Donald Trump Announces 2016 White House Bid

[spaminator]

Possible plea deal for Montreal woman who allegedly tried to poison Trump
A U.S. federal prosecutor says negotiations are underway for an agreement to settle the charges against Pascale Ferrier.

Author of the articleaul Cherry • Montreal Gazette
Publishing date:Aug 26, 2022 • 10 hours ago • 2 minute read • Join the conversation
Pascale Ferrier has been detained since her arrest on Sept. 20, 2020 at a border crossing in Buffalo, N.Y.
Pascale Ferrier has been detained since her arrest on Sept. 20, 2020 at a border crossing in Buffalo, N.Y. PHOTO BY HIDALGO COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE /The Associated Press
A St-Hubert woman arrested almost two years ago after poison-laced letters were sent to then-U.S. president Donald Trump and Texas law enforcement officials may see her cases combined while she considers a possible plea deal.


Federal prosecutor Michael Friedman on Friday informed U.S. District Court Judge Dabney Friedrich in Washington, D.C. of the development in the case against Pascale Ferrier, 55, who faces three charges, including threatening to kill the president.


On Sept. 20, 2020, as the FBI was trying to determine who had sent a letter laced with ricin and addressed to Trump at the White House, Ferrier showed up at a U.S. border crossing at the Peace Bridge in Buffalo, N.Y. Border guards searched her vehicle and found a loaded semi-automatic handgun, a knife, a stun gun, a collapsible baton and 294 rounds of ammunition in a backpack.

Ferrier also faces charges in a U.S. district court in Texas, where she is alleged to have sent six ricin-laced letters to police officers and prison officials.


She had been briefly detained in Texas before 2020, and the letters are alleged to have been mailed to officials involved in her case. Her fingerprints were found on four of the six letters.

The letter destined for Trump was intercepted and never delivered to the White House.

“Both of these U.S. attorney offices, here in D.C. and also in the southern district of Texas, have extended draft plea material” to Ferrier’s lawyer, Friedman said, adding negotiations toward a possible guilty plea continue.

Friedman said Ferrier’s lawyer recently made requests to alter the terms of what has been offered — “sort of a global-in-nature plea offer that would resolve both of these cases (and) that would have the Texas case transferred” to D.C.


The prosecutor said a plea agreement may be ready by late September.

Also on Friday, the judge rejected Ferrier’s bid for the return of $166 in Canadian currency that was seized when she was arrested. That money was seized along with more than US$2,200.

The money is considered evidence of Ferrier’s potential plans if she had entered the U.S. In the letter to Trump, she is alleged to have written: “This gift is in this letter. If it doesn’t work, I’ll find (sic) better recipe for another poison, or I might use my gun when I’m able to come.”

Ferrier argued the Canadian money should not be considered as evidence of what might have happened if she entered the U.S. She argued she needs the money to purchase toiletries at the commissary where she is detained and to make Zoom calls with her family.

“I’m certainly sympathetic to Mrs. Ferrier’s desire to have money to spend in prison for Zoom calls and commissary purchases,” Friedrich said. “But the government’s reasons for keeping the money are stronger than Mrs. Ferrier’s.”

pcherry@postmedia.com

Cases may be combined for St-Hubert woman who allegedly tried to poison Trump

A U.S. federal prosecutor says negotiations are underway for an agreement to settle the charges against Pascale Ferrier.

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

FBI: Trump mixed top secret docs with magazines, other items
Affidavit — heavily redacted — offers most detailed description to date of government records being stored at Mar-a-Lago

Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Eric Tucker And Michael Balsamo
Publishing date:Aug 26, 2022 • 8 hours ago • 6 minute read • 119 Comments

WASHINGTON — Fourteen of the 15 boxes recovered from former President Donald Trump’s Florida estate early this year contained classified documents, many of them top secret, mixed in with miscellaneous newspapers, magazines and personal correspondence, according to an FBI affidavit released Friday.


