Trump Indictment ( includes NY AG and Fed documents case ) (3 Viewers)

[SteveSBrickNJ]

Former President D. Trump has been indicted by a New York Grand Jury. There will be much to talk about on this topic because this is just the first step in a lengthy process.
Possibly it is worthy of its own thread here rather than posting about Trump's indictment in already existing threads?
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This 3/31/23 story might get the ball rolling....
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Manhattan’s DA wanted a Friday Trump arrest. Trump’s team said no.

Secret Service needed more time to prepare, according to the ex-president’s legal team.

www.yahoo.com

 

[DJ1BigTymer]

Biden had boxes of classified information in his garage leftover from his days as VP.

I already acknowledge that he did, the request was for an example of someone do so WILLFULLY.

 

[Snarky Sack]

I already acknowledge that he did, the request was for an example of someone do so WILLFULLY.

Did he accidentally take them with him?

 

[DaveXA]

Did he accidentally take them with him?

Yes, so?

 

[DJ1BigTymer]

Did he accidentally take them with him?

Did he take further actions to retain them?

 

[Snarky Sack]

Yes, so?

How could that have been an accident? I think you must be joking.

 

[Saintamaniac]

I want to be perfectly clear here. It is not my intention to change your mind on any of this. You've more than illustrated that nothing, and I mean nothing will change your mind about trump. My intention is to show where you lack an understanding of the situation that faces the person you blindly support.

Which Hillary was not, and part of Comey's justification for that was that such a case had never been prosecuted before. Why would not the same apply to Trump?

I directly challenge him to talk about the trump indictments without mentioning Clinton. He can't and he won't because whataboutism is the ONLY thing he has to stand on.

I don't normally quote myself but I wanted to do so as a reminder of the request I made for you to defend trump without mentioning Clinton. You can't.

Then why did the prosecutor not charge him for mishandling classified documents?

They will also need to show criminal intent

Counts 1 - 31 are for "willful retention of national defense information," i.e. talking documents out of the White House.

Your own post shows that you acknowledge that counts 1-31 are charges for willful retention of national defense information. I may be wrong but I would think that national defense documents are classified at some level and unlike other presidents who have been granted security clearances after they left the White house, trump has not because he is a national security risk. You claim to be an educator so I assumed incorrectly that you had at aleast a rudimentary understanding of the "willful retention" means.

False premise. Trump never confessed to any crime. In fact, Trump has stated over and over that it is legal to do what he did.

Trump can say whatever he wants to until he is orange-er in the face, it won't change the law. He has admitted to exactly what he is accused of and it's why so many of the his lawyers have bailed on him and why he has had problems retaining decent council.

Trump will indeed use the hated "buttery males" defense, and it will work with some members of the jury.

No it won't because it will never be heard by any jurors. His lawyer might attempt to, but the government would object as completely irrelevant to the case. Maybe he has a chance that his bought and paid for judge would overall the objection so there's that.

 

[Snarky Sack]

I want to be perfectly clear here. It is not my intention to change your mind on any of this. You've more than illustrated that nothing, and I mean nothing will change your mind about trump. My intention is to show where you lack an understanding of the situation that faces the person you blindly support.

Understood. I know that nothing can sway a Trump hater so I'm not trying to change your mind either.

Not even the revelations of FBI misconduct slowed down the cries of "Orange Man Baa-aaa-aaad!" There are still people who believe that the Steele Dossier was a real intelligence project. I don't know if you are one of them.

I don't think so. You are one of the more intelligent posters on here. I wish you had not waited so long to show it.

I don't normally quote myself but I wanted to do so as a reminder of the request I made for you to defend trump without mentioning Clinton. You can't.

I'm not going to agree to toss out parts of the argument Trump can make to defend himself because they make you uncomfortable.

There are plenty of arguments unrelated to Clinton and I have made them.

Your own post shows that you acknowledge that counts 1-31 are charges for willful retention of national defense information. I may be wrong but I would think that national defense documents are classified at some level and unlike other presidents who have been granted security clearances after they left the White house, trump has not because he is a national security risk. You claim to be an educator so I assumed incorrectly that you had at aleast a rudimentary understanding of the "willful retention" means.

That argument makes since if the charges are for having classified documents and not "national security documents." You could make the case that Trump knew they were classified, and knew he had no security clearance.

You - Saintamaniac - could make that case, but apparently the DOJ cannot, because that is not what they charged him with. So, that point is moot.

Trump can say whatever he wants to until he is orange-er in the face, it won't change the law. He has admitted to exactly what he is accused of and it's why so many of the his lawyers have bailed on him and why he has had problems retaining decent council.

I have never heard him say "I willfully retained national defense information." Where is him saying that? The DOJ will try to convince the jury that he meant that, but they will not be able to show that he said that.

As with the Ukraine phone call, this case heavily relies on interpretation rather than fact.

No it won't because it will never be heard by any jurors. His lawyer might attempt to, but the government would object as completely irrelevant to the case. Maybe he has a chance that his bought and paid for judge would overall the objection so there's that.

His experts can certainly talk about the history of former presidents and other senior officials keeping classfied national security documents in their home. Is the judge going to let them talk about Colin Powell doing that, Joe Biden Doing that, Mike Pence doing that, but then sustain the prosecutor's objection when the expert gets to H. Clinton?

