The Mir-a-Lago search cited three criminal statutes:
1. Obstruction of justice.
2. Theft of government records
3. Espionage Act,
Donald Trump's lawyer told the FBI that all the government documents had been returned. The government knew that was not true and so did Trump. Obstruction.
Trump knew he had removed and still possessed records in contravention of the Presidential Records Act of 1978. Theft.
Trump disobeyed Section 793 of the Espionage Act that prohibits conveying non-public material relating to the national defense, or failure "to deliver it on demand to the officer or employee of the United States entitled to receive it." Trump had it and the FBI found it. Espionage.
Trump was openly flouting the law. Comments sent to me by Trump-friendly people argue that even if the boxes the FBI found contained secret and sensitive material, Trump had declared them non-secret. Therefore, this was just a dispute over storage location, not espionage. So the real issue is why are people picking on Trump, who maybe just wanted source material for writing his memoirs.
Jack Mullen had a different take on how this moment will be remembered, and how to think about Trump's claim of blanket declassification. His two older brothers had worked in the American intelligence field. He grew up in Medford and now lives in Washington, D.C. He read yesterday's guest post by his friend Larry Slesser and wanted to add this.
Guest Post by Jack Mullen
Trump: "I am so much behind you, you’re going say ‘Please, don’t give us so much backing, Mr. President, please, we don’t need that much backing’."
So said President Trump on his first full day in office on January 21, 2017, in front of the 117 stars representing the CIA individuals who gave their lives in service of this country.
I bristled then on Trump's first official day in office. I wonder how slighted my two older brothers might have felt. Both performed intelligence work for this country. I bristled again upon learning the ex-President took documents marked “classified” to his home at Mar-a-Lago. Yesterday’s Guest Post by Larry Slessler eloquently stated the outrage felt by the families of those who, like Larry, put their lives on the line to protect classified information. It was a sacrifice he was willing to make.
American history is flush with instances of unsung heroes in the intelligence field who protected their comrades-in-arm and their country. These people go unnoticed and receive scant thanks. Most don’t want the thanks. Many can not get it. They are unsung because their work was secret.. They just do their job--much like so many others who serve our country. What they did not need is a Commander-in-Chief who makes a big self-serving show, saying he will give them so much backing that they will plead for him not to give him so much backing. What a blowhard.
“Daddy, what did you do in the War?” was a refrain of many Medford kids growing up in the 1950’s. I was one of them. Most of our fathers ignored our badgering, and said little about their war experiences. However, a few cracks appeared when Hollywood came out with war movies that smacked them in the face. My dad had no use for the sappy Van Johnson. Other fathers I knew chuckled that a so-called “tough guy” named Marion Robert Morrison evaded military service and changed his name to John Wayne. Marion Morrison, aka John Wayne, became a symbol of the taciturn, strong American War hero.
Those real vets--not the movie star vets--felt scorn for the likes of Van Johnson and John Wayne, the movie heroes who struck poses. Their rolled eyeballs were the clue we kids had to go on about how Daddy really felt about people who showed off about past deeds or great intentions. I now wonder how they would express themselves when Donald Trump claims to have declassified intelligence material, and done so on the fly, based not on the content but on the fact that he took it, so he needed to try to backdate its legality. How disrespectful to the people who put their trust in a process that put their lives at risk. Worse, he did whatever he did to mop up after his own behavior, and to cover his own ass. I suspect my father and brothers would have found that Larry Slessler spoke for them all. Scorn.
As always, Larry Slessler and I are in agreement, (with Jack Mullen as well) especially relating to military and war. As an Army Officer in the sixties responsible for nuclear weapons for several years and many Secret and Top Secret and Crypto (use of nukes) documents. This was always, always one responsibility you had better not mess up, or face prison, and we all very well knew it! The pathetic trumpian excuses for committing treason and insurrection are disgusting and sickening for all who have served and those of us who took metal in our bodies for our country, that this election losing ex president would continue to jeopardize and directly harm our country's security, even as he did while in office. The excuses we are hearing are also embarrassing for any sentient human to utter or repeat and insulting to our intelligence