A federal judge declared Thursday that she would not let former President Donald Trump’s campaign for the White House affect the schedule of the criminal case in which he stands accused of plotting to overturn the 2020 election.

At an hourlong hearing, Judge Tanya Chutkan said the November election was simply “not relevant” to the timing of how Trump’s case should unfold.

“I am definitely not getting drawn into an election dispute,” she told Trump’s lawyer.

The hearing, in U.S. District Court in Washington, was held to discuss the next steps in the case, which had been in limbo for months as Trump pursued a claim all the way to the Supreme Court that he was immune from prosecution on the charges brought against him by special counsel Jack Smith.

The Supreme Court ruled in July that Trump has some immunity for charges arising from certain official acts as president. The justices also ordered Chutkan to undertake the complicated task of sorting through a newly revised indictment and deciding which of its many allegations need to be tossed out under the immunity decision and which can survive and go to trial.

Chutkan did not rule on how she intends to conduct that task or a schedule for completing it, but she said she would issue a written order laying out her plans as soon as possible.

The hearing — the first in the case since October — showcased again how the defense and prosecution have been at loggerheads over the issue of timing.

Speaking for the special counsel’s office, prosecutor Thomas Windom told Chutkan that the government could send her a detailed brief within about three weeks laying out its views of why the entire new indictment should be able to withstand the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling.

Windom noted that the brief would likely contain new information, like FBI interviews with witnesses, that would bolster the government’s contention that Trump was not acting in his official capacity when he sought to reverse his defeat to Joe Biden, but was rather acting in his private role as a candidate for office.

John Lauro, a lawyer for Trump, took a different view of how to move forward, arguing that any debate about immunity should be pushed off until at least December, after the election, while the defense sought to attack the case on other grounds. Lauro said, for instance, he intended to file a motion to throw out the case because Smith was improperly appointed as special counsel.

When Chutkan pushed Lauro on why he wanted to delay the discussions of immunity until winter, he acknowledged his concerns that the new information about Trump that the government wants to make public would come out at a “sensitive time,” before the election.

That led to Chutkan’s declaration that she considered the timing of the election to be irrelevant.

“It strikes me that what you’re trying to do is affect the presentation of evidence in this case so as to not impinge on an election,” she told Lauro.

Both sides and Chutkan appeared to agree that however she ruled, it would be appealed again to the Supreme Court — bringing another delay.

The hearing opened with a brief rearraignment of Trump, who was not in the courtroom because he was in New York campaigning. Through Lauro, Trump pleaded not guilty to a revised indictment that Smith obtained after the Supreme Court ruling. The charges were the same as in the original version, but some parts, particularly evidence about Trump’s interactions with Justice Department officials as he sought to overturn his loss, were removed as immune.

Lauro pointed out that Justice Clarence Thomas, in a concurring opinion in the immunity case, questioned how Smith got his job.

In Florida, federal Judge Aileen Cannon — citing Thomas — dismissed Trump’s classified documents case in July on the grounds that Smith had been improperly appointed.