In the unlikely event that she does, at least one Trump voter on the jury will be sure to remind the others of why the prosecution objected.

 

[DaveXA]

How could that have been an accident? I think you must be joking.

You do realize they don't pack all of their own sheet, right? It could have been something as simple as a document being mis-filed or the wrong box brought to the wrong truck. Stuff happens. When the docs were discovered, they timely returned them per protocol. Trump refused to when so ordered to return them.

It's really not that complicated. And why there was no issue raised at the time it happened.

 

[DJ1BigTymer]

How could that have been an accident? I think you must be joking.

Did he take ANY further action to WILLFULLY retain them?

 

[bird]

Waste of time. Trump humpers will never admit that their false god is anything but the reincarnation of a combination of John Wayne, Saint Ronnie the Dim-Witted, Robert E. Lee. With a large dash of the vile William Bedford Forrest.

 

[MT15]

That was the story, but it turned out that Clinton ordered staff to strip classified markings off of documents so they could be sent over nonsecure communication. So, it is much more likely that they were not later deemed worthy of being classified, but classified again for the same reason they had been classified before Clinton's staffers stripped the marking at her direction.

They were classified the whole time. Just taking a marking off does not render the information unclassified. If it did, Trump could have solved his classified document problem by having staff cut the markings off

Would you have bought it if Trump said he had burned all of his "personal" documents? I dont' buy it from Hilary either.

The difference that the FBI did not do the equivalent of your metaphorical high-speed chase with Hillary as they did with Trump. It was more like the slow-motion, he-can-stop-when-he's-ready chase of O.J. Simpson.

Clinton withheld requested documents just like Trump did, but the DOJ let who they thought was the next president take her time, hand in what she herself deemed necessary to hand in, and even destroy some of the material that she decided to destroy. Then to make sure it never came out, she was allowed to hammer and bleach bit the devices.

Just like when the DNC servers were hacked, the FBI never subpoena'd the servers, but let the DNC use a private company to examine them.

It's not a two-tiered justice system, it is a multi-tiered justice system. While they held power, the Clintons were on the top tier.

Everything you said here is just speculation, and some of it is just flat out untrue.

 

[cuddlemonkey]

Answering @DaveXA and @Saintamaniac as well.

I have read about those differences many times, and I get it. I just disagree with your conclusions.

My point is that hatred for Trump on a message board is not enough to convict him of a crime. The DOJ will have to bring the receipts and they aren't ready to do that yet.

This thread actually should be crickets until they are.

You can disagree with anything you want. The difference is that all of the available evidence points directly away from your conclusion.

 

[Snarky Sack]

Did he take ANY further action to WILLFULLY retain them?

You mean besides willfully retaining them since he left the Senate?

 

[cuddlemonkey]

You mean besides willfully retaining them since he left the Senate?

What is your definition of "willful" and how do you prove something has been done willfully?

 

[DJ1BigTymer]

You mean besides willfully retaining them since he left the Senate?

Dude...nvmd. There's no point continuing this with a bad faith participant.

 

[Snarky Sack]

What is your definition of "willful" and how do you prove something has ben done willfully?

I use the standard definition of willful, but I'm sure there is some legalistic definition that I'm not aware of, so I'm not going to venture a guess on that.

As to how to prove willfulness:

I would say/guess that if the prosecution could prove that Trump kept documents in order to conceal the fact that he had them in the first place, that would legally be considered evidence that he knew he was breaking the law.

But . . . if he kept them because he thought that he had a right to keep them, that is not a guilty person's move. That would eliminate criminal intent. Which was an important reason given for not prosecuting you know who.

I'm just guessing. If someone can show me that I'm wrong about that standard, I'll be happy to learn. Sorry, but it would need to be "show me," not "tell me."

 

[MT15]

Sack is conflating things. He keeps saying Trump isn’t accused of mishandling classified documents as if that is some big “gotcha” of some sort, but there’s a good reason for that and it’s not what he thinks.

If I understand it correctly, and I will look for an article here in a minute, the statute Trump is charged under doesn’t mention classification status of national defense documents because the statute pre-dates the establishment of the classification system.

So to say the government isn’t charging him with mishandling classified documents is true, but not really accurate. It has no meaning to the charges, but rest assured those documents were classified.

Due to Trump’s vanity, we also have a recording of him admitting he knew they were classified, and knew he could have declassified them while he was president, and acknowledging that he did not. All done while showing this one document off to random people at Bedminster. A classified document that Trump’s lawyers cannot find at this point.

Defense of this is just so foolish on so many levels, it boggles the mind.

 

[MT15]

Article: https://www.reuters.com/legal/what-charges-might-trump-face-removing-white-house-records-2022-08-10/

Quotes:

“The warrant gave prosecutors the right to seize records containing evidence in violation of three laws, with code numbers 793, 2071 and 1519.

While the list of items agents took from Mar-a-Lago notes that many of the documents were classified, those three laws deal with mishandling of federal government records regardless of whether or not they are classified.”

“The law with number 793 prevents unauthorized possession of national defense information, without mentioning whether the records are classified or not. It is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.”

“That law was initially passed under the 1917 Espionage Act, which predates the statutory classification system.

The other laws, 2071 and 1519, make it illegal to conceal or destroy official U.S. documents. They are punishable by up to three and 20 years in prison, respectively. Neither law requires the information in question to be classified.”