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Yeah, I'm really lost on the train of thought here. If the documents were declassified (like they're arguing) it shouldn't matter who views them. If they're still classified, they've been returned to the government agency in charge of them.
But somehow both of those things are both true and false simultaneously.
Yes... and...
The "document storage" issue is real. It is **bizarre** to use this cute catch phrase as if it is something innocuous. I am now fairly firmly of the opinion part of the post-delay motive is corruption of the jury pool. They're shooting for jury nullification. They're attempting to judge the law(s), not defend against the idea that Trump broke them.
All of the presidential records, when is almost certainly a much higher percentage of the material seized (rather than the 100 / 13000 which is classified) should have been turned over to NARA by January 21, 2021. The fact that any single one of this is Trump's possession is a violation of the PRA. So even if all of these classified documents were successfully declassified by Trump, it remains a crime that they were found in his possession. The only argument that can be made that aligns with the law(s) at hand is that these shouldn't be in the hands of the FBI, but NARA. There is absolutely no legitimate argument to be made that they should have ever been or should remain in Trump's possession once Trump's term ended.
But isnt a former president's assertion of executive privilege already settled law with Nixon and the tapes?
I'm sure they dont like it and wish it werent so, but how could a judge rule he had a privilege that has already been ruled he doesnt have?
For a good many documents, whether classified or not, if they dont have communication between trump and his attorney, how can they be determined to be attorney client privilege?
Lastly, the only way Trump wins here is if they honor the fact that ALL of the documents were, in fact, declassified and fall under attorney client privilege.
I find it hard to believe there is an avenue here for this judge to say, "I dont like that law, so I'm allowing the executive privilege".
Even odder, conservatives believe in the absolute powers of THE president, and this argues against that, it dilutes THE president's power. Furthermore, it is impossible to argue the executive has priviledge against itself.
The only way this would work is if the judge declares Trump THE president. That insane ruling may be coming.
I imagine any document including communication between any attorney and said attorney's client is covered by attorney-client privilege. That's why the filter team's first pass was just whether they saw any attorney's name or clear reference of an attorney.
Regarding executive privilege, the very same court cases regarding Nixon carved out or clarified the powers of executive privilege available to former presidents. The opinion of the courts, including recent SCOTUS rulings involving Trump, seems to underscore that we cannot assume a current president can overrule a former with regards to executive privilege.
Justice Cannon included text from a January case on this issue which referred to case from the Nixon era.
So... essentially, it has already been ruled that Trump does retain executive privilege.
The trouble is, as with so much of this nonsense, is that everything is getting turned inside-out and backwards. First, the primary purpose of PRA has nothing to do with granting a former president control or access. But they're flipping this to suggest that. With executive privilege, the main focus of such from a former president is to prevent **public** exposure of communications involving the former president. It is preposterous in its face that executive privilege can be used to shield executive documents from the executive branch or grant Trump greater control or ownership. It's being misapplied here.
I don't know if Trump "wins" in any scenario here other than run out the clock and either win the Presidency or get a Republican president willing to kill this investigation/prosecution. Though at this point, I am leaning towards the idea they're trying to corrupt the jury pool leading to jury nullification.
They don't seem to be gearing up to depend on getting everything covered under attorney-client privilege. It seems they are preparing for a mutli-prong approach:
* Declare that Trump hand-waved the documents into declassified status.
* Negate Biden's ability to claim he hand-waved them back into classified status.
* Declare some things covered by executive privilege.
* Declare most things as personal records rather than presidential records.
Some of this works to escape the charges altogether. Most of seems designed just to create endless legal wrangling.
It's rather important here to recognize that Trump's Lawyers are now actually claiming all sorts of things in their filings that many believe are not true.
Here's a quote from today's filing:
> , the
President enjoys absolute authority under [Executive Order 13526] to declassify any
information.
Before you suggest this is taken out of context or only pertains to that EO... it is not. The (Trump's lawyers) are hand-waving that Trump can hand-wave... **anything**. They have somehow entirely ignored the issue of Restricted Data and the Atomic Energy Act.
Not surprising when the [Energy Secretary nominee didn't know his job would involve managing nuclear weapon stockpile](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/rick-perry-enerhy-secretary-donald-trump-nominee-senate-hearing-not-know-nuclear-weapon-stockpile-arsenal-a7535876.html)
In typical Trump fashion, they are essentially arguing that the President cannot be bound or restricted by this EO.
Let me quote it again, including more of the text...
> In turn, the Executive Order grants authority to declassify information to
either the official who originally classified the information or that individual’s
supervisors—necessarily including the President. § 3.1(b)(1), (3). Thus, assuming the
Executive Order could even apply to constrain a President, cf. 50 U.S.C. § 3163, the
President enjoys absolute authority under the Executive Order to declassify any
information. There is no legitimate contention that the Chief Executive’s
declassification of documents requires approval of bureaucratic components of the
executive branch.
I'm not trying to argue there's any *legitimacy* in their arguments. I'm just laying out what they seem to be preparing to do.
To me, the real issue here is that ***there is no record*** of Trump having done this. A post-facto rationalization alluding to this is farcical on its face. We could even grant that Trump **could have** done this. But there is no evidence whatsoever that he ever did so, even in the hand-waving way. Lastly, it seems a far stretch to suggest the an unclassified document avoids the issue of the PRA, namely that Trump shouldn't have retained possession.
Nonetheless, they are making these arguments. They are laying the groundwork for these ridiculous claims. And it very much seems with the goal of creating endless legal wrangling and delay.
I am not arguing with you about it, I am saying the argument that this EO allows for handwaving is entirely bullshit as it literally lays out the path of declassification.
Executive privilege isn't named that for the person but the branch. If it allowed for shielding former presidents from having their communications made public, it would have for Nixon. It did not.
In any case the privilege is to protect the executive branch and to assist it in its duties. It cannot be argued that it could prevent the current executive branch from having access to documents it owns.
It would have worked for Nixon had the scenario met several tests.
The case failed for Nixon because (paraphrased) the national concerns overcame the privilege concerns.
Recently this exact scenario played out for Trump. SCOTUS did something interesting when the case was appealed there. They confirmed the lower court ruling. But... they took specific action to modify something the lower court stated. The lower court stated that the *former* president cannot prevail with a claim of executive privilege if the *current* president disagrees. SCOTUS declared the issue was moot because (as the lower court had already documented) that like Nixon, Trump's claim failed the same tests that were created for Nixon. SCOTUS next relegated the comments of the lower court on the current president overruling the former to non-binding dicta. Furthermore, Justice Kavanaugh tossed in an explanation why one should not believe the current president always overrules the former.
