Month: August 2022

Categories
Crime Donald Trump Espionage

The New Fear: Trump May Have More Classified Documents At Other Properties He Owns

Now that it has clearly been established that disgraced former president Donald Trump did indeed have classified and top secret documents at his Palm Beach Mar-a-Lago golf resort, the question is being raised: Could the twice-impeached ex-president also have such material at his other properties, and wouldn’t that present a massive national security risk to the United States?

Two former aides to Trump say they believe Trump does indeed still have classified information in his possession.

Michael Cohen, who served as personal attorney to Trump for several years, weighed in on Twitter.

“I have been saying this since the @FBI raid…I believe #Trump has copies, potentially other documents as well, at other locations including his children’s homes, Weisselberg’s florida home, Bedminster, NJ golf course, Fifth Avenue apartment, etc…”

Former National Security Adviser John Bolton echoed Cohen’s comments, telling Sky News:

“Well given that it’s Donald Trump we’re talking about. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more highly classified documents at Bedminster or some some other residence of his.”

Bolton added:

“I just think it’s important that everybody, whether they’re pro-Trump or anti-Trump or whatever their position is to try and take a deep breath here. Let this process play out. You know, the filing that was done last night in the United States that included that picture that you’ve shown there and a lot of information about the documents and about Trump’s ‘obstruction,’ is the word they use, the refusal to turn them over to the National Archives, is revealing bit by bit the seriousness of the case and we don’t know all the details yet.”

Bolton also said talk about the Justice Department not being independent needs to end:

“It could be very, very serious, but my strong urging to everybody is stay calm. Let’s let it play out. We’ve got due process in the United States. The facts will come out here, but let’s not jump to conclusions that the Justice Department is an arm of the Democratic Party on the one hand or that Trump ought to go to jail tomorrow on the other.”

 

Categories
GOP The Biden Administration

Naming Names: White House Lists The ‘Extreme’ MAGA Republicans Who Promote Violence

Republicans are beside themselves because President Joe Biden referred to some of the most extreme MAGA members of the party and their political leanings as “semi-fascism,” which is an apt description of the ones who urged the January 6, 2021 storming of the Capitol and were even given tours of the building just a day before the insurrection took place that left five people dead and caused millions of dollars in damage.

At Wednesday’s press briefing, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre was asked by CBS News correspondent Nancy Cordes to address the controversy which has arisen in response to the president’s remarks:

“Over the past week or so, we’ve heard many Republicans argue that this President ran a uniter. And now he’s calling MAGA Republicans, which is a very large swath of the American populace, ‘semi-fascists.’ He is arguing that they’re a threat to democracy. Does the White House believe that this is a fair criticism by Republicans that this is not unifying language?”

Jean-Pierre came prepared, responding with names and specifics:

“Representative Paul Gosar (R-AZ) has posted videos depicting him attacking the President and members of Congress.

“You have Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) who has “publicly expressed support for shooting prominent Democratic elected officials and suggesting physically assaulting transgender school officials.

“You have Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC), [who] has said falsely if our election system ‘continues to be rigged and continues to be stolen, then it’s going to lead to one place, and that’s bloodshed.’ And just last week, you had Governor Ron DeSantis suggesting that Dr. Fauci should be physically assaulted. And former President Trump has done the same many, many times.”

The press secretary also referenced a headline from the New York Times earlier this month:

“‘As right wing rhetoric escalates, so do threats and violence.’ And so these are things that we have to call out.”

Jean-Pierre concluded by noting:

“I was talking about the ‘soul of the nation,’ something the President has talked about since 2017. When he wrote that article in The Atlantic, and he’s called it out then, he called it out January 6, he called it out Inauguration Day. He called it out last week. He called it out yesterday. So there is been a consistent call out from the President, what he’s seeing from an extreme part of this party of the Republican Party. And historians, I would argue, would say the same.”

Categories
Crime Donald Trump Espionage WTF?!

Trump Attorney Whines: I Can’t Believe DOJ Wants To Charge My Client With ‘Mundane’ Crimes Like Espionage

Alina Habba is an attorney for disgraced, one-term, twice-impeached former president Donald Trump, and she’s absolutely flabbergasted that the Justice Department might want to charge her client with “mundane” crimes such as violations of the Espionage Act.

Speaking with right-wing activist Charlie Kirk on Real America’s Voice, Habba whined:

“So what they did was to try and criminalize Donald Trump, as they always do. They found these three mundane statutes, espionage and the two others, obstruction.

“And they’re trying to claim that there was some sort of criminal activity. But their papers say it’s under the Presidential Records Act. So your admission is the power that we’ve all been saying he does have. You can take a picture of top secret documents, Charlie, and show the world a label.”

