(4 minute, 30 second read)
Impunity
Before I get into this it needs to be noted that President Trump violated the Presidential Records Act on a regular basis.[i] The Act, passed in 1978, made Presidential records the property of the people, NOT the personal property of the President. The Archivist of the United States through the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) administers the records.[ii]
THE LIBRARIANS!
Cause and effect
According to the people he had around him during his tenure in the White House, Trump continually destroyed documents. The problem was/is when dealing with a man like Trump is that nothing happened at the time when he broke the law because he was President. There wasn’t any incentive for him or his appointees to stop doing it. Just like the Hatch Act violations that occurred during his Administration.[iii]
Nothing happened.
Shotgun Approach.
Are you keeping score of the various stories that Trump is pumping out regarding the classified documents that the FBI found when they executed a search warrant on his Mar-a-Lago home? It’s a little confusing but I’m going to give it a go with what we have so far.
The Standard Operating Procedure for Trump is to throw as much stuff out there as possible to see how many bases he can cover (because his supporters don’t care anyway – he’s their man no matter what). He doesn’t seem to have caught on yet that what he says can be used against him in court. Nor has he caught on to the fact that the DOJ is looking at whether he violated laws, regardless of whether the documents were classified or not.[iv] He signed off on one of the laws that the FBI is citing. Not only that, HE increased the penalty, making it a felony (because he was in a snit about Hillary).[v]
Scorecard (So far.)
- 1. In May of 2021 the Librarians find out documents, the people’s documents, are missing from the White House and contacts Trump’s team of sycophants. (How about towels, robes and toilet paper. Trump has a thing with toilets. Did anybody think to check with housekeeping about missing stuff?!)
- 2. One of the documents missing was the map of the hurricane that Trump drew on with a sharpie pen! (Well, the man does have an eye for fine art)
- 3. After 9 months of haggling, the librarians showed up at Mar-a-Lago in January of 2022 and picked up 15 boxes of documents that Trump wasn’t supposed to have. They found classified documents mixed in and contacted the DOJ. (The documents were being kept in the basement. Whew! I was worried that they might not have been someplace secure!)
- 4. Trump was served with a subpoena to return classified documents. (He returned some but not all.)
- 5. Trump and his minions said that he didn’t have any more classified documents. (He did.)
- 6. An informant told the FBI that Trump had more classified documents. (Who was that masked person? Shallow throat?)
- 7. The FBI served a (lawfully acquired) search warrant and found lots of classified documents. (Shit hit the fan.)
- 8. The FBI was conducting a witch hunt. (The FBI knew what they were looking for.)
- 9. Nobody was present. (His lawyers were present and Trump family along with lawyers were watching on CCTV. Yes, really.)
- 10. Trump claimed that the documents were planted. (They weren’t. Besides, Trump now claims ownership. The FBI also has the CCTV recordings.)
- 11. Trump said that he had the documents and was doing homework with them. (OMG! LOL! Who assigned it?)
- 12. Trump claimed that Obama had taken classified documents. (Obama hadn’t.)
- 13. Trump claimed that he had unclassified the documents so forget his previous claims. (So why were they kept in his safe and a padlocked room?)
- 14. Trump said he didn’t pack the boxes from the White House so he didn’t know what was in them. (So, Trump lets other people use his personal safe and closets to store classified documents?)
- 15. Trump is being persecuted for not breaking the law. (He hasn’t been charged with anything yet. But he’s acting real guilty.)
- 16. Trump claims any time classified documents left the Oval Office they were automatically declassified because he said so. (Bizarre. Just bizarre. That’s not how any of this works.)
- 17. The Trump Republican Party is now calling for defunding law enforcement – especially the FBI (I thought they were against that.), threatening violence against…well…just against everybody that isn’t them, threatening civil war, threatening revolution, threatening the families of law enforcement including children, threatening judges.
Whoa Now!
Since we don’t know exactly what’s in the classified/unclassified documents all the Trump Republican Party has to do is tell us. (Hm, even if unclassified wouldn’t that be compromising our national security?) Well anyway, at least Trump’s buddy Putin would be so happy he would probably let Trump get the hotel in Moscow that Trump’s always wanted.
Perhaps it’s only unclassified if Trump is looking at it. He hasn’t used that one yet. But in the meantime,
WHAT ABOUT HILLARY’S EMAILS!
[i] https://www.archives.gov/presidential-libraries/laws/1978-act.html
[ii] https://www.usa.gov/federal-agencies/national-archives-and-records-administration
[iii] https://www.history.com/news/hatch-act-fdr-politics
[iv] https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=(title:18%20section:1924%20edition:prelim)
[v] https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-made-it-a-felony-to-mishandle-classified-documents-in-2018_n_62f3c2e9e4b0133dd5b4f229