No space at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate was authorized for the storage of classified material, according to the court papers, which laid out the FBI’s rationale for searching the property this month, including “probable cause to believe that evidence of obstruction will be found.”


The 32-page affidavit — heavily redacted to protect the safety of witnesses and law enforcement officials and “the integrity of the ongoing investigation” — offers the most detailed description to date of the government records being stored at Mar-a-Lago long after Trump left the White House. It also reveals the gravity of the government’s concerns that the documents were there illegally.

The document makes clear how the haphazard retention of top secret government records, and the apparent failure to safeguard them despite months of entreaties from U.S. officials, has exposed Trump to fresh legal peril just as he lays the groundwork for another potential presidential run in 2024.


“The government is conducting a criminal investigation concerning the improper removal and storage of classified information in unauthorized spaces, as well as the unlawful concealment or removal of government records,” an FBI agent wrote on the first page of the affidavit.

Documents previously made public show that federal agents are investigating potential violations of multiple federal laws, including one that governs gathering, transmitting or losing defence information under the Espionage Act. The other statutes address the concealment, mutilation or removal of records and the destruction, alteration or falsification of records in federal investigations.

Trump has long insisted, despite clear evidence to the contrary, that he fully cooperated with government officials. And he has rallied Republicans behind him by painting the search as a politically motivated witch hunt intended to damage his reelection prospects. He repeated that refrain on his social media site Friday, saying he and his representatives had had a close working relationship with the FBI and “GAVE THEM MUCH.”



His attorneys late Friday repeated their request for the appointment of an independent special master to review the documents taken from the home, saying the redacted affidavit doesn’t give Trump sufficient information about why the search took place or what materials were removed.

The affidavit does not provide new details about 11 sets of classified records recovered during the Aug. 8 search at Mar-a-Lago but instead concerns a separate batch of 15 boxes that the National Archives and Records Administration retrieved from the home in January. The Archives sent the matter to the Justice Department, indicating in its referral that a review showed “a lot” of classified materials, the affidavit says.

The affidavit made the case to a judge that a search of Mar-a-Lago was necessary due to the highly sensitive material found in those 15 boxes. Of 184 documents with classification markings, 25 were at the top secret level, the affidavit says. Some had special markings suggesting they included information from highly sensitive human sources or the collection of electronic “signals” authorized by a special intelligence court.



And some of those classified records were mixed with other documents, including newspapers, magazines and miscellaneous print-outs, the affidavit says, citing a letter from the Archives.

Douglas London, a former senior CIA officer and author of “The Recruiter,” said this showed Trump’s lack of respect for controls. “One of the rules of classified is you don’t mix classified and unclassified so there’s no mistakes or accidents,” he said.

The affidavit shows how agents were authorized to search a large swath of Mar-a-Lago, including Trump’s official post-presidential “45 Office,” storage rooms and all other areas in which boxes or documents could be stored. They did not propose searching areas of the property used or rented by Mar-a-Lago members, such as private guest suites.


The FBI submitted the affidavit, or sworn statement, to a judge so it could obtain the warrant to search Trump’s property. Affidavits typically contain vital information about an investigation, with agents spelling out the justification for why they want to search a particular location and why they believe they’re likely to find evidence of a potential crime there.

The documents routinely remain sealed during pending investigations. But in an acknowledgment of the extraordinary public interest in the investigation, U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart on Thursday ordered the department by Friday to make public a redacted version of the affidavit.

In a separate document unsealed Friday, Justice Department officials said it was necessary to redact some information to “protect the safety and privacy of a significant number of civilian witnesses, in addition to law enforcement personnel, as well as to protect the integrity of the ongoing investigation.”


The second half of the affidavit is almost entirely redacted, making it impossible to discern the scope of the investigation or where it might be headed. It does not reveal which individuals might be under investigation and it does not resolve core questions, such as why top secret documents were taken to Mar-a-Lago after the president’s term ended even though classified information requires special storage.

