Larry Hogan describes comparisons of the FBI to Nazi Germany's secret police, made by Florida senator Rick Scott, as dangerous.
Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre repeatedly declined to answer questions on the matter during an interview with ABC News, citing the US justice department’s independence on law enforcement matters. Many senior senate Republicans have remained largely quiet in the wake of the unprecedented law enforcement action, while others have appeared on conservative news channels supporting baseless accusations that the FBI planted evidence during the search. ... It’s incumbent upon everybody to take a deep breath.” He added: “It’s absurd and, you know, it’s dangerous,” especially after an armed man enraged by the raid was killed in Ohio when he tried to invade an FBI office. … No doubt that higher ups in the FBI have made mistakes, they do it, I’ve defended cases as well, and I’ve seen wrong actions. But we cannot say that whenever they [FBI officers] went in and did that search that they were not doing their job as law enforcement officers.”
Former president potentially committed national security crime by storing classified material at his Mar-a-Lago estate.
Presidential historian Michael Beschloss on Sunday said former President Trump's handling of classified documents after he left office did not align with ...
Sunday Talk Shows He has also claimed without evidence that former President Obama kept 33 million pages of documents, with “much” of them being classified. Sunday Talk Shows
Former President Donald Trump on Sunday called on the FBI to return seized documents that are allegedly protected by attorney-client and executive ...
But she's unpopular — and with Hispanic voters poised to continue their rightward shift, Republican Mark Ronchetti, a former TV meteorologist, is suddenly in play. Why it matters: New Mexico has the largest share of Hispanic voters of any state in the country. And the Republican nominee has gotten this far without help from Donald Trump. Background: Trump and his associates have frequently sought to claim executive privilege to prevent the release of documents or information. Former President Trump on Sunday called on the FBI to return seized documents that are allegedly protected by attorney-client and executive privileges. - Fox Newsreported on Saturday that the FBI seized boxes covered by attorney-client privilege and possibly executive privilege, according to unnamed sources familiar with the investigation.
The former president thought his 2016 opponent should go to prison for recklessly endangering national security.
In light of that practice, the statement says, Trump "had a standing order that documents removed from the Oval Office and taken into the residence were deemed to be declassified." One need not be a fan of the FBI to see that Trump's view of what qualifies as shameful and disgraceful is based on no principle beyond his petty personal interests. It notes that "the power to classify and declassify documents rests solely with the President of the United States." Rangappa says "accountability" requires that declassification of a given document be justified by a rationale dealing with the national security implications, which "allows for objections from others if the reasoning is based on an incorrect premise." It would apply, for example, to the "executive grant of clemency" for Roger Stone that the FBI found at Mar-a-Lago and might apply to various other unclassified items, such as the "leatherbound box of documents" and binders of photos that are also listed in the search inventory. President Trump, in order to prepare for work the next day, often took documents including classified documents from the Oval Office to the residence." To start with, there is some evidence to support the inference that Trump's alleged mishandling of classified material was "intentional and willful." In a June email, according to the Times, Jay Bratt, chief of the Counterintelligence and Export Control Section of the department's National Security Division, asked Trump lawyer M. Evan Corcoran to replace the padlock on a room where boxes of government documents were stored at Mar-a-Lago with a more tamper-resistant model. Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, one of the few Republican politicians who does not hesitate to criticize Trump, notes that "we still have a lot of unanswered questions" about the search. The FBI presumably presented evidence to that effect, possibly based on a Trump insider's tip, in its search warrant affidavit (which, unlike the warrant itself and the inventory, remains sealed). That apparent misrepresentation may help explain why the search warrant cites not only 18 USC 793 but also 18 USC 1519, which makes it a felony, punishable by up to 20 years in prison, to knowingly conceal "any record, document, or tangible object" with "the intent to impede, obstruct, or influence" a federal investigation. According to a statement that Trump representative John Solomon read on Fox News after the search warrant and inventory were unsealed, Trump had a "standing order" as president that automatically declassified material he moved from the Oval Office to his residence at the White House. That explanation raises additional questions about Trump's seemingly cavalier treatment of sensitive information, which I'll get to later. All the cases prosecuted involved some combination of: clearly intentional and willful mishandling of classified information; or vast quantities of materials exposed in such a way as to support an inference of intentional misconduct; or indications of disloyalty to the United States; or efforts to obstruct justice.
