Special counsel Jack Smith has proposed taking the case to trial early next year, while Trump's lawyers argued that it should be held in spring of 2026.

The federal judge presiding over Donald Trump’s criminal election interference case shut down a bid by the former president to set his trial more than two-and-a-half years away.

“This case is not going to trial in 2026,” Judge Tanya Chutkan said in a hearing Monday morning in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., NBC News reported.

But the judge also said that she would reject a proposal by federal prosecutors to bring the case to trial in less than five months.