Trump’s Republican allies in Congress were largely silent Friday as the affidavit emerged, another sign of the GOP’s reluctance to publicly part ways with the former president, whose grip on the party remains strong during the midterm election season. Both parties have demanded more information about the search, with lawmakers seeking briefings from the Justice Department and FBI once Congress returns from summer recess.


Though Trump’s spokesman derided the investigation as “all politics,” the affidavit makes clear the FBI search was hardly the first time federal law enforcement had expressed concerns about the records. The Justice Department’s top counterintelligence official, for instance, visited Mar-a-Lago last spring to assess how the documents were being stored.

The affidavit includes excerpts from a June 8 letter in which a Justice Department official reminded a Trump lawyer that Mar-a-Lago did not include a secure location authorized to hold classified records. The official requested that the room at the estate where the documents had been stored be secured, and that the boxes that were moved from the White House to Mar-a-Lago “be preserved in that room in their current condition until further notice.”


The back-and-forth culminated in the Aug. 8 search in which agents retrieved 11 sets of classified records.

The document unsealed Friday also offer insight into arguments the Trump legal team is expected to make. It includes a letter from Trump lawyer M. Evan Corcoran in which he asserts that a president has “absolute authority” to declassify documents and that “presidential actions involving classified documents are not subject to criminal sanction.”

Mark Zaid, a longtime national security lawyer who has criticized Trump for his handling of classified information, said the letter was “blatantly wrong” to assert Trump could declassify “anything and everything.”

“There are some legal, technical defences as to certain provisions of the espionage act whether it would apply to the president,” Zaid said. “But some of those provisions make no distinction that would raise a defence.”

In addition, the affidavit includes a footnote from the FBI agent who wrote it observing that one of the laws that may have been violated doesn’t even use the term “classified information” but instead criminalizes the unlawful retention of national defence information.

— Associated Press writers Jill Colvin in New York and Nomaan Merchant, Michael Balsamo and Lisa Mascaro in Washington contributed to this report.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1563211412314263553

FBI: Trump mixed top secret docs with magazines, other items

Boxes recovered from Donald Trump's Florida estate contained classified documents, many of them top secret, according to FBI affidavit.

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

Judge plans to appoint special master in Trump records case
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Eric Tucker
Publishing date:Aug 27, 2022 • 11 hours ago • 1 minute read • Join the conversation

WASHINGTON — A federal judge in Florida told the Justice Department on Saturday to provide her with more specific information about the classified records removed from his Florida estate and said it was her “preliminary intent” to appoint a special master in the case.


The two-page order from U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon signals that she’s inclined to grant a request from Trump’s lawyers, who this week asked for the appointment of an independent special master to review the records taken from Mar-a-Lago and identify any that may be protected by executive privilege.


The judge scheduled a Thursday hearing to discuss the matter further. A special master is often a former judge.

Cannon also directed the Justice Department to file under seal with her more detailed descriptions of the material taken from Trump’s property. The former president’s lawyers have complained that investigators did not disclose enough information to them about what specific documents were removed when agents executed a search warrant on Aug. 8 to look for classified documents.

The special master appointment, if it happens, is unlikely to significantly affect the direction of the Justice Department investigation, though it’s possible an outside review of the documents could slow the probe down.

Judge plans to appoint special master in Trump records case

WASHINGTON — A federal judge in Florida told the Justice Department on Saturday to provide her with more specific information about the classified records…

torontosun.com

 

[The_Foxer]

Trump's p;laying right into their hands with that move.. It's very normal for a lawyer to play a 'delay delay delay' game, but it will do NOTHING positive for trump here and now the democrats can stretch this out till the november votes. Currently they look like they're going to get slaughtered in the midterms so having something to distract and make the republicans look bad is a blessing.

 

[spaminator]

U.S. says it's reviewed documents seized in Mar-a-Lago search
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Eric Tucker
Publishing date:Aug 29, 2022 • 14 hours ago • 1 minute read • Join the conversation

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department has completed its review of potentially privileged documents seized from former President Donald Trump’s Florida estate this month and has identified “a limited set of materials that potentially contain attorney-client privileged information,” according to a court filing Monday.