His claim that some documents were protected by executive and attorney-client privileges adds to an ever-changing list of defenses.
“He can literally stand over to the documents and say these are now declassified and that is done with definitive action immediately.” Trump’s children initially stated the FBI wouldn’t find anything, and that Trump returned everything he was supposed to earlier this year. Other GOP representatives, along with Trump himself, touted Trump’s penchant for declassification.
Republicans stepped up calls on Sunday for the release of an FBI affidavit showing the underlying justification for its seizure of documents at former ...
Simona Halep has won the National Bank Open for a third time. They travel along Vancouver's bike lanes and waterfront paths, with her sitting sideways across his lap. 9 hr ago 9 hr ago 9 hr ago 9 hr ago 2 hr ago 2 hr ago 9 hr ago He said it was "most disturbing" that Trump continued to hold the classified documents after the Justice Department sought their return. "And if they can't do that, then we've got a serious problem on our hands." The unsealing of such affidavits is highly unusual and would require approval from a federal judge.
Ramped-up calls come amid reports of heightened threats against federal law enforcement personnel after the raid of former president Donald Trump's ...
It's going answer a lot of questions." Some have sent messages to their supporters claiming without evidence that the FBI would target them next. We want to know what did the FBI tell them?
Senate Intelligence Committee leaders made a bipartisan request to the US government for classified documents the FBI seized in its search of former ...
Former President Trump on Sunday called on the FBI to return documents reportedly seized at Mar-a-Lago that are protected by attorney-client and executive ...
The FBI declined to comment. A federal appeals court in December denied Trump’s claims of executive privilege to block the National Archives from turning over those records. During the Watergate scandal, the Supreme Court ruled in United States v.
Donald Trump demanded that the FBI return to him any attorney-client and executive privilege material that they seized from his Mar-a-Lago residence during ...
It requires that all presidents preserve their records and hand them over to the National Archives upon leaving office. 'They even demanded that the security cameras be turned off (we refused), but there was no way of knowing if what they took was legitimate, or was there a 'plant?' This was, after all, the FBI!' What can I do to reduce the heat?' Donald Trump demanded via Truth Social on Sunday that the FBI return to him documents they seized during the Monday raid of Mar-a-Lago that contained 'attorney-client' and 'executive privileged' material Donald Trump demanded that the FBI return to him any attorney-client material they seized from Mar-a-Lago during the raid on Monday. - Donald Trump demanded via Truth Social on Sunday that the FBI return to him documents they seized during the Monday raid of Mar-a-Lago
Democrats want 'damage assessment' on seized documents while Republicans question FBI action.
An aerial view of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate is seen Wednesday, Aug. 10, 2022, in Palm Beach, Florida. Steve Helber/AP.
In 2019, a 33-year-old businesswoman from Shanghai was arrested for trespassing on the grounds of Trump's club. While at Mar-a-Lago, Trump did not always use his SCIF when viewing classified documents, according to one person familiar with the matter. Compared to the White House, with its strict access lists, it was sometimes unclear even to Trump's senior-most advisers who he'd come into contact with at the club. in spring 2017 to discuss launching an airstrike on Syria; at the time, he was hosting Chinese President Xi Jinping for dinner. "Trump kept a lot of things in his files that were not in the regular system or that had been given to him in the course of intelligence briefings," said John Bolton, Trump's former national security adviser. Soon after, some new rules went in effect to limit who could be at the club when Trump was there. Yet the flood of photos posted to social media by Mar-a-Lago members showed the two leaders poring over documents at their dinner table, along with aides working on laptops and Trump speaking on his cellphone. Still, the tracking of records was not a priority for Trump, according to several former officials. That was his right as the President of the United States," Mulvaney said. President of France," according to the search warrant. When it became clear he would need to leave the White House, items were quickly stowed away in boxes and shipped south without a clearly organized system. When Trump departed office in January 2021, it was Mar-a-Lago where he decamped, sore from a loss he refused to acknowledge.
