Lawyers for former President Donald J. Trump requested a federal decide on Monday evening to indefinitely postpone his trial on prices of illegally retaining labeled paperwork after he left workplace, saying that the continuing mustn’t start till all “substantive motions” within the case had been introduced and determined.

The written filing — submitted half-hour earlier than its deadline of midnight on Tuesday — presents a major early take a look at for Judge Aileen M. Cannon, the Trump-appointed jurist who’s overseeing the case. If granted, it may have the impact of pushing Mr. Trump’s trial into the ultimate phases of the presidential marketing campaign wherein he’s now the Republican front-runner and even previous the 2024 election.

While timing is necessary in any prison matter, it may very well be vastly consequential in Mr. Trump’s case, wherein he stands accused of illegally holding on to 31 labeled paperwork after leaving the White House and obstructing the federal government’s repeated efforts to reclaim them.

There may very well be issues of a kind by no means earlier than introduced to a courtroom if Mr. Trump is a candidate within the final legs of a presidential marketing campaign and a federal prison defendant on trial on the similar time. If the trial is pushed again till after the election and Mr. Trump wins, he may attempt to pardon himself after taking workplace or have his legal professional basic dismiss the matter fully.

Some of the previous president’s advisers have been blunt in personal conversations that he’s trying to profitable the election as an answer to his authorized issues. And the request for an open-ended delay to the trial of Mr. Trump and his co-defendant, Walt Nauta, a private aide, presents a high-stakes query for Judge Cannon, who got here into the case already beneath scrutiny for making choices favorable to the previous president within the early phases of the investigation.

Mr. Trump’s attorneys pitched their request to Judge Cannon as a plea for cautious deliberation and as a method of safeguarding democracy.

“This extraordinary case presents a serious challenge to both the fact and perception of our American democracy,” wrote the attorneys, Chris M. Kise and Todd Blanche for Mr. Trump, and Stanley Woodward Jr. and Sasha Dadan for Mr. Nauta.

“The court now presides over a prosecution advanced by the administration of a sitting president against his chief political rival, himself a leading candidate for the presidency of the United States,” they wrote. “Therefore, a measured consideration and timeline that allows for a careful and complete review of the procedures that led to this indictment and the unprecedented legal issues presented herein best serves the interests of the defendants and the public.”

The attorneys additionally took word of the weird intertwining of regulation and politics within the case, suggesting that Mr. Trump’s standing as a presidential candidate must be factored into the timing of the trial.

“President Trump is running for president of the United States and is currently the likely Republican Party nominee,” they wrote. “This undertaking requires a tremendous amount of time and energy, and that effort will continue until the election on Nov. 5, 2024.”

“Mr. Nauta’s job requires him to accompany President Trump during most campaign trips around the country,” they continued. “This schedule makes trial preparation with both of the defendants challenging. Such preparation requires significant planning and time.”

The submitting got here in response to at least one submitted final month by prosecutors working for the particular counsel, Jack Smith, who requested a trial date of Dec. 11. Judge Cannon, showing to undertake the brisk calendar mandated by the Speedy Trial Act, had initially scheduled the case to go to trial in August.

On Monday, hours earlier than Mr. Trump’s attorneys requested a delay of the trial, a lawyer for Mr. Nauta requested Judge Cannon to postpone a listening to to debate the problem of the labeled supplies within the case that was scheduled for Friday. The protection and the prosecution finally agreed to delay the listening to, which is able to happen in Federal District Court in Fort Pierce, Fla., till subsequent Tuesday.

Judge Cannon nonetheless has to grant her approval for that schedule change.

In making their case to delay the trial, Mr. Trump’s attorneys cited the expansive discovery proof offered to them by the federal government.

The first discovery disclosure, they stated, contained greater than 833,450 pages of fabric, together with about 122,650 emails and 305,670 different paperwork. The attorneys stated that after subsequent troves of proof have been handed over, they’d probably make extra requests to the federal government for additional data.

They additionally pointed to the advanced technique of deciding the right way to deal with the delicate supplies on the coronary heart of the case beneath the Classified Information Procedures Act — the topic of the listening to that had been scheduled for Friday. The attorneys strongly hinted that they have been going to battle the federal government throughout the pretrial litigation over labeled materials, a course of that might take up vital quantities of time.

“In general, the defendants believe there should simply be no ‘secret’ evidence, nor any facts concealed from public view relative to the prosecution of a leading presidential candidate by his political opponent,” the attorneys wrote. “Our democracy demands no less than full transparency.”

Aside from its request for a delay, the submitting served as a preview of Mr. Trump’s authorized technique because the attorneys laid out methods wherein they deliberate to assault his indictment.

They prompt, for instance, that they supposed to problem a few of the prices he’s going through by arguing that the Presidential Records Act permitted Mr. Trump to take paperwork with him from the White House. That interpretation of the Watergate-era regulation is at odds with how authorized specialists interpret it and was not profitable throughout an prolonged authorized battle final 12 months over an outdoor arbiter who was put in place to evaluate a trove of supplies seized by the F.B.I. from Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump’s personal membership and residence in Florida.

The former president’s attorneys additionally prompt that they could elevate “constitutional and statutory challenges” to Mr. Smith’s authority as particular counsel. Moreover, they laid the groundwork for questioning whether or not an neutral jury may very well be seated on the trial whereas Mr. Trump was working for workplace.

“There is simply no question any trial of this action during the pendency of a presidential election will impact both the outcome of that election,” they wrote, “and, importantly, the ability of the defendants to obtain a fair trial.”