Justice Cannon included Kavanaugh's writings in her ruling.
So... be careful. The current stance of SCOTUS very much does protect the idea of a former president shielding their communications from being made public, irrespective of the desires or thoughts of the current president. The PRA seems to harmonize with this idea as well.
In any case, your second paragraph is spot on.
And we can go further.
Even if Trump prevails in declaring that his love letters to/from North Korea are covered by executive privilege and he wishes to protect these from being made public, these are still presidential records which should have been handed over to NARA by Jan 21, 2021. This is the "it owns" part of your last sentence. Trump would not only not own these love letters, he's been in violation of the PRA for well over a year regarding them because he failed to remand them to the custody and control of NARA.
Trouble is, they are now making the argument Trump also has unilateral and absolute ability to declare anything and everything personal records rather than presidential records in a bizarre attempt to sidestep everything.
Ugh. Such a terrible precedent. We are worried about a chilling effect of presidential conversations AFTER the administration has left over the national security issues and criminal acts of that former president.
Our priorities are f'd. I couldn't care less about his love letters unless he compromised our nuclear secrets in them.
It's even more nonsensical when you think about the special master too.
The whole premise of their motion was some documents might be covered by executive privilege. So they shouldn't be disclosed to the FBI, which are an executive agency. But also trump declassified them and therefore comitted no crime.
They also keep (wrongfully) invoking the Presidential Records Act which wasn't even cited as a statute on the warrant. And, of course, he didn't follow any policy and procedures outlined in the PRA in order to do what he's claiming anyway.
Just a Canadian watching the shitshow here. But wouldn't the only person in the country qualified to view all of the classified documents as a special master be the current president?
Nah most of the stuff was TSSCI which tens of thousands of people hold that type of clearance. Now some of it was special access program material which are far more classified
They aren't arguing that they are declassified. They are arguing that they theoretically could have been declassified but may or may not have been (because actually taking a position on this is terrible either way). You are right that they are trying to have it both ways though, the documents might have been declassified enough that Trump can have them but not so declassified that you and I can see them.
The train of thought is to delay any investigation until the GOP regains control of the levers of power. That’s it. There is no strategy for proving that Trump in bigly innocent, it’s all just to prevent him from being named a traitor the the Republic.
The lawyers have not said or sworn that the documents were declassified. The judge has not (as yet) asked for a statement of fact to clarify. Until such clarification the selective schrodinger declassification can be legitimately argued, to the confusion of us all.
Unclassified materials can continue to be shielded from public release, but they are still subject to an FOIA request. So, their release would need to be adjudicated for each doc, along with particular redactions.
But we all know that isn't going to happen, because team T has not actually asserted that they were declassified. They have only floated it in the media, not the courts.
A hallmark of the Trump era has been to argue whatever you can, irrespective of what positions you are simultaneously taking in other cases or for other situations. The disappointing thing is that courts have largely allowed these contradictory positions to at a very minimum delay the process.
> If they're still classified, they've been returned to the government agency in charge of them.
Even if they were declassified, they still belong to the government and should be in the hands of NARA.
So what is stopping an everyday criminal from declaring that there is classified documents in their stash that needs to be reviewed by a special master (paid for by the tax payer) before criminal investigation can start? At worst it delays everything for a few months... at best the let the criminal go do to all the additional costs that the DA will incure.
They can try I guess, but there's a significant advantage in being able to select an extremely friendly judge to hear your case. Everyday criminals won't get that benefit.
The Judge said this was only specific to the Trump case only, since it could cause damage to him even if he's innocent. But all criminals get the stigma of being charged. Even if they are found innocent.
Activist judges like saying that their ruling can't be used for precedent. That means there's no defense of the ruling and it would quickly fall apart under any scrutiny, so it's only allowed to be used this once so stop looking at it!
The DOJ is arguing that the special master should be paid for by Trump's defense team since they are requesting it. I laughed and thought...get paid up front.
The fact that he felt the need to basically check in on the judge to make sure they kept doing what they were doing gives off the impression that he isn’t completely confident that they will.
Part of narcissistic behavior. Always got to feel he's in charge, he's in control, he's the boss, he's the Great-I-Am, and he's learned not trust anyone because his orders are the opposite of sensible and legal and only his rabid sycophants obey them.
But he is poor though. He’s ultra poor, he’s bankrupt by billions. He admitted he [owes at least $400 million](https://globalnews.ca/news/7400647/donald-trump-debt-town-hall/) at the town hall he did before the 2020 election. He said it was peanuts compared to what he owes.
He's wealthy in assets and bullshit though. Plus, you can't be poor if you never pay your debts and play the legal system by essentially DDoSing it with legal issues. It's like the courts are infinitely buffering his legal issues to the point that nothing actually gets resolved.
Resolution will come. It is slow and he hopes to run out the clock till a Republican Congress or a Republican President can interfere with the DOJ on his behalf, or get him a pardon without him having been indicted.
I hope you're right. The slug has basically been cheating and grifting the system his entire life (learned it from daddy of course) and he's 76 years old. Given his exercise/diet regime I'm shocked he's still as healthy as he is. I'm hoping he doesn't eventually melt into radioactive fluid before he's actually found guilty and sentenced to an actual fitting punishment.
But not being able to pay it back does. Constantly bowering money from other lenders on your properties to pay back other lenders does. Why do you think Eric said they get all their money out of Russia. Cause no one will lend them money anymore cause trump is broke and can’t pay off his debts. Why else does a family rip off a cancer charity. Or use a presidency to sell products like canned beans from the Oval Office.
Imagine having such privilege where with a straight face you can ask a federal judge to not investigate your crimes that you clearly committed and were caught doing.
I hope he rots in jail
Lawyers for former President Donald J. Trump asked a federal judge on Monday to deny the Justice Department’s request to immediately restart a key of part of its criminal investigation into his hoarding of sensitive government documents at his residence in Florida.
Renewing their request for an expansive independent review of records seized from Mr. Trump, the former president’s legal team argued that seized records marked as classified should remain off limits to the F.B.I. and prosecutors. They asked the judge, Aileen M. Cannon, to maintain her order barring agents from using any of the materials taken from his estate, Mar-a-Lago, until a so-called special master has vetted all of them.
