Trump ignoring White House lawyer on secret docs could open door to Espionage Act charges: legal expert

Tom Boggioni
September 20, 2022



President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Phoenix, photo by Gage Skidmore.


Reacting to a report from the New York Times that a White House lawyer warned Donald Trump late last year that he had no right to hang onto sensitive government documents after he left office, one former U.S. Attorney claimed that the allegation just increased the chances the former president could be indicted by the Department of Justice.

Late Monday, the Times reported, "The lawyer, Eric Herschmann, sought to impress upon Mr. Trump the seriousness of the issue and the potential for investigations and legal exposure if he did not return the documents, particularly any classified material, the people said," before adding, "Mr. Trump thanked Mr. Herschmann for the discussion but was noncommittal about his plans for returning the documents, the people familiar with the conversation said."

If true, former U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade told the hosts on MSNBC"s "Morning Joe," Trump opened the door to indictment under the Espionage Act.

Asked about the "legal ramifications" for Trump over the allegations, McQuade explained, "It's excellent evidence of one of the essential elements of the offense when it comes to the Espionage Act and the retention of government records, which is willfulness."

READ MORE: New video shows fake Trump elector inside restricted area of Georgia elections office: CNN

"Did you do this knowing that it was against the law, and this could be strong evidence of that," she elaborated before cautioning, "One tricky aspect of this, I imagine he would assert attorney/client privilege as to these statements and say that the privilege belongs to him, and cannot be waived by a lawyer like Eric Herschmann -- I imagine there would be some litigation. But I think ultimately the government would prevail. The client is not Donald Trump the man, it is the president of the United States and is actually in the best interest of the office and the nation for the government to retain these documents."

"I think the government would win the battle, but you can bet Donald Trump will assert that," she added. "I also think it could be relevant to the obstruction of justice charges, which I think is going to come down to, again, was it the lawyers who made the misrepresentations about whether they had the documents or were they directed to do so by Donald Trump."

Watch the video below or at this link.



https://www.rawstory.com/trump-espionage-act-2658309721/

 

There comes a point when you should not just pay attention to what is being said but who all is saying it. I personally don't have any respect for MAGA Haberman but one thing she is is well connected. To people who want a stenographer to get their side of the story out. So by the time this has her byline on its because a bunch of people are coming forward. Off the record of course.

But you do have to wonder if people are willing to start telling this to Haberman what are they telling prosecutors?

Trump Was Warned Late Last Year of Potential Legal Peril Over Documents

Maggie Haberman
Tue, September 20, 2022 at 6:06 AM



Former President Donald Trump speaks at a rally in Wilkes-Barre, Pa., on Saturday, Sept. 3, 2022. (Hannah Beier/The New York Times)

A onetime White House lawyer under President Donald Trump warned him late last year that Trump could face legal liability if he did not return government materials he had taken with him when he left office, three people familiar with the matter said.

The lawyer, Eric Herschmann, sought to impress upon Trump the seriousness of the issue and the potential for investigations and legal exposure if he did not return the documents, particularly any classified material, the people said.

The account of the conversation is the latest evidence that Trump had been informed of the legal perils of holding on to material that is now at the heart of a Justice Department criminal investigation into his handling of the documents and the possibility that he or his aides engaged in obstruction.



In January, not long after the discussion with Herschmann, Trump turned over to the National Archives 15 boxes of material he had taken with him from the White House. Those boxes contained 184 classified documents, the Justice Department has said.

But Trump continued to hold on to a considerable cache of other documents, including some with the highest security classification, until returning some under subpoena in June and having even more seized in a court-authorized search of his Mar-a-Lago residence and private club in Florida by FBI agents last month.

The precise date of the late 2021 meeting between Trump and Herschmann was unclear. It was also unclear what, if any, awareness Herschmann had of what was in the boxes when the subject was discussed.

But by then, the National Archives had told associates of Trump’s that it was missing documents such as original copies of his presidential correspondence with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un and the letter left for him by President Barack Obama. Archives officials said they had been told by then that there were roughly two dozen boxes of documents that had been in the White House residence and which qualified as presidential records, which had never been sent to the archives.

By the time of the meeting, Herschmann, a former prosecutor, was not working with or for Trump, from whom the National Archives had spent months trying to procure missing material.

