, Trump's attorneys are urging Judge Cannon to disregard any evidence gathered during the 2022 search.

Judge Cannon made a ruling on Monday evening, rejecting one of Trump's attempts to dismiss the case based on technical defects in the indictment. However, she did remove prosecutors' account of Trump allegedly showing a classified map to a political adviser from the indictment, as it was not directly related to the mishandling of documents. This leaves open the possibility that the map incident may be reintroduced as evidence by the prosecution.

The revelation that some documents were out of order has also caught the attention of Republicans in Congress. Prosecutors maintain that the documents remained within their respective individual boxes, and any shuffling of order was a result of the third-party review. However, the Trump team claims that recent discovery materials suggest that the FBI's filter team, responsible for segregating potentially privileged documents, did not preserve the original order of the documents within the boxes.

In response to these allegations, Special Counsel Jack Smith's office released a statement stating that the misconduct allegations are false and that they have fulfilled their legal obligations. Meanwhile, Trump's defense lawyers have been granted an extension to disclose potential expert witnesses for the trial, as an expert they had planned to include in their witness list decided against participating in the case. The deadline for disclosures has been extended until July 8.

The judge has yet to rule on several outstanding motions to dismiss the case put forth by Trump and his co-defendants, leaving the final decision regarding the future of the case pending.