SCREENSHOT: CNN
Posted on 06/13/2023 9:21:24 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
SCREENSHOT: CNN
House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan broke down the major “flaw” in the indictment against former President Donald Trump Sunday on CNN with Dana Bash.
Trump announced the indictment Thursday, ahead of the official indictment being unsealed Friday. The charges against Trump include 31 counts of alleged violation of the Espionage Act or the willful retention of national security information, as well as one count of “conspiracy to obstruct justice,” one count of “withholding a document or record,” one count of corruptly concealing a documents or record,” one count of “concealing a documents in a deferral investigation,” one count of “scheme to conceal” and one count of “false statements and representations.”
Bash asked Jordan to comment on part of the indictment.
“The indictment said: ‘TRUMP directed NAUTA,’ who’s his personal aide, ‘to move boxes before Trump Attorney 1’s June 2 review, so that many boxes were not searched and many documents responsive to the May 11 Subpoena could not be found and were in fact not found by Trump Attorney 1.’ [sic] In plain English, this alleges that Trump instructed his aide to help him remove sensitive documents in defiance of a federal subpoena. A), Does that trouble you? And B) If he thought he had the right to have these documents, why was he trying so hard to hide them?” Bash asked.
“No, it doesn’t bother me because again, you can’t have obstruction of something when there was no underlying crime. The standard is set. The standard is what the Constitution says. The commander-in-chief — the president of the United States — has the ability to classify and control access to information. That’s what the Constitution and the court have said. So you can’t obstruct when there is — you can’t obstruct when there is no underlying crime,” said Jordan.
“He is not the president of the United States — ”
“That is the fundamental flaw,” Jordan shot back.
“And you’re just taking him at his word?” Dana asked.
“And when he was president, he declassified the material. He’s been — he’s been very clear about that.”
“He says point-blank, on tape, ‘As president I could have declassified it. Now I can’t.’ He says, in his own words, it’s on tape as part of this indictment, that he did not declassify the material. Therefore, it is classified.”
“Dana … saying he could have, saying he could have is not the same as saying he didn’t,” Jordan pushed back.
“He said, ‘now I can’t’,” Bash said.
“Now he can’t — right — because he’s not president now. But when he was president, he did declassify it. He said that,” Jordan said.
“Which means that what he was holding was classified,” Bash argued.
“Not if he declassified it when he was president of the United States, for goodness sake!”
“But he’s saying point-blank in this audio tape that he did not declassify it,” Bash said. “What you’re saying just doesn’t make sense on its face.”
“Dana, what this truly is, Dana, is an affront to the rule of law. It’s an affront to consistent application of the law. You have Secretary Clinton — who had classified material on a server — she was not president of the United States. She was Secretary Clinton. You have that happen, nothing happens to her,” Jordan continued before the duo moved on to other issues.
Bash was referencing was a July 2021 call which alleged Trump showed a “plan of attack” to a writer, a publisher and two staffers, which he said was prepared for him by the Department of Defense, according to the indictment. “As president, I could have declassified it,” Trump allegedly said at the time, and “now I can’t, you know, but this is still a secret.”
Trump, at his core, is a showman.
In conferring with the writers, hired to write his biography, he played up the importance of the information regarding General Milley’s plan to invade Iran.
He tried to underline the fact that it was Milley’s plan, even though others attempted to ascribe the plan’s origin to him. He stresses that the document was retained, precisely to underpin the fact that it was Milley urging war, not himself.
Without question, absent Trump’s retention of the document, it would have remained “Classified”. Hidden. His grandiose statement that it is still classified is likely true, or would be claimed true by the Pentagon.
The fact is, the President is the sole arbiter of what is or is not classified. He can declare something declassified by the simple thought in his head. There is no superseding authority in that regard. No overt declaration he needs to make. No process or procedure he must follow.
That he declares, by word, thought or action, that something is declassified, then, in that moment, it is declassified.
The mere fact that those documents are/were in his possession are prima facie evidence that he declassified them.
There is no avenue by which a case can be structured to claim otherwise.
No amount of bragging, on his part, about whether some piece of paper he holds is now, or was previously, classified changes the underlying facts.
If he has it in his possession, ipso facto, he declassified it.
Unless someone is making the case that he broke I to the Pentagon, sometime after Biden took office, and raided the Locker of Classified Documents.