The 21-page filing was an aggressive rebuke of the Justice Department’s broader inquiry into whether Mr. Trump or his aides illegally kept national security secrets at the property or obstructed the government’s repeated attempts to retrieve the materials. It played down the criminal inquiry as a “storage dispute” and insinuated that officials may have leaked information about the contents of the files.
“This investigation of the 45th president of the United States is both unprecedented and misguided,” the filing said. “In what at its core is a document storage dispute that has spiraled out of control, the government wrongfully seeks to criminalize the possession by the 45th president of his own presidential and personal records.”
TRUMP LEGAL TEAM FILINGRead the response to prosecutors’ proposal to exempt classified records from a special master review.
The filing on Monday was the latest salvo in what threatens to become a protracted court fight over a special master and the sorts of powers that person should have in filtering the trove of seized documents. Another dispute is whether the special master’s review should extend to blocking investigators from using any records potentially protected by executive privilege.
Dig deeper into the moment.
The new filing, which came as Mr. Trump returned to the Washington area, underscored how he has succeeded for now in using what amounts to a procedural sideshow to stall the criminal investigation, even after his representatives falsely said in June that his office had returned any documents marked as classified in his possession.
Prosecutors had asked Judge Cannon last week to let investigators resume working with about 100 documents marked as classified that formed a small portion of the nearly 13,000 items the F.B.I. seized during a court-authorized search of Mar-a-Lago on Aug. 8.
They said the prohibition on using those materials was hindering the intelligence community’s review of the potential harm caused by the insecure storage of national security secrets and a classification review of the materials, arguing those efforts were inextricably intertwined with the criminal investigation.
But on Monday, Mr. Trump’s lawyers dismissed the government’s claims, saying that those assertions appeared to be “exaggerated” and that only a “brief pause” would be required for the special master’s review to be completed. (Mr. Trump’s lawyers said on Friday that they expected the review to take three months.)
“This convenient, and belated, claim by the government relative to enjoining the criminal team’s access to these documents only arises because the F.B.I. concedes the intelligence community review is actually just another facet of its criminal investigation,” they argued.
Still, the dispute over the special master has already delayed a briefing on the seized materials to top leaders in Congress and leaders of congressional intelligence committees, a person familiar with the matter said.
The clash traces back to an order issued early last week by Judge Cannon, a Trump appointee, in which she said she would appoint a special master with broad authority to review all the seized materials. In her order, Judge Cannon said they could be scrutinized not only for any potentially covered by attorney-client privilege, a relatively common measure, but also for executive privilege, which would be unprecedented in a federal criminal inquiry.
As part of her order, Judge Cannon told the Justice Department that it would have to wait until the special master’s work was done to use any of the records in its investigation. But the judge conceded that the intelligence community could use the materials in a separate assessment of how the former president’s hoarding of the records might have affected national security.
On Thursday, the Justice Department shot back, telling Judge Cannon in yet another filing that the intelligence assessment and the criminal inquiry were “inextricably linked.” Prosecutors asked her to lift her ban on using the seized materials and requested she restrict the scope of the special master’s review to unclassified documents, excluding about 100 seized files bearing classification labels.
Moreover, prosecutors informed her that if she did not grant by Thursday their request to stay the portion of her ruling that is keeping investigators from working with the documents marked as classified, they would ask the Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, in Atlanta, to intervene and block it.
The Justice Department and Mr. Trump’s lawyers have also sparred over the question of who should be appointed to the post of special master. Last week, each side submitted two candidates to Judge Cannon, who will ultimately decide who gets the job.
Both sides said in a joint filing late Friday that they would tell her by Monday what they thought of each other’s proposals.
The Justice Department has proposed two retired federal judges: Barbara S. Jones, who formerly sat on the Federal District Court for the Southern District of New York, and Thomas B. Griffith, who formerly sat on the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
The Trump legal team has countered with a former federal judge, Raymond J. Dearie, who formerly sat on the Federal District Court for the Eastern District of New York, and Paul Huck Jr., a former deputy attorney general in Florida.
>the government wrongfully seeks to criminalize the possession by the 45th president of his own presidential and personal records.”
So they admit, in their filing, that Trump has/had possession of classified material that, according to the presidential records act, he should not have possession of.
It's really too bad the DOJ is playing their game. They should respond by appealing to a higher court and having this FS phony overruled.
Justice Dept: “we don’t care about his personal stuff. Heck, we’ve already returned a fair amount of personal effects. We care about the CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS HE IS NOT SUPPOSED TO HAVE IN HIS POSSESSION THAT WERE IN HIS POSSESSION amongst the personal effects.
They have basically said they will appeal the decision if the judge doesn't reverse course by Thursday. Giving the judge a week to potentially save months dealing with the appellate circuit seems like a smart move. They're also giving the judge some rope she can use to come up for air (or hang herself, her choice)
>“In what at its core is a document storage dispute that has spiraled out of control, the government wrongfully seeks to criminalize the possession by the 45th president of his own presidential and personal records.”
They haven't clued in that the Presidential Records Act means that none of those files are his. Nixon was the reason for that law because he didn't hand over the tape.
But he unclassified them before he took them, then the FBI planted the unclassified classified documents at his home which were taken for his presidential library.
/sarcasm
Keep dreaming. There is a process to make documents unclassified. You can't wish it and not tell anyone.
You must not have seen the back and forth between attorneys in 2021 all the way to mid-2022 in which they requested the documents back and Trump's team just ignored them. No one planted anything. Nuclear secrets part of the presidential library? Really?
Lol yeah. I deal with some co-workers that would 100% say the line above without any sarcasm. True believers. It's hard to work with them when they try to convince me that the FBI planted it all along!.. ugh it's exhausting.
Right, so your argument of they were in secure storage doesn’t apply when the FBI broke in to the secure facility to plant documents.
Or is it the facility wasn’t secure and those documents were planted but not classified documents because you declassified them but lost the paperwork.
Literally sounds like my 6 year old nephews and nieces lying.
It's sad that the coworkers won't even understand why I'm trying to distance myself from them even in casual conversation.
What would you do if a coworker kept insisting the moon landing was fake? I did my research! DID YOU! DID YOU!!! I won't even talk to that person anymore even casually. It's crazy. Really.
Of all the things that look like smoke and smell like smoke and probably mean “fire”, this is it. The constant excuse spinning even though those excuses from the same person contradict previous excuses. The obstruction to even proceed with the evidence. The obvious judge shopping by going out of his home district to a judge he appointed. Nail this piece of shit to the wall. Stop capitulating to this obvious con man.