The filing from the department follows a judge’s weekend order indicating that she was inclined to grant the Trump legal team’s request for a special master to review the seized documents and to set aside any that may be covered by claims of legal privilege.


A hearing is set for Thursday in federal court in Florida.

The Justice Department said in its filing that it would disclose more information later this week.

U.S. says it's reviewed documents seized in Mar-a-Lago search

Justice Department has completed its review of potentially privileged documents seized from former President Donald Trump's Florida estate.

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

U.S. Justice Dept. responds to Trump FBI search lawsuit
Author of the article:Reuters
Reuters
Sarah N. Lynch and Dan Whitcomb
Publishing date:Aug 31, 2022 • 1 day ago • 1 minute read • Join the conversation

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Justice Department said on Tuesday it found evidence to suggest that documents removed from the White House when Donald Trump left office were later concealed at his Florida home to obstruct a federal investigation into their whereabouts.


A Trump lawyer “explicitly prohibited” FBI agents from looking in boxes in a storage room at Trump’s property during a June search, the department said in a court filing.


“The government also developed evidence that government records were likely concealed and removed from the Storage Room and that efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government’s investigation,” the department argued in a filing in U.S. District Court in the Southern District of Florida.

The Justice Department’s filings come ahead of a Thursday court hearing before U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon in West Palm Beach. She is weighing Trump’s request to appoint a special master who would conduct a privilege review of the documents seized from Mar-a-Lago on Aug. 8, many of which are labeled as classified.


A special master is an independent third party sometimes appointed by a court in sensitive cases to review materials potentially covered by attorney-client privilege to ensure investigators do not improperly view them.

A special master was appointed, for instance, in the searches of the homes and offices of two of Trump’s former attorneys: Rudy Giuliani and Michael Cohen.

In Trump’s initial request to the court, his attorneys claimed that the former president wanted to protect materials that were subject to a legal doctrine known as executive privilege, which can shield some presidential communications.

But legal experts called that argument into question, saying it was nonsensical for a former president to claim he wanted to assert executive privilege against the executive branch itself.

U.S. Justice Dept. responds to Trump FBI search lawsuit

The U.S. Justice Department on Tuesday filed its latest response to former president Donald Trump's lawsuit over FBI's search of his home.

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

Takeaways from the government filing about what was hidden at Mar-a-Lago
Author of the article:Washington Post
Washington Post
Amber Phillips, The Washington Post
Publishing date:Aug 31, 2022 • 14 hours ago • 3 minute read • Join the conversation

In the ongoing legal battle about whether the government can keep the material FBI agents recovered from Mar-a-Lago earlier this month, the government has now alleged that legal representatives of former president Donald Trump hid boxes of material and may have even given federal agents false information about handing it all over, according to an extraordinary late-night court filing Tuesday.


Here are three takeaways from this latest revelation.


1. Prosecutors may focus on whether obstruction was committed

Trump’s lawyers may have given false information to the FBI, prevented agents from fully searching the property this summer, and then hid documents that remained at Mar-a-Lago when the FBI left, according to this filing.

“Records were likely concealed and removed,” prosecutors wrote, and “efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government’s investigation.”

The FBI started investigating in May, and, armed with a subpoena, agents went to Mar-a-Lago and met with Trump’s lawyers. They recovered 38 documents marked classified, prosecutors said, and a Trump representative acting as custodian of records signed a statement certifying that all material with classification markings had been returned to the government.


That turned out to be wrong. The FBI kept investigating, and it found evidence, according to this new filing, that boxes had been moved before the prosecutors said they did a search for classified material.

Agents feared that some of the government’s top secrets were still in Trump’s possession, possibly nuclear secrets, The Washington Post has reported. Agents obtained a search warrant and recovered more than 100 classified documents, including some so secret that, according to the filing, “even the FBI counterintelligence personnel and DOJ attorneys conducting the review required additional clearances before they were permitted to review certain documents.”