A prez can keep classified material as part of their personal records. They don’t lose clearance upon leaving office, like many officials do not.
RE: Well, Trump can try to make that argument, but I don’t think it will be successful.
The question the jury needs to consider first is this — What should be the *DEFAULT status of those documents in dispute* when they are at Mar-a-Lago? I can only see the following possibilities:
1) ALL DECLASSIFIED
2) ALL CLASSIFIED
3) SOME CLASSIFIED, SOME DECLASSIFIED
If #3, How is a jury to know which is which?
Yes. Jordan is an attorney. That’s one reason he leads the Judiciary Committee.
RE: A prez can keep classified material as part of their personal records
Then what’s the DOJ after and what crime was committed ( assuming what you said is true )?
Well, Trump can try to argue that, but if that is the basis of his defense, he will have to try to persuade 12 laymen of that.
the presidential records act makes the records of the president his... for his personal use, library, etc... if this is not thrown out on that merit, there is more evil afoot.
dems forget about the intent portion of prosecution... their intent is always to get republicans... but breaking the law involves intent... this should go no where.
It doesn’t matter if the documents recovered were classified or not to the indictment.
And Trump can try to make that argument, but he will have to convince a jury. Maybe listening to the tape would make a difference because there can be different inflections and nuances in the spoken word versus the written word. Based on reading the transcript, I would not buy that as a defense without something else to back it up.
Where is that in the PRA? All I have is this interpretation from Wikipedia:
“6. Establishes that Presidential records automatically transfer into the legal custody of the Archivist as soon as the President leaves office. [7]”
Can you clarify it for me?
All were declassified.
Besides, if he was just waving them around, as CNN wrote, then no one was able to read them, anyway.
Also, in any classified document, a confidential, secret or top-secret document, every paragraph is marked with its classification. I’ve seen entire documents in which only one paragraph was classified.
So, showing a document to someone doesn’t mean security has been breached.
They’re accusing him of being a spy.
There’s a reason the are trying to use the espionage act. It’s to avoid the Clinton precedent set by an Obama judge that a president decides what is kept when leaving office. It’s also to avoid the problem of everyone taking such documents even senator Joe, sainted Mike Pence, Obama, Bill and more.
They include the recorded quote to say he didn’t declassify by moving the documents. It’s not as cut an dried because this has never been litigated, no one has charged a former POTUS over document retention. This was unnecessary. It’s political and has little to do with protecting the United States.
Notice they aren’t saying he was selling secrets or actively undermining the USA. We literally have this quote because he’s saying he was lied about by a subordinate member of his administration and retained evidence of that in his possession as part of his personal presidential records. Trump would do this obviously motivated by wanting to ensure history accurately depicts his presidency in light of the Russia hoax, misinformation leaks and false claims.
“ They are saying Trump was carelessly storing these documents while not charging him that way to avoid cases against Biden, Pence and the rest. ”
And that is why I think they included the audio tape. If you read the charges, Trump is not actually charged with anything related to the Milley document that Ican see. So why even include that in the indictment?
1. To obviate a defense based on the claim that Trump didn’t know he had classified documents or that he believed they were already declassified.
2. To establish intent - that knowing the documents he had were still classified, he knowingly shared them with people not authorized to have access to them.
I think they will use #2 to justify the disparate treatment. It’s BS, but I think that’s the plan.
It’s a very political situation and unnecessary.
That is totally the plan.
Name the office or person(s) that POTUS as head of the Executive branch of our government has to report to. I can help you out. The answer is no-one.
I see you identify with Pelosi's view on guilty until proven innocent. That's a real bad look FRiend.
See, this helps me to understand. So the PRA doesn’t have anything to do with the charges?
Is the PRA part of the indictment?
It still doesn’t matter regarding the indictment, does it? NARA sees that they don’t have possession of the national security documents, so it tells the FBI. President Trump’s lawyers sign off on everything being turned over. FBI investigates and raids and finds stuff.
First, you are relying on CNN for accurate information?
Second, if you read charges 1-31, none of them require the information to be classified, just that they contain “national defense” information. So while we can argue if the information was classified or not, the charges don’t strictly rely on that. Basically the charge is that he possessed national defense information; he was not authorized to have that information in his possession; and that he refused to return it when asked by the government. Those are the points he will have to address on those charges. The other charges relate to him trying to hide the documents from the subpoena.
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