DAILY BEAST
Lies, Obstruction, Conspiracy:
Trump Indicted in Mar-a-Lago Documents Case
The ex-president will be charged with willful retention of documents under the Espionage Act and six other crimes, his lawyer said.
Photo Illustration by Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily Beast/Getty
Donald Trump has been indicted on seven charges—including a violation under the Espionage Act—for hoarding classified documents at Mar-a-Lago long after he left the White House, his lawyer said on Thursday night.
Trump reacted in predictable fashion to the news, which was delivered by prosecutors in an email, ranting about the “Boxes Hoax” on his social media platform Truth Social.
“I have been summoned to appear at the Federal Courthouse in Miami on Tuesday, at 3 PM.,” he wrote. “This is indeed a DARK DAY for the United States of America. We are a Country in serious and rapid Decline, but together we will Make America Great Again!”
A spokesman for Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith, who has been handling this investigation, declined to comment to The Daily Beast.
James Trusty, one of Trump's lead defense lawyers in this case, said on CNN that the team has not seen the actual indictment and might not until they show up at the federal courthouse next week.
But he said a summary sheet that accompanied the summons mentioned a number of criminal charges, including “willful retention of documents,” which is a violation of the Espionage Act, “conspiracy to obstruct” a law enforcement investigation, and making “false statements.”
None of those would be a surprise, but accusations of a conspiracy notably would mean that the feds discovered that someone—or several others—tried to help the former president allegedly commit a cover-up.
If you’re reading this, then you know that former President Donald Trump was indicted yet again on Thursday afternoon. Naturally, the MSNBC shows were all-in on that topic throughout the network’s Thursday night lineup.
Including (sorry) “All-In With Chris Hayes,” where Hayes hosted a round table discussion of the news that featured fellow MSNBC host and former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki. She noted during the discussion that Trump is already using this news to raise money from supporters, a fact she noted in contrast to how Joe Biden is likely to discuss the matter.
So in case you need a catch up, Trump’s latest indictment involves still-undisclosed federal charges stemming from the special counsel investigation into his handling of classified documents. The news became public Thursday when Trump himself announced it, and the indictment has since been confirmed by several major media outlets, including NBC.
The government, however, has yet to issue an official statement on the matter, so we’ll have to wait to find out precisely what Trump is being charged with. That could happen on Tuesday when Trump surrenders himself in a federal court, though if recent history is a guide, it’s likely the details will be leaked at some point earlier. Read more about the whole thing here.
Meanwhile back on MSNBC, Hayes asked Psaki, “I wonder how you think about the Biden administration handles this, how Democrats handle this, how Republicans in Congress handle this.”
“This isn’t Alvin Bragg in Manhattan, who is not part of the Biden administration,” Hayes continued, referring to the District Attorney overseeing Trump’s criminal fraud case in New York City. “You can heap scorn on him and you can say nasty things about him, with all sorts of, you know, pretty gross, racist undertones. [But] this is the Justice Department of the United States, that Joe Biden is the president of at the moment.”
“Exactly,” Psaki replied, “I mean look, I think Trump is clearly — he already is fundraising off of this, or attempting to, and he is clearly going to try to gather the base around him as he did around the indictment by Alvin Bragg.”
“This case is different, for a range of reasons. One of them, just on the pure messaging standpoint, a case where people are trying to communicate publicly and try and critique about how a former president may have paid hush money to an adult film star, is a bit more complicated than this,” Psaki continued.
“Which is somebody obstructing justice, somebody withholding classified documents, potentially sharing them in a way that could harm our national security, that is different. And we should acknowledge that, in terms of how it will be communicated,” Psaki said.
“In terms of the White House, the way that I expect they will handle it,” she said, “is, Joe Biden is an institutionalist, he believes in the separation of the branches of government, and I suspect that they will be very limited in anything they say about this at all. Especially in the short term.”
“Now, over the long term, if there are additional indictments… there are ways to, once you get past the pure politicization period of time, or the accusation of that, to talk about kind of the value for our national security, for rule of law, for democracy. And there is a way for Joe Biden to do that on the campaign trail and in speeches. But for now, I expect they will be very quiet, same with Democrats,” Psaki clarified.
You can watch the full clip here.
Jen Psaki Says Trump ‘Already Is Fundraising’ Off of his latest Criminal Indictment
Her remarks came during a panel discussion of Trump’s new legal headache on MSNBC’s ”All-In With Chris Hayes“
CNN 4 min ago
Our live coverage has ended for the night. Read more about the federal indictment of former President Donald Trump here.
The latest on the federal indictment of Trump in the documents probe
By Maureen Chowdhury, Tori B. Powell and Matt Meyer, CNN
Analysis: Trump now faces his second criminal indictment as he looks to recapture White House
Analysis from CNN's Stephen Collinson
Donald Trump, who has often lied, unquestionably told the truth when he said Thursday was a “dark day” for America.
The ex-president’s social media post correctly described the magnitude of his indictment over the alleged mishandling of classified documents — though completely ignored any personal culpability in the case.
But the first-ever indictment of a former president by a federal grand jury thrust the country into an unprecedented and perilous moment in its history at a time when it is already internally estranged over politics.
Criminal probes of former presidents and current presidential candidates might be business as usual in tottering developing world states. But there’s no parallel for an ex-commander in chief facing federal charges in the US, much less one who has already incited violence in order to advance his political ends and is currently running to recapture the White House.
America’s legal and political institutions, which were repeatedly torn apart by Trump’s tumultuous term in office, may now face their biggest test from an ex-president who was impeached twice, tried to steal an election and is already facing a separate criminal trial next March.
If that was not serious enough, these federal charges — related to classified documents that Trump took to his Mar-a-Lago resort — are coming down at a moment when Trump is the front-runner for the Republican nomination in 2024.
These seven counts bring a host of political complications, even if the Justice Department will argue that it’s simply following the evidence and is proving that no one, not even former presidents, are above the law.
Simply put, Trump is set to be brought to trial by the Justice Department of his successor. In another profound twist, that successor — President Joe Biden — could end up facing the accused in the 2024 general election, in a scenario that would inject new fervor into Trump’s claims he’s a victim of politicized justice. Trump’s supporters already thought that an invisible “deep state” establishment was out to get their hero. It will be even worse now.
Read Collinson's full analysis here.
HUFFPOST
Stephen Miller Fumes Over Trump Indictment: An End To U.S. 'Democratic Republic'
Stephen Miller predicted that history will judge the federal indictment of former President Donald Trump, on charges linked to his handling of classified documents, as the day the United States “ceased to be a democratic republic.”
Miller, who was a senior adviser in the Trump White House, went on Fox News on Thursday night to bash news about his former boss, who reportedly faces seven federal criminal charges tied to the storage of government documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.
“This is a sad day for me personally, as someone who has so much affection and admiration for President Trump, who has seen him, up close and personal and the heart he has for this country,” Miller said.
“I believe history will record today as the day that we cease to be a democratic republic and we became a people ruled by an unelected government bureaucracy.”
Miller, elsewhere in his Fox News appearance, claimed the Justice Department decided who can and can’t be president before he then jumped into Republican claims that President Joe Biden was involved in a bribery scheme prior to his administration.
He also said he hopes for Republicans, conservatives and “the whole of the country that cares about the rule of law” to coalesce around Trump.
Twitter users criticized Miller, who had suggested that an “alternate slate of electors” could aid in Trump’s 2020 election challenge, over his take now on the federal indictment news.
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