Trump thanked Herschmann for the discussion but was noncommittal about his plans for returning the documents, the people familiar with the conversation said.

Herschmann, who defended Trump during his first impeachment trial but tried to stop several efforts by outside advisers aimed at keeping him in power after he lost the 2020 election, declined to comment. A spokesperson for Trump did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The meeting between Herschmann and Trump has not been previously reported, and it adds to the picture of Trump’s interactions with several people about returning the documents in the months before the National Archives retrieved 15 boxes of material in January. When they went through the boxes, officials at the archives discovered that they contained nearly 200 individual classified documents.

It was not immediately clear if the meeting was solely related to the discussion about the documents, or if it was about other issues.

Some of Trump’s advisers, including informal ones such as Tom Fitton, of the conservative legal advocacy group Judicial Watch, have told the former president that he could hold on to the documents as personal records, according to people briefed on their discussions.

Trump is facing not just the investigation over potential mishandling of government records but a number of other inquiries, including a wide-ranging Justice Department investigation into what led to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and a state investigation in Georgia into efforts to overturn the outcome of the 2020 election.

Lawyers for Trump turned over an additional set of classified documents in June. The FBI then carried out a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago on Aug. 8 and retrieved more than 100 additional individual documents with classified markings.

A federal judge in Florida has at least temporarily barred the Justice Department from using the material seized in the search in pursuing its criminal investigation. On Friday, the department asked a federal appeals court to let the FBI regain access to those 100 or so sensitive documents so it could continue the inquiry and assess the national security risks stemming from Trump keeping them in an unsecured location.

The special master appointed to determine whether the material seized in the search is subject to attorney-client privilege or executive privilege is scheduled to meet with lawyers for Trump and the Justice Department on Tuesday.

The first filings before Judge Raymond Dearie, the special master, suggested that the Trump legal team was not happy with early signs of how quickly he appears poised to try to resolve the matter.

Dearie had invited the Justice Department and the Trump legal team to submit letters Monday proposing what they should talk about at a first meeting in his courtroom in the federal courthouse in Brooklyn on Tuesday.

He also circulated a proposed calendar, which was not made public, for how the work flow could unfold.

In its submission, the Trump legal team complained about that calendar. For example, Dearie apparently proposed that both sides complete their sifting of the documents and proposals for how to label them by Oct. 7. After that deadline, Dearie would write a report to a Trump-appointed judge, Aileen Cannon, who named him special master and set an overall deadline of Nov. 30, recommending how she should rule about any disagreements.

The Trump legal team said Oct. 7 was far too early a date for that phase of the work to be done, writing: “We respectfully suggest that all of the deadlines can be extended to allow for a more realistic and complete assessment of the areas of disagreement.”

Trump’s team had recommended Dearie as a possible special master, and the Justice Department agreed.

The website Axios reported that the Trump team did so because the lawyers believed that the judge shared their skepticism of the FBI, because he was one of the judges on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court who approved of warrants to surveil a 2016 Trump campaign adviser named Carter Page. Two of the four warrants the court approved were later declared invalid.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-warned-last-potential-legal-120631225.html

 

I say treason, if applicable, is in order. If applicable, he will set s record as being the first executed President who broke national trust by committing Treason.

 

So, you would convict trump based on alleged claims from 3 people "familiar with the situation" who remain unidentified.

 

I would need evidence, review then convict. However, that is someone else job, not mine. Bother them.

 

A fair trial and then we hang the bastard then.

 

I can just imagine the Prosecutor standing before the jury and saying, "Three people familiar with the case say he did it. We rest our case."

We need to remember, any election Trump loses is a rigged election and any trial where Trump is convicted is a rigged trial. Funny how that works. Everything involving Trump is a special case where the normal rules which apply to the rest of us are suspended.

People who are more than familiar with the situation, that is to say people who are being paid(they hope) to defend Donald Trump can't say "he didn't do it". The accusation is, Trump took government documents, which is a violation of the law. Trump's defense team's response is, we don't know if the documents are classified or not. That's basically the same as Trump being accused of shooting someone on 5th Avenue?" and the lawyer says, "We don't know if the murder victim is dead, or not."

 

Its curious, isn't it? How the accused use different ways of defending themselves?
I did not have sex with that woman.
You can keep your insurance if you like it.
The devil made me do it.
It's all fake.
The other guy did it.
They got the wrong guy.