This is all in addition to what National Archives officials took from the property earlier this year. On Friday, the government released a heavily redacted version of its affidavit that justified searching Mar-a-Lago. It revealed that the National Archives recovered 184 documents marked classified, months before the FBI got involved. The FBI later said this batch included information collected from human informants and secretive national defence information.


That’s an astonishing amount of classified material, legal experts said.

To underscore their point, prosecutors attached to the court filing a remarkable photo showing a box of government material they said was recovered from Trump’s office. In it are bright-yellow-bordered folders marked “Top Secret,” as well as folders bordered in red and marked “Secret.”

2. There’s still no evidence Trump declassified any of this before he took it

Trump’s defence has always been flimsy: that he declassified the documents before taking them to Mar-a-Lago. This filing further punches a hole in that, with prosecutors pointing out that Trump’s lawyers have never argued that in court or in conversation or correspondence with the Justice Department about the documents. It’s true that presidents have broad declassification powers, but not for everything, and there’s a process and paperwork that needs to happen to declassify something.


There’s also no evidence of such paperwork, least of all for potentially hundreds of classified documents. In addition, former presidents don’t have that power.

That’s an astonishing amount of classified material, legal experts said. In comparison, when then-Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton was investigated for improper handling of classified information as secretary of state, she had 113 emails containing classified information – far less material than Trump is accused of hoarding at Mar-a-Lago.

3. We still don’t know why Trump took – and apparently insisted on keeping – these documents

This is one of the biggest mysteries of this whole saga.

The Post’s Josh Dawsey, Carol Leonnig, Jacqueline Alemany and Rosalind S. Helderman have reported that for the past year, Trump resisted handing much of anything over to the government, to the point where his allies feared he was “essentially daring” the FBI to come after them.

“These are the types of documents that would make most of us quiver to hold,” Barbara McQuade, a former U.S. attorney, told me earlier this month, “let alone retain unlawfully.”

Takeaways from the government filing about what was hidden at Mar-a-Lago

In the ongoing legal battle about whether the government can keep the material FBI agents recovered from Mar-a-Lago earlier this month, the government has now…

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

Obstruction now a major focus in Trump documents probe
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Eric Tucker
Publishing date:Aug 31, 2022 • 7 hours ago • 5 minute read • Join the conversation

WASHINGTON — The FBI investigation into top-secret government information discovered at Mar-a-Lago is zeroing in on the question of whether former President Donald Trump’s team criminally obstructed the probe. A new document alleges that government records had been concealed and removed and that law enforcement officials were misled about what was still there.


The allegation does not necessarily mean that Trump or anyone else will ultimately face charges. But it could pose the most direct legal threat to either Trump and those in his orbit, in part because the Justice Department has historically regarded obstruction as an aggravating factor that tilts in favour of bringing charges in investigations involving the mishandling of classified information.


“It goes to the heart of trying to suborn the very integrity of our criminal justice system,” said David Laufman, who once oversaw the same Justice Department counterintelligence section now responsible for the Mar-a-Lago investigation.

The latest Justice Department motion in the case is focused less on the removal last year of classified information from the White House to Mar-a-Lago and more on the events of this past spring. That’s when law enforcement officials tried — unsuccessfully — to get all documents back and were assured, falsely, that everything had been accounted for after a “diligent search.”


The Justice Department issued a grand jury subpoena in May for the records, and officials visited Mar-a-Lago on June 3 to collect them. When they got there, Tuesday’s department document says, they were handed by a Trump lawyer a “single Redweld envelope, double-wrapped in tape” containing documents.


A custodian for the records presented a sworn certification to the officials saying that “any and all responsive documents” to the subpoena had been located and produced. A Trump lawyer said that all records that had come from the White House had been held in one location — a storage room — and that there were none in any private space or other spot at the house.

But the FBI came to doubt the truth of those statements and obtained a search warrant to return on Aug. 8.


Officials had “developed evidence that government records were likely concealed and removed from the Storage Room and that efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government’s investigation,” the new Justice Department filing says.