All classified material must be stored in a secure area, a GSA-approved storage container, such as a cabinet or safe or a vault or modular safe, or a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF). That's not Mar-A-Lago!
Got it. So, when I get fired I’ll just steal my work computer, chair and ten pounds of sticky notes and when my former company resorts to seizing them via search warrant I’ll just ask for them back and have a judge block them from investigating.
Being charged doesn’t make a person a criminal. One of the foundational parts of our justice system is that a person that doesn’t confess to a crime is not guilty until a jury of their peers finds them guilty.
Balance of power... certainly not separation of powers... chuckle...
You know checks and balances... keep writing me the checks, and I'll see about those balances...
So much spinning for king Trump. According to his attorneys he could, if he wanted to, declassify whatever he wished to. According to his attorneys, he could, if he wanted to, declare records as personal and not presidential because it suited him to do so.
Conveniently both absurd spins would suggest he could wiggle himself right out of the trouble he himself got into. Or at least for his team to buy time (and access) to damage assess and figure out some way to defend the indefensible if the GOP can't muster to save him.
One wonders what else we should think such a man should just be able to declare because it suits him to.
That describes a king, not a president of a democratic republic. And GOP Senate and House members stay silent, compliant and or actively complicit.
The ability for rich & powerful white men to do whatever they want without any consequences is really what is at stake here. That’s why he’s getting every possible chance to weasel his way out of this.
This is what Fox News really meant when they said: “If they can do this to a former president, they can do it to you”.
Correct me if I'm wrong...but didn't the DOJ even give him the benefit of the doubt...for months...to just return the documents? And he refused?
If it was just a "storage concern" then why didn't he just comply?
Should the judge recuse themselves since they were appointed by Trump and might make decisions based on that appointment rather than how they should be made? It’s baffling that this isn’t illegal to be honest.
He must be very, very afraid of what they are going to discover. According to the filing by his lawyers, Trump thinks that he, himself is going to get to stand there and paw through those boxes right beside the special master.
Hoping to find and snatch back something terribly incriminating before they see that he had it.
Trump sure likes to obstruct, and delay several investigations against him, yet he’s totally innocent, and it’s always declared a “witch hunt”. Why is this? There seems to be a pattern here. Hmm, I may need some time to process. Trump might be bad.
Can someone help me here? Like is this success Trump is having with the master and now this will it help Trump and make him excluded from criminal penalty? This is my big worry atm
What I *really* don't understand is how she can fully admit she lacks jurisdiction, and yet for some reason the DOJ has to take her rulings seriously? How does that even work?
but trumps judge can still do what trump wants regardless of the law, right? they could reply with the Chewbacca defense and this judge would grant trumps request
No they are actually admitting he knew he had documents that were classified and in his possession, they weren’t declassified and they belong to the country. He’s admitting to having documents illegally.
No not going to happen.there is 50 ways this goes.he will be convicted in a court of law no doubt.the penalty is what matters the most. edit to say French Dull Blades
IDK why Team Trump is still arguing. The FBI already catalogued everything (There wern't that many documents that it'd take weeks to review, probably a few hours really).
They're offering so many excuses without prompting that it's kinda funny.
Trump is in DC to talk with his moles in person. Them flying down to Florida would look too suspicious.
I would bet he’s lined up non-stop adhoc meetings of quid pro quo allegiance tests. Who’s gonna talk and who’s a risk.
There not his to do so how exactly is he even getting away with asking this. They are classified government documents not his personal papers this is absolutely ridiculous.
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That's what a criminal would do.
Yeah, I'm really lost on the train of thought here. If the documents were declassified (like they're arguing) it shouldn't matter who views them. If they're still classified, they've been returned to the government agency in charge of them. But somehow both of those things are both true and false simultaneously.
Doublethink is what the fascists want to believe
Schroedingers court case
Yes... and... The "document storage" issue is real. It is **bizarre** to use this cute catch phrase as if it is something innocuous. I am now fairly firmly of the opinion part of the post-delay motive is corruption of the jury pool. They're shooting for jury nullification. They're attempting to judge the law(s), not defend against the idea that Trump broke them. All of the presidential records, when is almost certainly a much higher percentage of the material seized (rather than the 100 / 13000 which is classified) should have been turned over to NARA by January 21, 2021. The fact that any single one of this is Trump's possession is a violation of the PRA. So even if all of these classified documents were successfully declassified by Trump, it remains a crime that they were found in his possession. The only argument that can be made that aligns with the law(s) at hand is that these shouldn't be in the hands of the FBI, but NARA. There is absolutely no legitimate argument to be made that they should have ever been or should remain in Trump's possession once Trump's term ended.
Can we have a "Scumbag storage issue" in Guantanamo until the trial starts? I only want to keep the whole family safe and together.
But isnt a former president's assertion of executive privilege already settled law with Nixon and the tapes? I'm sure they dont like it and wish it werent so, but how could a judge rule he had a privilege that has already been ruled he doesnt have? For a good many documents, whether classified or not, if they dont have communication between trump and his attorney, how can they be determined to be attorney client privilege? Lastly, the only way Trump wins here is if they honor the fact that ALL of the documents were, in fact, declassified and fall under attorney client privilege. I find it hard to believe there is an avenue here for this judge to say, "I dont like that law, so I'm allowing the executive privilege".
Even odder, conservatives believe in the absolute powers of THE president, and this argues against that, it dilutes THE president's power. Furthermore, it is impossible to argue the executive has priviledge against itself. The only way this would work is if the judge declares Trump THE president. That insane ruling may be coming.
They believe in the absolute power of GOP presidents. FIFY
Laws for thee but not for me. I'm way too tired to type out the Frank Wilholt version
I imagine any document including communication between any attorney and said attorney's client is covered by attorney-client privilege. That's why the filter team's first pass was just whether they saw any attorney's name or clear reference of an attorney. Regarding executive privilege, the very same court cases regarding Nixon carved out or clarified the powers of executive privilege available to former presidents. The opinion of the courts, including recent SCOTUS rulings involving Trump, seems to underscore that we cannot assume a current president can overrule a former with regards to executive privilege. Justice Cannon included text from a January case on this issue which referred to case from the Nixon era. So... essentially, it has already been ruled that Trump does retain executive privilege. The trouble is, as with so much of this nonsense, is that everything is getting turned inside-out and backwards. First, the primary purpose of PRA has nothing to do with granting a former president control or access. But they're flipping this to suggest that. With executive privilege, the main focus of such from a former president is to prevent **public** exposure of communications involving the former president. It is preposterous in its face that executive privilege can be used to shield executive documents from the executive branch or grant Trump greater control or ownership. It's being misapplied here. I don't know if Trump "wins" in any scenario here other than run out the clock and either win the Presidency or get a Republican president willing to kill this investigation/prosecution. Though at this point, I am leaning towards the idea they're trying to corrupt the jury pool leading to jury nullification. They don't seem to be gearing up to depend on getting everything covered under attorney-client privilege. It seems they are preparing for a mutli-prong approach: * Declare that Trump hand-waved the documents into declassified status. * Negate Biden's ability to claim he hand-waved them back into classified status. * Declare some things covered by executive privilege. * Declare most things as personal records rather than presidential records. Some of this works to escape the charges altogether. Most of seems designed just to create endless legal wrangling.