 

You may find it curious, but in Trump's case, it's a violation of the law, compounded by obstruction and perjury. His defense is basically, "Oh yeah, says you."

What is curious is a why Trump supporters want to attack the procedure instead of defending Trump. The real problem is they want Trump to be above the law, but don't have the balls to say it out loud.

 

Attack the procedure rather than defend Trump?
Say, Bron, has it occurred to you yet that almost everything written about Trump and his documents is based on carefully edited leaks and bombshell reports based on "a source familiar with the situation?"
Hard to get twisted about such.
Especially given the last 7 years of concerted effort on the part of despicables to get Trump, no matter what it takes.

No matter.
Shooter thinks most deplorables have started concentrating on mid terms, and whatever it is trump is doing, did or might do is pretty much irrelevant?
Despicables are still stuck on Trump but that's OK. The surprise after mid terms will be that much more fun to watch.

 

You don't defend Trump. All you have is a extended whine about how unfair it all is, punctuated with a "just you wait."

What happens after midterms? Are you expecting some kind of Putin Protection Plan for Trump to be passed by Congress?

Maybe a Behghazi style investigation. How about another Durham style Special Prosecutor? He did pretty good with his three year investigation, which resulted in one indictment and no conviction.

If Republicans are upset about Congressional investigations and Grand Juries, there's a simple solution. Stop violating the law and don't commit perjury, and don't obstruct justice. If nothing else, it should be apparent most of them aren't smart enough to get away with it.

 

U.S. urges appeals court to block Trump from reviewing classified records
Sarah N. Lynch
Wed, September 21, 2022 at 9:16 AM



By Sarah N. Lynch

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former President Donald Trump has failed to provide evidence he declassified any records the FBI seized from his Florida estate and he is not entitled to review them or have them returned, the U.S. Justice Department has argued to a federal appeals court.

Prosecutors have asked the Atlanta-based appellate court to lift a stay by U.S. District Judge Alieen Cannon that bars them from using any of the classified materials in their ongoing criminal investigation until after an independent arbiter called a special master completes a review to weed out any documents that could be privileged.

Of the more than 11,000 documents seized by the FBI from Mar-a-Lago on Aug. 8, about 100 have classified markings.

"Plaintiff again implies that he could have declassified the records before leaving office. As before, however, Plaintiff conspicuously fails to represent, much less show, that he actually took that step," the Justice Department's attorneys wrote in a filing late Tuesday, referring to the former Republican president, who sued the department after the FBI carried out the search at his Florida home and country club.

The government's latest filing came just hours after U.S. Judge Raymond Dearie, who was appointed by Cannon as special master, pressed Trump's attorneys at a hearing in Brooklyn to provide him with evidence that Trump had actually declassified some of the seized materials.

"If the government gives me prima facie evidence (a legal term meaning a fact is presumed to be true unless disproved) that this is classified, and you decide not to advance a claim of declassification ... as far as I'm concerned that's the end of it," Dearie told them. "You can't have your cake and eat it."

Federal prosecutors in their filing to the appeals court highlighted that Trump's attorneys had resisted Dearie's request.

Dearie was appointed at Trump's request, and Cannon tasked him with reviewing all of the materials, including classified ones, so that he can separate anything that could be subject to attorney-client privilege or executive privilege - a legal doctrine that shields some White House communications from disclosure.

The Justice Department is conducting a criminal investigation of Trump for retaining government records, some marked as highly classified including top secret, at Mar-a-Lago after leaving office in January 2021. Trump has denied wrongdoing and has said without providing evidence that the investigation is a partisan attack.

As one of his defenses, Trump has claimed on social media posts without evidence that he declassified the records. However, his lawyers have not made such claims in any of their legal filings.

"Plaintiff’s effort to raise questions about classification status is a red herring," prosecutors told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in their late-night filing Tuesday. "Even if plaintiff could show that he declassified the records at issue, there would still be no justification for restricting the government’s use of evidence at the center of an ongoing criminal investigation."

Trump is a former president and the records do not belong to him. However, prosecutors did not directly appeal that portion of Cannon's order. The department's attorneys previously determined that they believed Trump as a former president cannot assert executive privilege over the sitting president, Joe Biden.