While it is legally irrelevant, former President Donald J. Trump claims he had declassified the top secret files the F.B.I. seized at his Florida residence.
The Atomic Energy Act made it a crime for officials to disclose restricted data without authorization. A rare exception, where Congress has tied a law to the classification system, is Section 1924 of Title 18 of the U.S. Code, which makes the unauthorized retention or removal of classified material a crime. Congress has passed a law, the Atomic Energy Act, that imposes its own legal restrictions on mishandling information about how to build a nuclear bomb or enrich nuclear material. “Hypothetical questions like ‘What if a president thinks to himself that something is declassified? In the normal course of business, certain officials who have been designated as “original classification authorities” in federal departments and agencies can do so. There are also procedures for the removal of classification markings on documents. Doing so will give you access to the work of over 1,700 journalists whose mission is to cover the world and make sure you have accurate and impartial information on the most important topics of the day. It makes no reference to classification status, and prosecutors in an Espionage Act case do not need to prove that anything was deemed classified. I’d like to thank you for reading The Times and encourage you to support journalism like this by becoming a subscriber. Presidents have established and developed it through a series of executive orders dating to the era encompassing World War II and the early Cold War. The current directive, Executive Order 13526, was issued by President Barack Obama in 2009. The main punishment for disobedience is administrative: Officials can be admonished, lose their security clearances and be fired. Officials with the authority to classify or declassify matters can deem information as falling into three categories: confidential, secret or top secret.
Trump denied the FBI's findings and said the documents seized were declassified. A presidential historian said that the way former President Donald Trump stored ...
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COBLESKILL — Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-Schuylerville, said Sunday she expects former President Donald Trump and Republicans generally will derive political ...
In improving his own political position, Joe Biden managed to improve Donald Trump's even more. Celebrity Sightings In New York City - August 10, 2022.
But in the gladiator arena of latter-day American politics, and at the supper table, Donald Trump is the same. And every bit a caricature of his neo-adopted Irish identity, the Trump reboot will drive Biden to run again. When Trump returns to Palm Beach next month from his summer redoubt at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, and greets club members on the Mar-a-Lago terrace, he will regale them with tales of this attack. Politics is the business of lawyers and not of showmen, Democrats continue to believe that.” Charmed enough to meet a few, I can remark that some VIPs in private leave a thespian impression of their world-presenting posture; I haven’t encountered him directly, but Boris Johnson, I suspect, could be accused of being—as rivals once damned his predecessor in charisma, Tony Blair—an actor. And so, fabled Trump reporter Michael Wolff thinks this is it: America is barreling toward a cinematic zenith in the Trump show.
The famed horror author reflected on everything from modern politics under Donald Trump to his daily writing regimen.
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The nonprofit arm of the Republican Accountability Project is launching ads across all the closest swing states of the 2020 presidential race.
“The assault on police officers, the destruction of property, the reason for being there — to stop certification of the election,” a voter named Tom says in one of the 30-second spots, listing what turned him off from the party Jan. 6. Longwell’s organization is chasing after voters whose minds can be changed on Trump and the seriousness of the Jan. 6 attack, she said. Separately, Republican Accountability PAC intends to buy $10-million worth of political ads this year to oppose candidates in 14 states who have supported Trump’s election fraud conspiracy theories. Though Trump remains the overwhelming favorite among right-wing activists, as evidenced in recent straw polls conducted at major conservative gatherings, rank-and-file GOP voters are less convinced. So far, the group has raised $7.5 million toward that goal. The group’s goal is also to seize on a potential opening in the Republican Party ahead of 2024 — namely, to help influence Republican voters to support someone other than Trump in the next presidential election.
U.S. national security depends upon our allies' ability to trust us with intelligence. Mar-a-Lago was no place to keep top-secret documents.