In their August search, agents found classified documents not only in the storage room but also in the former president’s office — including three classified documents in office desks, according to the Justice Department. In some instances, the agents and attorneys conducting the review of seized documents required additional clearances since the material was so highly classified.

“That the FBI, in a matter of hours, recovered twice as many documents with classification markings as the ‘diligent search’ that the former president’s counsel and other representatives had weeks to perform calls into serious question the representations made in the June 3 certification and casts doubt on the extent of cooperation in this matter,” the document states.


In a court filing Wednesday night, lawyers for Trump decried the search as having taken place in “the midst of the standard give-and-take” between a former president and the National Archives and Records Administration over presidential records. It said the department had “gratuitously” made public certain information, including a photograph of classified documents seized from the home.

The Justice Department has stated in court filings that, besides investigating crimes related to the mishandling of national defence information and other documents, it is also looking into whether anyone committed obstruction. It is not clear from Tuesday’s filing how much of that inquiry might centre on Trump, who has repeatedly insisted that his team was cooperative with the FBI, as opposed to any of his lawyers or representatives who were directly involved in making the representations to the department. It’s also unclear what role Trump himself had in those representations.


Obstruction matters because it’s one of the factors investigators look for in weighing whether to bring charges. For instance, in his July 2016 announcement that the FBI would not be recommending criminal charges against Hillary Clinton in an investigation involving handling of her emails, FBI Director James Comey cited the absence of obstruction as one of the reasons.

When the Justice Department charged former CIA Director David Petraeus in 2015 with sharing classified information with his biographer, it made a point of including in court documents details about false statements prosecutors said he made during an FBI interview.

It is not the first time that an obstruction investigation has surfaced in connection with Trump. Special Counsel Robert Mueller investigated whether Trump had obstructed an inquiry into whether his 2016 presidential campaign had colluded with Russia, and though Mueller did not recommend charges against the then-sitting president, he also pointedly declined to exonerate him.


In the current case, federal investigators are likely evaluating why Trump representatives provided statements about the status of classified information at Mar-a-Lago that proved easily contradicted by the evidence, as well as which individuals were involved in removing boxes and why.

Sarah Krissoff, a New York lawyer and former federal prosecutor, said the detailed information in this week’s filing tells its own tale.

“Reading between the lines of what they were saying here, it suggests that they had very direct information from a source regarding the location of classified documents within Mar-a-Lago and essentially the concealment of, or lack of cooperation with, the prior efforts to recover those documents,” she said.


The purpose of the Tuesday night filing was to oppose a request from the Trump legal team for a special master to review the documents seized during this month’s search and to return to him certain seized property. U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon is to hear arguments on the matter Thursday.

Trump’s lawyers said in a Wednesday night filing that a special master was needed in the name of fairness, saying that “left unchecked, the DOJ will impugn, leak, and publicize selective aspects of their investigation.”

Cannon on Saturday said it was her “preliminary intent” to appoint such a person but also gave the Justice Department an opportunity to respond.

On Monday, the department said it had already completed its review of potentially privileged documents and identified a “limited set of materials that potentially contain attorney-client privileged information.” It said Tuesday that a special master was therefore unnecessary and that the presidential records that were taken from the home do not belong to Trump.

— Associated Press writers Jill Colvin and Michael Balsamo in New York contributed to this report.

Obstruction now a major focus in Trump documents probe

FBI investigation into top-secret information discovered at Mar-a-Lago is zeroing in on whether Donald Trump’s team obstructed the probe.

torontosun.com

 

[pgs]

Obstruction now a major focus in Trump documents probe
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Eric Tucker
Publishing date:Aug 31, 2022 • 7 hours ago • 5 minute read • Join the conversation

WASHINGTON — The FBI investigation into top-secret government information discovered at Mar-a-Lago is zeroing in on the question of whether former President Donald Trump’s team criminally obstructed the probe. A new document alleges that government records had been concealed and removed and that law enforcement officials were misled about what was still there.