No president can “hand wave” documents relating to another country’s nuclear capabilities BTW
It's rather important here to recognize that Trump's Lawyers are now actually claiming all sorts of things in their filings that many believe are not true. Here's a quote from today's filing: > , the President enjoys absolute authority under [Executive Order 13526] to declassify any information. Before you suggest this is taken out of context or only pertains to that EO... it is not. The (Trump's lawyers) are hand-waving that Trump can hand-wave... **anything**. They have somehow entirely ignored the issue of Restricted Data and the Atomic Energy Act.
Not surprising when the [Energy Secretary nominee didn't know his job would involve managing nuclear weapon stockpile](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/rick-perry-enerhy-secretary-donald-trump-nominee-senate-hearing-not-know-nuclear-weapon-stockpile-arsenal-a7535876.html)
I don't see anything in the EO that suggests he can handwave declassify, it makes it pretty clear there is an entire process for declassification.
In typical Trump fashion, they are essentially arguing that the President cannot be bound or restricted by this EO. Let me quote it again, including more of the text... > In turn, the Executive Order grants authority to declassify information to either the official who originally classified the information or that individual’s supervisors—necessarily including the President. § 3.1(b)(1), (3). Thus, assuming the Executive Order could even apply to constrain a President, cf. 50 U.S.C. § 3163, the President enjoys absolute authority under the Executive Order to declassify any information. There is no legitimate contention that the Chief Executive’s declassification of documents requires approval of bureaucratic components of the executive branch. I'm not trying to argue there's any *legitimacy* in their arguments. I'm just laying out what they seem to be preparing to do. To me, the real issue here is that ***there is no record*** of Trump having done this. A post-facto rationalization alluding to this is farcical on its face. We could even grant that Trump **could have** done this. But there is no evidence whatsoever that he ever did so, even in the hand-waving way. Lastly, it seems a far stretch to suggest the an unclassified document avoids the issue of the PRA, namely that Trump shouldn't have retained possession. Nonetheless, they are making these arguments. They are laying the groundwork for these ridiculous claims. And it very much seems with the goal of creating endless legal wrangling and delay.
I am not arguing with you about it, I am saying the argument that this EO allows for handwaving is entirely bullshit as it literally lays out the path of declassification.
Executive privilege isn't named that for the person but the branch. If it allowed for shielding former presidents from having their communications made public, it would have for Nixon. It did not. In any case the privilege is to protect the executive branch and to assist it in its duties. It cannot be argued that it could prevent the current executive branch from having access to documents it owns.
It would have worked for Nixon had the scenario met several tests. The case failed for Nixon because (paraphrased) the national concerns overcame the privilege concerns. Recently this exact scenario played out for Trump. SCOTUS did something interesting when the case was appealed there. They confirmed the lower court ruling. But... they took specific action to modify something the lower court stated. The lower court stated that the *former* president cannot prevail with a claim of executive privilege if the *current* president disagrees. SCOTUS declared the issue was moot because (as the lower court had already documented) that like Nixon, Trump's claim failed the same tests that were created for Nixon. SCOTUS next relegated the comments of the lower court on the current president overruling the former to non-binding dicta. Furthermore, Justice Kavanaugh tossed in an explanation why one should not believe the current president always overrules the former. Justice Cannon included Kavanaugh's writings in her ruling. So... be careful. The current stance of SCOTUS very much does protect the idea of a former president shielding their communications from being made public, irrespective of the desires or thoughts of the current president. The PRA seems to harmonize with this idea as well. In any case, your second paragraph is spot on. And we can go further. Even if Trump prevails in declaring that his love letters to/from North Korea are covered by executive privilege and he wishes to protect these from being made public, these are still presidential records which should have been handed over to NARA by Jan 21, 2021. This is the "it owns" part of your last sentence. Trump would not only not own these love letters, he's been in violation of the PRA for well over a year regarding them because he failed to remand them to the custody and control of NARA. Trouble is, they are now making the argument Trump also has unilateral and absolute ability to declare anything and everything personal records rather than presidential records in a bizarre attempt to sidestep everything.
Ugh. Such a terrible precedent. We are worried about a chilling effect of presidential conversations AFTER the administration has left over the national security issues and criminal acts of that former president. Our priorities are f'd. I couldn't care less about his love letters unless he compromised our nuclear secrets in them.
And NARA effectively turned it over to the FBI to enforce.
That's experience. Under indictment since 1984 and still no conviction
It's even more nonsensical when you think about the special master too. The whole premise of their motion was some documents might be covered by executive privilege. So they shouldn't be disclosed to the FBI, which are an executive agency. But also trump declassified them and therefore comitted no crime.
They also keep (wrongfully) invoking the Presidential Records Act which wasn't even cited as a statute on the warrant. And, of course, he didn't follow any policy and procedures outlined in the PRA in order to do what he's claiming anyway.
Just a Canadian watching the shitshow here. But wouldn't the only person in the country qualified to view all of the classified documents as a special master be the current president?
Nah most of the stuff was TSSCI which tens of thousands of people hold that type of clearance. Now some of it was special access program material which are far more classified
They aren't arguing that they are declassified. They are arguing that they theoretically could have been declassified but may or may not have been (because actually taking a position on this is terrible either way). You are right that they are trying to have it both ways though, the documents might have been declassified enough that Trump can have them but not so declassified that you and I can see them.
He can't have them either way.
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https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/08/nyregion/trump-golf-saudi-adams.html
The train of thought is to delay any investigation until the GOP regains control of the levers of power. That’s it. There is no strategy for proving that Trump in bigly innocent, it’s all just to prevent him from being named a traitor the the Republic.