It is still unclear how the conservative-leaning 11th circuit, which has 6 out of 11 Trump-appointed judges, will rule, and the court has not yet revealed which three of its judges will take up the Justice Department's appeal.

Earlier on Tuesday, Trump's lawyers filed their response to the department's appeal, urging the court to keep the stay in place and to allow them under Dearie's supervision to review all of the seized materials, including those marked classified.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/u-urges-appeals-court-block-151652414.html

 

You know what happens after mid terms. For 7 years the despicables have done everything they can to get trump, no matter what it takes, and you gotta admit, they went pretty low with some of their tactics. Assuming the deplorables gain majorities in both the house and senate biden will be a lame duck until he's 25th by Kamala or whatever is done to get him off the stage.

The deplorables for their part will introduce Karma to the despicables. Hopefully, deplorables won't sink as low as despicables did, but Shooter will be happy if they can expose the Pelosi corruption and as a bonus maybe Hunter Biden and dad's little robbery schemes. Shooter gives not a bean fart if any of these robbers are actually indicted or convicted, exposing them will suffice.

And Shooter gives not a fig fart what happens with Trump. Indict him. Convict him. Get your perp walk. God knows you've worked hard enough to get it and sold enough of your souls to get it. Despicables have been exposed for what they are.

And in 2024 Shooter will hope someone (which party doesn't matter) will step up and take care of our business for once.

 

You put a lot of work into not giving a fig fart.

Nobody is scared of Republican investigations. We've all seen them do their best and accomplish nothing. The reason is simple. The accusations are based on lies created to keep the base in line. When someone tries to provide evidence in the light of day, it evaporates like the dew. Nancy's corruption and Hunter's laptop? Maybe we can get Steve Bannon and Alex Jones to testify before Congress and tell us all about it.

That's the Republican dilemma. They promise a lot and deliver nothing, and yet the base never gets tired of being fed fresh bullshit when the old lies go stale.

 

30 31 32 33 investigations.
7 years.
And still, Trump is unindicted, Un convicted, and not a single perp walk.

 

Patience. Don't forget to eat your figs.

 

I like fig newtons

 

Once again, more proof you do not believe in "innocent until proven guilty"!

 

Well, if Putin uses nukes. The leftover people
can repopulate our planet. Be prepared to fuck happy.

 

Both Trump and his political hack judge Cannon got the ever loving shit kicked out of them by the appeals court.


DOJ can continue Trump classified docs investigation without special master: Appeals court
ALEXANDER MALLIN and KATHERINE FAULDERS
Wed, September 21, 2022 at 6:03 PM·6 min read



A panel of judges on the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has granted a request from the Justice Department to stay portions of a ruling by U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon that had effectively paused the government's investigation into former President Donald Trump's potential mishandling of classified records after leaving office.

The three-judge panel, comprised of two Trump appointees and a Barack Obama appointee, ruled unanimously on Wednesday that the Justice Department is no longer enjoined from investigating the documents with classification markings that were recovered from Mar-a-Lago and will no longer have to submit those materials to special master Ray Dearie for his review.

"[Trump] has not even attempted to show that he has a need to know the information contained in the classified documents," the panel wrote in its ruling. "Nor has he established that the current administration has waived that requirement for these documents."

The judges also agreed with the Justice Department that Trump has submitted no record or claim that he ever declassified the documents at issue -- which undercut Trump's statements on social media otherwise. His team resisted stating as much when pressed by Dearie during a separate hearing on Tuesday.


"In any event, at least for these purposes, the declassification argument is a red herring because declassifying an official document would not change its content or render it personal," the judges wrote. "So even if we assumed that Plaintiff did declassify some or all of the documents, that would not explain why he has a personal interest in them."

Earlier this month, Judge Cannon, who was nominated by Trump, granted his request for a special master to review what was taken by the FBI in a court-authorized search of Mar-a-Lago last month.

The special master's review, as ordered by Cannon, was to be for items that might be covered by both attorney-client privilege and executive privilege, even though Trump is no longer the president and has never asserted privilege over any specific records.