The allegation does not necessarily mean that Trump or anyone else will ultimately face charges. But it could pose the most direct legal threat to either Trump and those in his orbit, in part because the Justice Department has historically regarded obstruction as an aggravating factor that tilts in favour of bringing charges in investigations involving the mishandling of classified information.


“It goes to the heart of trying to suborn the very integrity of our criminal justice system,” said David Laufman, who once oversaw the same Justice Department counterintelligence section now responsible for the Mar-a-Lago investigation.

The latest Justice Department motion in the case is focused less on the removal last year of classified information from the White House to Mar-a-Lago and more on the events of this past spring. That’s when law enforcement officials tried — unsuccessfully — to get all documents back and were assured, falsely, that everything had been accounted for after a “diligent search.”


The Justice Department issued a grand jury subpoena in May for the records, and officials visited Mar-a-Lago on June 3 to collect them. When they got there, Tuesday’s department document says, they were handed by a Trump lawyer a “single Redweld envelope, double-wrapped in tape” containing documents.


A custodian for the records presented a sworn certification to the officials saying that “any and all responsive documents” to the subpoena had been located and produced. A Trump lawyer said that all records that had come from the White House had been held in one location — a storage room — and that there were none in any private space or other spot at the house.

But the FBI came to doubt the truth of those statements and obtained a search warrant to return on Aug. 8.


Officials had “developed evidence that government records were likely concealed and removed from the Storage Room and that efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government’s investigation,” the new Justice Department filing says.

In their August search, agents found classified documents not only in the storage room but also in the former president’s office — including three classified documents in office desks, according to the Justice Department. In some instances, the agents and attorneys conducting the review of seized documents required additional clearances since the material was so highly classified.

“That the FBI, in a matter of hours, recovered twice as many documents with classification markings as the ‘diligent search’ that the former president’s counsel and other representatives had weeks to perform calls into serious question the representations made in the June 3 certification and casts doubt on the extent of cooperation in this matter,” the document states.


In a court filing Wednesday night, lawyers for Trump decried the search as having taken place in “the midst of the standard give-and-take” between a former president and the National Archives and Records Administration over presidential records. It said the department had “gratuitously” made public certain information, including a photograph of classified documents seized from the home.

The Justice Department has stated in court filings that, besides investigating crimes related to the mishandling of national defence information and other documents, it is also looking into whether anyone committed obstruction. It is not clear from Tuesday’s filing how much of that inquiry might centre on Trump, who has repeatedly insisted that his team was cooperative with the FBI, as opposed to any of his lawyers or representatives who were directly involved in making the representations to the department. It’s also unclear what role Trump himself had in those representations.


Obstruction matters because it’s one of the factors investigators look for in weighing whether to bring charges. For instance, in his July 2016 announcement that the FBI would not be recommending criminal charges against Hillary Clinton in an investigation involving handling of her emails, FBI Director James Comey cited the absence of obstruction as one of the reasons.

When the Justice Department charged former CIA Director David Petraeus in 2015 with sharing classified information with his biographer, it made a point of including in court documents details about false statements prosecutors said he made during an FBI interview.

It is not the first time that an obstruction investigation has surfaced in connection with Trump. Special Counsel Robert Mueller investigated whether Trump had obstructed an inquiry into whether his 2016 presidential campaign had colluded with Russia, and though Mueller did not recommend charges against the then-sitting president, he also pointedly declined to exonerate him.


In the current case, federal investigators are likely evaluating why Trump representatives provided statements about the status of classified information at Mar-a-Lago that proved easily contradicted by the evidence, as well as which individuals were involved in removing boxes and why.

Sarah Krissoff, a New York lawyer and former federal prosecutor, said the detailed information in this week’s filing tells its own tale.

“Reading between the lines of what they were saying here, it suggests that they had very direct information from a source regarding the location of classified documents within Mar-a-Lago and essentially the concealment of, or lack of cooperation with, the prior efforts to recover those documents,” she said.