Habba added:

“But if they’re declassified, as he has the right to do that, he has the right to have them.”

Time for a fact check: Habba is trying to cloud the matter by suggesting everything was covered under the Presidential Records Act, and that means Trump should have turned all his records and documents over to the National Archives.

The documents were not declassified because there is no paper trail proving that. Trump cannot just wave his hand over a piece of paper and call it declassified. There’s a process that requires quite a lot of paperwork and numerous steps before something is officially declassified.

Additionally, as Mediaite notes, there are several laws Trump is suspected of having violated, and they’re a hell of a lot more serious than Habba is suggesting:

The warrant allowing the FBI to search Mar-a-Lago cited three potential statute violations by Trump:

18 USC 2071 — Concealment, removal or mutilation
18 USC 793 — Gathering, transmitting or losing defense information
18 USC 1519 — Destruction, alteration or falsification of records in Federal investigations

18 USC 793 is the Espionage Act, which Habba referenced.

Categories
Donald Trump Fox News Social Media

Fox Host Claims Trump Never Attacked A ‘Group’ Of People – Twitter Brings The Receipts Proving Otherwise

Fox News host Sean Duffy claimed Tuesday that disgraced former president Donald Trump never went after a “group” of people as he attempted to aim criticism at President Joe Biden for calling MAGA Republicans and their philosophy “semi-fascism.”

“What we’re seeing now is either the beginning or the death knell of an extreme MAGA philosophy,” Mr. Biden told donors at the fundraiser. “It’s not just Trump, it’s the entire philosophy that underpins the – I’m going to say something, it’s like semi-fascism.”

“I respect conservative Republicans,” Mr. Biden said later. “I don’t respect these MAGA Republicans.”

Appearing on Fox Business with fellow Fox host Brian Kilmeade, Duffy suggested it was unwise of Biden to attack such a large group of Americans, adding:

“(Donald Trump) went after people individually, but he never went after a whole group of people. The Donald Trump voter, the MAGA voter who loves America, salutes the flag, stands for the national anthem, works hard ― Joe Biden goes after 70 million plus voters, politically, Brian, is insanity.”

Who do you supposed wiped Sean Duffy’s memory so completely that he cannot recall the things Trump said about Mexican immigrants and Muslims?

Here’s a quick refresher course for anyone who shares Duffy’s selective recall:

It didn’t take long before Twitter users also pummeled Duffy with reminders of the disgusting things the twice-impeached ex-president said, and they brought all the receipts.

 

Categories
Crime Donald Trump Espionage Justice Department

Latest DOJ Court Filing Lays Waste To Trump’s Claims Of Innocence 

The Justice Department made clear in a Tuesday evening court filing that they believe they have all the evidence they need to charge former president Donald Trump with multiple crimes, including the mishandling of classified documents and obstruction of justice.

The filing, according to the Washington Post, suggests that the DOJ does indeed plan to seek criminal charges against Trump:

The filing traces the extraordinary saga of government officials’ repeated efforts to recover sensitive national security papers from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence and club, centered on a storage room where prosecutors came to suspect that “government records were likely concealed and removed … and that efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government’s investigation.”

For the first time, investigators with the DOJ included a redacted photograph showing some of Trump took with him when he left the White House in January of 2021:

Among the most incriminating details in the government filing is a photograph, showing a number of files labeled “Top Secret” with bright red or yellow cover sheets, spread out over a carpet. Those files were found inside a container in Trump’s office, according to the court filing. A close examination of one of the cover sheets in the photo shows a marking for “HCS,” a government acronym for systems used to protect intelligence gathered from secret human sources.

The filing also mentions other instances of what can best be called obstruction:

“The former president’s counsel explicitly prohibited government personnel from opening or looking inside any of the boxes that remained in the storage room, giving no opportunity for the government to confirm that no documents with classification markings remained.”

MSNBC political analyst John Heilemann noted Wednesday morning that the Justice Department filing means Attorney General Merrick Garland will indeed seek to indict and others who may have assisted him:

“What we’ve seen now, having crossed the Rubicon and having sent the FBI agents down there to do that search and seizure, having come back and now know how many documents were there, how long Trump resisted. How high the level was, and now DOJ here laying it on the floor and putting the photographs out, they’re not just spiking the ball on all of Trump’s legal team, bad legal interpretations and maneuvers, but they’re implicitly or explicitly kind of single-handedly tipping their hand, too. I don’t understand a world in which Merrick Garland could not indict Donald Trump. I think that’s where we’re heading.”