NATO is expanding, with Finland and Sweden set to join, and that will involve a further extension of the alliance’s intelligence-sharing arrangements. They will be concerned about whether any of the information in the documents is about them, whether any of it has been shared by Trump, and whether, perhaps most worrying, their intelligence efforts—resulting in information they shared, trusting the U.S.’s capacity to safeguard secrets—may have been compromised. When Biden came to office, he ensured that Trump would have no access to real-time intelligence by depriving him of the daily briefings that were a traditional courtesy for past presidents. That they are in the possession of the FBI now is important, but the damage is done. Although we Americans tend to focus on our own foes—worrying, for instance, whether Trump was too cozy with the Russians or North Koreans—reclaiming the documents, regardless of their contents, was essential to restoring confidence in the U.S.’s ability to protect other nations’ secrets as well as its own. With the FBI raid, the Biden administration will need to assure allies that their shared efforts with us are still reliable. And responsible presidents and former presidents are trusted protectors of the nation’s most closely guarded secrets. Still, it is the mere fact of the papers—regardless of what is in them—that poses a significant national-security problem. The best case here for Trump—that the substance of the papers proves insignificant—is still a challenge for the United States, because we are finally a nation among other nations. Why Macron? Lest we forget, France is a friend and partner to the U.S., most notably in the unified response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The temptation to indulge in overheated speculation, particularly for some of Trump’s more partisan critics, is irresistible—but irresponsible, as The Atlantic’s Tom Nichols has warned. According to an inventory of what the FBI took from Mar-a-Lago during last week’s search and recovery of materials from Trump’s home, the French dossier, so to speak, stood out.
COBLESKILL — Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-Schuylerville, said Sunday she expects former President Donald Trump and Republicans generally will derive political ...
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! EXCLUSIVE: Former President Trump said he "will do whatever" he can "to help the country," after the FBI's ...
Records covered by that government classification level could potentially include human intelligence and information that, if disclosed, could jeopardize relations between the United States and other nations, as well as the lives of intelligence operatives abroad. "Whatever we can do to help—because the temperature has to be brought down in the country. "I think they would want the same thing—I’ve never seen anything like this," Trump said. "My people were asked to stand outside." Trump is disputing the classification of those records, saying the records have been declassified. "The country is in a very dangerous position.
Former president Donald Trump's stubborn refusal to return highly classified material forced the Justice Department's hand, resulting in the execution of a ...
Trump’s best defense would likely be that he didn’t really know that classified material remained at Mar-a-Lago, because he relied on his aides and lawyers, who told him that they gave all the classified material back to the government. The main purpose of the search warrant was likely the recovery of classified material, and DOJ might go no further. That statute, along with one of the other statutes cited in the search warrant, require the prosecution to prove “willfulness.” In other words, they require the government to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant intended to break the law. Even if they did, none of the criminal statutes cited by the DOJ in the search warrant require that the documents were classified. And unlike other outside-the-box acts he allegedly engaged in, like ordering that the special counsel who investigated him be fired (which his White House counsel disregarded), or inciting a mob to attack the Capitol, taking classified material and concealing it from the government is a crime that is regularly charged and straightforward to prove. Much of the initial reaction to the search warrant focused on the Espionage Act, which was cited in the search warrant.
Would you object to what the FBI and the Justice Department have done if the investigation was focused on someone who wasn't Donald Trump?
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'There is tremendous anger in the country, at a level that has never been seen before, other than during very perilous times,' former president says.
“The FBI and DHS have observed an increase in threats to federal law enforcement and, to a lesser extent, other law enforcement and government officials following the FBI’s recent execution of a search warrant in Palm Beach, Florida,” the bulletin states. The FBI and DHS would like to ensure that law enforcement, court, and government personnel are aware of the range of threats and criminal and violent incidents.” “The FBI and DHS have also observed the personal identifying information of possible targets of violence, such as home addresses and identification of family members, disseminated online as additional targets.” “The threats we have observed, to date, underscore that [domestic violent extremists] may view the 2022 midterm election as an additional flashpoint around which to escalate threats against perceived ideological opponents, including federal law enforcement personnel.” The warrant was signed by a US Magistrate Judge on 5 August. The FBI removed around 20 boxes of materials from the private club, according to several media reports. As always, we would like to remind members of the public that if they observe anything suspicious to report it to law enforcement immediately”. If it isn’t, terrible things are going to happen”. “My people were asked to stand outside.” “And then they break into a president’s house, a sneak attack where it was totally, no one ever thought a thing like this would happen.” Federal agents have faced threats of violence following the raid. Mr Trump has claimed that the documents had been declassified. “The country is in a very dangerous position.