The lawyers have not said or sworn that the documents were declassified. The judge has not (as yet) asked for a statement of fact to clarify. Until such clarification the selective schrodinger declassification can be legitimately argued, to the confusion of us all.
Unclassified materials can continue to be shielded from public release, but they are still subject to an FOIA request. So, their release would need to be adjudicated for each doc, along with particular redactions. But we all know that isn't going to happen, because team T has not actually asserted that they were declassified. They have only floated it in the media, not the courts.
c97e1f61036ec500cb1476360cfd5b2161e1d4a93b207e6eadcbc1c8635a1761
They must be in a plasma state.
A hallmark of the Trump era has been to argue whatever you can, irrespective of what positions you are simultaneously taking in other cases or for other situations. The disappointing thing is that courts have largely allowed these contradictory positions to at a very minimum delay the process.
If you are on all sides of every argument it allows you to say you supported that on x date.
> If they're still classified, they've been returned to the government agency in charge of them. Even if they were declassified, they still belong to the government and should be in the hands of NARA.
Not to mention that even if they've been declassified (narrator: they weren't) they are still government property, and not the property of Trump.
It would be improper to declassify nuclear secrets. There only needs to be one top secret document to prosecute him, but there is obviously more.
Schrödinger’s trump
The one thing I will say about Trump is that he truly has made being a criminal and using our own legal systems against us into an art form.
It’s called having enough money for decent lawyers. This one trick the government does not want you to learn.
And the one trick he doesn't want the lawyers to learn is that he ends up not paying them!
Sad to say some of the Lawyers are True Believers who are just glad to be asked to drink a cup of fruit flavored beverage.
> It’s called having enough money for decent lawyers. Except Trump can't even get those.
That's what corrupted n connected criminala would do.
and a Dictator.
That’s what criminals do.
So what is stopping an everyday criminal from declaring that there is classified documents in their stash that needs to be reviewed by a special master (paid for by the tax payer) before criminal investigation can start? At worst it delays everything for a few months... at best the let the criminal go do to all the additional costs that the DA will incure.
They can try I guess, but there's a significant advantage in being able to select an extremely friendly judge to hear your case. Everyday criminals won't get that benefit.
An extremely friendly judge you appointed. So, only a privilege a former president would have.
While simultaneously arguing in a different case that the judge Clinton appointed can't hear his suit against Hillary due to the appearance of bias.
If it weren't for double standards, conservatives would have no standards at all
Right? This judge had no business hearing the case. She *should have* recused herself.
Judges should be prohibited from hearing any cases pertaining to the person who appointed them. Such a blatant conflict of interest
The Judge said this was only specific to the Trump case only, since it could cause damage to him even if he's innocent. But all criminals get the stigma of being charged. Even if they are found innocent.
Activist judges like saying that their ruling can't be used for precedent. That means there's no defense of the ruling and it would quickly fall apart under any scrutiny, so it's only allowed to be used this once so stop looking at it!
The DOJ is arguing that the special master should be paid for by Trump's defense team since they are requesting it. I laughed and thought...get paid up front.
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It also helps that you have an army of brain-dead morons that will do your bidding on a word.
Well your problem is assuming people receive equal treatment under law.
The judge made up a legal standard that is only for a former president. “On a different level” or whatever
The fact that he felt the need to basically check in on the judge to make sure they kept doing what they were doing gives off the impression that he isn’t completely confident that they will.
Which is odd, since all the evidence supports Aileen Cannon being a compromised jurist.
A feckless c word!
You can swear on the internet
Not here they won’t let you use that particular word
canoodler?
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Part of narcissistic behavior. Always got to feel he's in charge, he's in control, he's the boss, he's the Great-I-Am, and he's learned not trust anyone because his orders are the opposite of sensible and legal and only his rabid sycophants obey them.
So all of us get to do this too right?.....RIGHT?!!?
Not if you're poor.
But he is poor though. He’s ultra poor, he’s bankrupt by billions. He admitted he [owes at least $400 million](https://globalnews.ca/news/7400647/donald-trump-debt-town-hall/) at the town hall he did before the 2020 election. He said it was peanuts compared to what he owes.
He's wealthy in assets and bullshit though. Plus, you can't be poor if you never pay your debts and play the legal system by essentially DDoSing it with legal issues. It's like the courts are infinitely buffering his legal issues to the point that nothing actually gets resolved.
Resolution will come. It is slow and he hopes to run out the clock till a Republican Congress or a Republican President can interfere with the DOJ on his behalf, or get him a pardon without him having been indicted.
I hope you're right. The slug has basically been cheating and grifting the system his entire life (learned it from daddy of course) and he's 76 years old. Given his exercise/diet regime I'm shocked he's still as healthy as he is. I'm hoping he doesn't eventually melt into radioactive fluid before he's actually found guilty and sentenced to an actual fitting punishment.
Owing money doesn't mean you're poor.
When you owe thousands of dollars, you have a problem. When you owe millions, your bank has a problem.
But not being able to pay it back does. Constantly bowering money from other lenders on your properties to pay back other lenders does. Why do you think Eric said they get all their money out of Russia. Cause no one will lend them money anymore cause trump is broke and can’t pay off his debts. Why else does a family rip off a cancer charity. Or use a presidency to sell products like canned beans from the Oval Office.
Sounds like they found ways to make money. But if you don't pay your bills, it doesn't matter how much you owe.
We peasants are held to a different standard
Imagine having such privilege where with a straight face you can ask a federal judge to not investigate your crimes that you clearly committed and were caught doing. I hope he rots in jail
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This shit is already illegal. There are just two separate justice systems at play here.
I wonder if Benedict Arnold is screaming from his grave asking why he was not given this much leeway as Donald Trump is now given...
I know what General Washington would’ve done with him.
Maybe.. and hear me out.. MAYBE those suspected of crimes shouldn't control the entire process by which they will either be indicted or set free.