PHOTO: Former President Donald Trump enters the stage at a Save America Rally in Youngstown, Ohio, Sept. 17, 2022. (Jeff Swensen/Getty Images)
Cannon's ruling, which enjoined the government from further use of the seized documents as part of its criminal investigation, was widely criticized by legal experts with a range of political views -- including Trump's former Attorney General William Barr.

"The Court hereby authorizes the appointment of a special master to review the seized property for personal items and documents and potentially privileged material subject to claims of attorney-client and/or executive privilege," Cannon wrote. She cited "the need to ensure at least the appearance of fairness and integrity under the extraordinary circumstances presented."

The 11th Circuit panel ruled Wednesday that they don't believe Trump would risk irreparable injury if Cannon's order is partially stayed because he has not asserted attorney-client privilege over any of the documents at issue with classification markings.

The three judges undercut Cannon directly as well, noting the government is "substantially likely to succeed" in showing she "abused [her] discretion in exercising jurisdiction over [Trump's] motion as it concerns the classified documents."


"The engrained principle that 'courts must exercise the traditional reluctance to intrude upon the authority of the Executive in military and national security affairs' guides our review of the United States's proffered national-security concerns," the appellate judges wrote.

The Justice Department previously requested that Cannon partially stay her order, relating to the special master and review of classified documents. But she rejected that motion and the government sought an appeal.

Cannon, in denying the government's request of a stay, wrote that she was not willing to accept their assertions that the roughly 100 documents taken from Mar-a-Lago were classified -- even though they were labeled as such, with some bearing "SECRET" and "TOP SECRET/SCI" markings.


PHOTO: FBI photograph of redacted documents and classified cover sheets recovered from a container stored in former U.S. president Donald Trump's Florida estate that was included in a U.S. Department of Justice filing Aug. 30, 2022. (U.S. Department Of Justice via Reuters)
"The Court does not find it appropriate to accept the Government's conclusions on these important and disputed issues without further review by a neutral third party in an expedited and orderly fashion," Cannon wrote in her rejection.

She approached with heavy skepticism the government's arguments about the documents with classified markings and the government's claims that Trump has no right to the materials at all.

In its motion last week for a partial stay from the 11th Circuit, the Justice Department argued that Cannon "has entered an unprecedented order enjoining the Executive Branch's use of its own highly classified records in a criminal investigation with direct implications for national security."

And while Cannon ruled that the intelligence community could continue its own assessment of the possible national security risks from Trump's handling of the documents, the government said in court papers that such a separation was not feasible.

The 11th Circuit judges agreed with the Department of Justice.

They wrote in their Wednesday ruling that Cannon's effort to distinguish the intelligence committee's classification review from the FBI's own criminal investigation was "untenable" and that they believe the FBI has "sufficiently explained how and why its national-security review is inextricably intertwined with its criminal investigation."


PHOTO: Former President Donald Trump speaks at a Save America Rally to support Republican candidates running for state and federal offices, Sept. 17, 2022 in Youngstown, Ohio. (Jeff Swensen/Getty Images)
"No party has offered anything beyond speculation to undermine the United States's representation—supported by sworn testimony—that findings from the criminal investigation may be critical to its national-security review," the judges wrote. "According to the United States, the criminal investigation will seek to determine, among other things, the identity of anyone who accessed the classified materials; whether any particular classified materials were compromised; and whether additional classified materials may be unaccounted for. As [Trump] acknowledges, backwards-looking inquiries are the domain of the criminal investigators."

"It would be difficult, if not impossible, for the United States to answer these critical questions if its criminal investigators are not permitted to review the seized classified materials," they added.

In another rejection of Cannon's assessment, the judges wrote that they agreed with the government's arguments that allowing special master Dearie, as an outside third-party, to examine the classified records with Trump's legal team could "impose irreparable harm."

"The Supreme Court has recognized that for reasons 'too obvious to call for enlarged discussion, the protection of classified information must be committed to the broad discretion of the agency responsible, and this must include broad discretion to determine who may have access to it,'" they wrote. "As a result, courts should order review of such materials in only the most extraordinary circumstances. The record does not allow for the conclusion that this is such a circumstance."

Former President Trump could seek to appeal to the full 11th Circuit Court of Appeals or even potentially the Supreme Court, but it's unclear how long it would take either to act on their appeal while the DOJ has access to the documents.

https://www.yahoo.com/gma/appeals-court-grants-dojs-request-000345872.html