The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals has ordered a judge to dismiss the case against former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. The ruling comes from a three-judge panel, which said that there is not sufficient reason to question the Department of Justice’s decision to dismiss the case. Judge Neomi Rao, who was appointed by President Donald Trump, wrote that U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan “fails to justify the district court's unprecedented intrusions on individual liberty and the Executive's charging authority.” The case could continue if future appeals are made.

Flynn had pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI in 2017 as part of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. Sullivan had been scheduled to hold a hearing on the case in July. The Department of Justice had initially moved to dismiss the case against Flynn in May. The order to dismiss the Flynn case comes two weeks after an adviser to Sullivan argued that the judge both can and should deny the government’s motion to dismiss the charges.