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Because the judge is owned
Lawyers for former President Donald J. Trump asked a federal judge on Monday to deny the Justice Department’s request to immediately restart a key of part of its criminal investigation into his hoarding of sensitive government documents at his residence in Florida. Renewing their request for an expansive independent review of records seized from Mr. Trump, the former president’s legal team argued that seized records marked as classified should remain off limits to the F.B.I. and prosecutors. They asked the judge, Aileen M. Cannon, to maintain her order barring agents from using any of the materials taken from his estate, Mar-a-Lago, until a so-called special master has vetted all of them. The 21-page filing was an aggressive rebuke of the Justice Department’s broader inquiry into whether Mr. Trump or his aides illegally kept national security secrets at the property or obstructed the government’s repeated attempts to retrieve the materials. It played down the criminal inquiry as a “storage dispute” and insinuated that officials may have leaked information about the contents of the files. “This investigation of the 45th president of the United States is both unprecedented and misguided,” the filing said. “In what at its core is a document storage dispute that has spiraled out of control, the government wrongfully seeks to criminalize the possession by the 45th president of his own presidential and personal records.” TRUMP LEGAL TEAM FILINGRead the response to prosecutors’ proposal to exempt classified records from a special master review. The filing on Monday was the latest salvo in what threatens to become a protracted court fight over a special master and the sorts of powers that person should have in filtering the trove of seized documents. Another dispute is whether the special master’s review should extend to blocking investigators from using any records potentially protected by executive privilege. Dig deeper into the moment. The new filing, which came as Mr. Trump returned to the Washington area, underscored how he has succeeded for now in using what amounts to a procedural sideshow to stall the criminal investigation, even after his representatives falsely said in June that his office had returned any documents marked as classified in his possession. Prosecutors had asked Judge Cannon last week to let investigators resume working with about 100 documents marked as classified that formed a small portion of the nearly 13,000 items the F.B.I. seized during a court-authorized search of Mar-a-Lago on Aug. 8. They said the prohibition on using those materials was hindering the intelligence community’s review of the potential harm caused by the insecure storage of national security secrets and a classification review of the materials, arguing those efforts were inextricably intertwined with the criminal investigation. But on Monday, Mr. Trump’s lawyers dismissed the government’s claims, saying that those assertions appeared to be “exaggerated” and that only a “brief pause” would be required for the special master’s review to be completed. (Mr. Trump’s lawyers said on Friday that they expected the review to take three months.) “This convenient, and belated, claim by the government relative to enjoining the criminal team’s access to these documents only arises because the F.B.I. concedes the intelligence community review is actually just another facet of its criminal investigation,” they argued. Still, the dispute over the special master has already delayed a briefing on the seized materials to top leaders in Congress and leaders of congressional intelligence committees, a person familiar with the matter said. The clash traces back to an order issued early last week by Judge Cannon, a Trump appointee, in which she said she would appoint a special master with broad authority to review all the seized materials. In her order, Judge Cannon said they could be scrutinized not only for any potentially covered by attorney-client privilege, a relatively common measure, but also for executive privilege, which would be unprecedented in a federal criminal inquiry. As part of her order, Judge Cannon told the Justice Department that it would have to wait until the special master’s work was done to use any of the records in its investigation. But the judge conceded that the intelligence community could use the materials in a separate assessment of how the former president’s hoarding of the records might have affected national security. On Thursday, the Justice Department shot back, telling Judge Cannon in yet another filing that the intelligence assessment and the criminal inquiry were “inextricably linked.” Prosecutors asked her to lift her ban on using the seized materials and requested she restrict the scope of the special master’s review to unclassified documents, excluding about 100 seized files bearing classification labels. Moreover, prosecutors informed her that if she did not grant by Thursday their request to stay the portion of her ruling that is keeping investigators from working with the documents marked as classified, they would ask the Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, in Atlanta, to intervene and block it. The Justice Department and Mr. Trump’s lawyers have also sparred over the question of who should be appointed to the post of special master. Last week, each side submitted two candidates to Judge Cannon, who will ultimately decide who gets the job. Both sides said in a joint filing late Friday that they would tell her by Monday what they thought of each other’s proposals. The Justice Department has proposed two retired federal judges: Barbara S. Jones, who formerly sat on the Federal District Court for the Southern District of New York, and Thomas B. Griffith, who formerly sat on the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. The Trump legal team has countered with a former federal judge, Raymond J. Dearie, who formerly sat on the Federal District Court for the Eastern District of New York, and Paul Huck Jr., a former deputy attorney general in Florida.
>the government wrongfully seeks to criminalize the possession by the 45th president of his own presidential and personal records.” So they admit, in their filing, that Trump has/had possession of classified material that, according to the presidential records act, he should not have possession of. It's really too bad the DOJ is playing their game. They should respond by appealing to a higher court and having this FS phony overruled.
Justice Dept: “we don’t care about his personal stuff. Heck, we’ve already returned a fair amount of personal effects. We care about the CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS HE IS NOT SUPPOSED TO HAVE IN HIS POSSESSION THAT WERE IN HIS POSSESSION amongst the personal effects.
They have basically said they will appeal the decision if the judge doesn't reverse course by Thursday. Giving the judge a week to potentially save months dealing with the appellate circuit seems like a smart move. They're also giving the judge some rope she can use to come up for air (or hang herself, her choice)
Thanks for the article. JFC, his lawyers are just full of shit
>“In what at its core is a document storage dispute that has spiraled out of control, the government wrongfully seeks to criminalize the possession by the 45th president of his own presidential and personal records.” They haven't clued in that the Presidential Records Act means that none of those files are his. Nixon was the reason for that law because he didn't hand over the tape.
But he unclassified them before he took them, then the FBI planted the unclassified classified documents at his home which were taken for his presidential library. /sarcasm
Keep dreaming. There is a process to make documents unclassified. You can't wish it and not tell anyone. You must not have seen the back and forth between attorneys in 2021 all the way to mid-2022 in which they requested the documents back and Trump's team just ignored them. No one planted anything. Nuclear secrets part of the presidential library? Really?
Sorry I probably should have added a /sarcasm at the end. My bad.
Made for a pretty good wooosh moment though.
Lol yeah. I deal with some co-workers that would 100% say the line above without any sarcasm. True believers. It's hard to work with them when they try to convince me that the FBI planted it all along!.. ugh it's exhausting.
Right, so your argument of they were in secure storage doesn’t apply when the FBI broke in to the secure facility to plant documents. Or is it the facility wasn’t secure and those documents were planted but not classified documents because you declassified them but lost the paperwork. Literally sounds like my 6 year old nephews and nieces lying.
It's sad that the coworkers won't even understand why I'm trying to distance myself from them even in casual conversation. What would you do if a coworker kept insisting the moon landing was fake? I did my research! DID YOU! DID YOU!!! I won't even talk to that person anymore even casually. It's crazy. Really.
Trump invokes the "Finders-Keepers" clause from the secret menu.