FBI took records including some top secret national security files after a search of the ex-president's Mar-a-Lago property. Donald Trump.
Is that not truly the standard when it comes to classified documents? When it comes to classified documents, famously, President Nixon said, if the president does it, then it is not illegal. The president has the ability to at any time declassify anything.” “He’s the one who didn’t cooperate. The former president also said: “Oh great! No evidence has been produced that he did declassify the records in question.
Opinion: Would you object to what the FBI and the Justice Department have done if the investigation was focused on someone who wasn't the former president?
This can be illegal, and potentially could threaten national security, so the man is asked to return the documents. Now, imagine the man who took the documents and his associates first tried to divert attention from the documents by blaming the judge for authorizing the search, then blamed the FBI, then blamed the attorney general, then said the documents were planted, then said he declassified the documents, then said the information was privileged, would that make you a bit suspicious … if it wasn’t Donald Trump? Would you say it was unreasonable for authorities to seek a search warrant of the man’s estate in order to try to retrieve those documents … if it wasn’t Donald Trump?
Why a targeted pardon for mishandling classified documents might just ultimately strengthen the rule of law — and help peel more mainstream Republicans away ...
Not least, the White House might be seen as capitulating to the threat of violence by Trump supporters. A laser-targeted pardon also has an appealing political logic: A pardon knocks the wind out of Trump’s claim to martyr status, which has allowed him to rally the GOP to his side. From a purely partisan perspective, moving the Mar-a-Lago search out of the spotlight may also appeal to a White House eager to return the public’s focus to abortion rights and its string of legislative successes in the run-up to the midterms. Trump himself pardoned Lewis “Scooter” Libby in connection to the leak of a CIA agent’s identity. Critically, Trump could still be held accountable for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. While this didn’t happen between 2016 and 2020, we have good reason to fear the downstream harms of a new pressure on the norm against partisan law-enforcement tools. Nor is there good reason to be a stickler for punishment of any and all federal crimes. For the Republicans who aren’t hard-core Trumpists but have also backed him in the past, criminal charges here are likely to confirm Trump’s lurid claims about the “ deep state” and a “ witch-hunt.” Even if most Trump devotees are likely to stick with him no matter what, those concerned with the trajectory of American democracy should surely pay close attention to Trump’s standing among Republicans and independents more generally — something that does and will change. It would probably amp up, not drain, wider support for Trump’s assaults on the rule of law and democracy — hence helping Trump, or a surrogate who could easily run in his stead. The FBI and DOJ were right to take action if the nation’s secrets were at risk. At the same time, Trump is already using the incident to build support among his followers and within the broader Republican coalition. If Trump or anyone else was aiming to seriously damage our national security, there is little reason for the government to go easy on them.
Donald Trump on Monday claimed his passports were 'stolen' in the FBI raid at Mar-a-Lago last week, which would mean he could not leave the country.
'Whatever we can do to help—because the temperature has to be brought down in the country. He fled the scene and was later killed in a standoff. He could have received the black and red passports as president. 'This is an assault on a political opponent at a level never before seen in our country. Donald Trump demanded via Truth Social on Sunday that the FBI return to him documents they seized during the Monday raid of Mar-a-Lago that contained 'attorney-client' and 'executive privileged' material He said that the FBI should consider his post on the alternative social media site his formal request that the documents be returned to his Palm Beach estate. 'People are so angry at what is taking place,' Trump told Fox when asked about reaching out. It has just been learned that the FBI, in its now famous raid of Mar-a-Lago, took boxes of privileged 'attorney-client' material, and also 'executive' privileged material, which they knowingly should not have taken,' Trump said Sunday on Truth Social. Attorney General Merrick Garland said he 'personally approved' the raid, which was part of a federal investigation into documents Trump took with him after he left the White House. According to federal law, any presidential records are the property of the federal government. Donald Trump claimed his passports were 'stolen' in the FBI raid at Mar-a-Lago last week - Donald Trump claimed his passports were 'stolen' in the FBI raid at Mar-a-Lago The Justice Department has hit back at Donald Trump's claim the FBI stole his passports during the raid on his Mar-a-Lago mansion.