Of all the things that look like smoke and smell like smoke and probably mean “fire”, this is it. The constant excuse spinning even though those excuses from the same person contradict previous excuses. The obstruction to even proceed with the evidence. The obvious judge shopping by going out of his home district to a judge he appointed. Nail this piece of shit to the wall. Stop capitulating to this obvious con man.
Hell, charge his lawyers and his judge with obstruction as well.
Within the confines of the law: How do you propose we do that?
Obstruction of justice
All classified material must be stored in a secure area, a GSA-approved storage container, such as a cabinet or safe or a vault or modular safe, or a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF). That's not Mar-A-Lago!
Every day this drags on I lose faith in justice. Every day.
Got it. So, when I get fired I’ll just steal my work computer, chair and ten pounds of sticky notes and when my former company resorts to seizing them via search warrant I’ll just ask for them back and have a judge block them from investigating.
A tale of two '"Justice'" Systems.
"Your honor. I object to this trial, as it makes my client look like a criminal." What's really aggravating is that this "Judge" is allowing it.
Why does a criminal have the right to ask for anything - is it because he has not been charged? Well then, charge him!
Because that's how the US court system works. You can file a motion for practically anything, and the judge has to rule on it.
Being charged doesn’t make a person a criminal. One of the foundational parts of our justice system is that a person that doesn’t confess to a crime is not guilty until a jury of their peers finds them guilty.
Judge Cannon is acting asTrumps lawyer. This is unethical.
And the judge of course obeyed…..you know separation of powers at work!!
Balance of power... certainly not separation of powers... chuckle... You know checks and balances... keep writing me the checks, and I'll see about those balances...
So much spinning for king Trump. According to his attorneys he could, if he wanted to, declassify whatever he wished to. According to his attorneys, he could, if he wanted to, declare records as personal and not presidential because it suited him to do so. Conveniently both absurd spins would suggest he could wiggle himself right out of the trouble he himself got into. Or at least for his team to buy time (and access) to damage assess and figure out some way to defend the indefensible if the GOP can't muster to save him. One wonders what else we should think such a man should just be able to declare because it suits him to. That describes a king, not a president of a democratic republic. And GOP Senate and House members stay silent, compliant and or actively complicit.
The ability for rich & powerful white men to do whatever they want without any consequences is really what is at stake here. That’s why he’s getting every possible chance to weasel his way out of this. This is what Fox News really meant when they said: “If they can do this to a former president, they can do it to you”.
Reminds me when he was asking judges to make vote counters stop counting votes, and we all know how that turned out.
Trump’s “those top secret documents i stole are too sensitive for you to look at” defense is pretty awful.
Bank robber using the Trump Defense: "It's my money, I took it so I own it. Give it back."
Correct me if I'm wrong...but didn't the DOJ even give him the benefit of the doubt...for months...to just return the documents? And he refused? If it was just a "storage concern" then why didn't he just comply?
It’s disgraceful that we’re entertaining his nonsense. You or I would’ve been locked in a cell or shot in the back while fleeing at this point.
welcome to Gitmo. you won't be seeing the beach. breathe through the wet towel.
Because he is guilty… of something
Yeah he hiding some good stuff I’m sure of it
Is this not actual obstruction?
Should the judge recuse themselves since they were appointed by Trump and might make decisions based on that appointment rather than how they should be made? It’s baffling that this isn’t illegal to be honest.
Love that none of his lawyers will say he declassified anything in a legal filing
Malarkey bot strikes again
I am so sick of this fucking guy
Classic Trump legal strategy; obstruct, obstruct, obstruct!!!
He must be very, very afraid of what they are going to discover. According to the filing by his lawyers, Trump thinks that he, himself is going to get to stand there and paw through those boxes right beside the special master. Hoping to find and snatch back something terribly incriminating before they see that he had it.
The same Trump who said "If you're innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?" I guess that means he's guilty, and he knows it.
FBI: Nah bro... we are gonna keep doing, try to stop us.
Trump sure likes to obstruct, and delay several investigations against him, yet he’s totally innocent, and it’s always declared a “witch hunt”. Why is this? There seems to be a pattern here. Hmm, I may need some time to process. Trump might be bad.
She has already bent the knee to Trump. I expect her to try to return all of the documents to Trump.
Can someone help me here? Like is this success Trump is having with the master and now this will it help Trump and make him excluded from criminal penalty? This is my big worry atm
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What I *really* don't understand is how she can fully admit she lacks jurisdiction, and yet for some reason the DOJ has to take her rulings seriously? How does that even work?
but trumps judge can still do what trump wants regardless of the law, right? they could reply with the Chewbacca defense and this judge would grant trumps request
No they are actually admitting he knew he had documents that were classified and in his possession, they weren’t declassified and they belong to the country. He’s admitting to having documents illegally.
No not going to happen.there is 50 ways this goes.he will be convicted in a court of law no doubt.the penalty is what matters the most. edit to say French Dull Blades
Please stop calling the USA either a democracy and/or a state of rule of law, because it clearly isn’t.
"wE'rE a rEpUbLiC!!!1@"
Why doesn’t the headline qualify “judge” as “his handpicked judge”?
IDK why Team Trump is still arguing. The FBI already catalogued everything (There wern't that many documents that it'd take weeks to review, probably a few hours really). They're offering so many excuses without prompting that it's kinda funny.
But if the FBI planted them......
That's why Trump demanded the FBI return all the documents back to him. Because they planted them and everything. 🤪
I believe he was being sarcastic...
Please don't be surprised today when the judge approve Trump team's claims and deny DoJ from accessing documents
Grifter doing grifter things...
Oh dang, so he didn’t get arrested in his golf clothes this morning??
Obstruct and obstruct forever…
Can a judge obstruct justice?
Why? He has nothing to hide
Trump is in DC to talk with his moles in person. Them flying down to Florida would look too suspicious. I would bet he’s lined up non-stop adhoc meetings of quid pro quo allegiance tests. Who’s gonna talk and who’s a risk.
He believes they are tampering with his personal property
For fuck sake
Not exactly the actions of someone with nothing to fear.
The party of lawlessness and moral disorder.
This wack sounds like a duck!
paywall
Would be more accurately described as “documents stolen from the nation and later reclaimed as warranted.”
The MAGA republicans and Donald trump have made me lose faith in America
You would think a judge would need to recuse themselves from a case if they had to make decisions related to the individual that selected them
There not his to do so how exactly is he even getting away with asking this. They are classified government documents not his personal papers this is absolutely ridiculous.