The purpose of the Tuesday night filing was to oppose a request from the Trump legal team for a special master to review the documents seized during this month’s search and to return to him certain seized property. U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon is to hear arguments on the matter Thursday.

Trump’s lawyers said in a Wednesday night filing that a special master was needed in the name of fairness, saying that “left unchecked, the DOJ will impugn, leak, and publicize selective aspects of their investigation.”

Cannon on Saturday said it was her “preliminary intent” to appoint such a person but also gave the Justice Department an opportunity to respond.

On Monday, the department said it had already completed its review of potentially privileged documents and identified a “limited set of materials that potentially contain attorney-client privileged information.” It said Tuesday that a special master was therefore unnecessary and that the presidential records that were taken from the home do not belong to Trump.

— Associated Press writers Jill Colvin and Michael Balsamo in New York contributed to this report.

Obstruction now a major focus in Trump documents probe

FBI investigation into top-secret information discovered at Mar-a-Lago is zeroing in on whether Donald Trump’s team obstructed the probe.

torontosun.com

Grasping at straws , it’s all they have .

 

[The_Foxer]

We still don’t know why Trump took – and apparently insisted on keeping – these documents

That is the biggest head scratcher for me.

If he was taking it just because he wanted the info - why not copy the folders and give the origianls back and hide the copies? pretty simple to do.

The information clearly isn't about him or at least most of it isn't, so he's not trying to destroy it to hide something. And if you were - just destroy it.

He knows the cops are going to come for it and that it's a legal issue - why take that risk in the first place when you could easily avoid it.

If he's a russian spy selling nuclear secrets then again - why keep the original?

It just makes no sense no matter how you look at it. No matter what he wanted to do with it keeping the originals was unnecessary.

 

[The_Foxer]

Grasping at straws , it’s all they have .

It's a pretty common 'go-to'. obviously obstruction is going to be hard to prove here. Obstruction is not when YOU do something to hide evidence, it's when you council someone else to take illegal action to do so. And they might try to claim he told his people to deliberately lie about things but they could just as easily say they were told something different and weren't deliberately doing wrong nor were they instructed to knowingly do something wrong so it's not obstruction.

But if there's the APPEARANCE of it, judges tend to be less forgiving in other areas.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

That is the biggest head scratcher for me.

If he was taking it just because he wanted the info - why not copy the folders and give the origianls back and hide the copies? pretty simple to do.

The information clearly isn't about him or at least most of it isn't, so he's not trying to destroy it to hide something. And if you were - just destroy it.

He knows the cops are going to come for it and that it's a legal issue - why take that risk in the first place when you could easily avoid it.

If he's a russian spy selling nuclear secrets then again - why keep the original?

It just makes no sense no matter how you look at it. No matter what he wanted to do with it keeping the originals was unnecessary.

He's a hoarder. How much evidence do you need before you'll believe what's been amply proven time and again? He grabs whatever he can, whether it's of use to him or not.

 

[The_Foxer]

He's a hoarder. How much evidence do you need before you'll believe what's been amply proven time and again? He grabs whatever he can, whether it's of use to him or not.

It seems like an overly simple explanation.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

It seems like an overly simple explanation.

For a textbook case. He's always done this. He carried boxes of random documents with him wherever he went. If asked him a tough question, he'd root through the box until he came up with a document that had nothing to do with the question, and crank up the bullshit machine (his mouth).

Columnist David von Drehle was an eyewitness to this show.

 

[spaminator]

U.S. judge signals willingness to appoint special master in Trump search case
Author of the article:Reuters
Reuters
Francisco Alvarado and Sarah N. Lynch
Publishing date:Sep 01, 2022 • 13 hours ago • 2 minute read • 41 Comments

WEST PALM BEACH — A federal judge on Thursday appeared sympathetic to former President Donald Trump’s request to appoint a special master to review the documents the FBI seized from his home in August, though she declined to issue a ruling immediately on the matter.


At a hearing in West Palm Beach, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon pressed the Justice Department on why it opposes the appointment of a special master in the case.


“Ultimately, what is the harm of appointing a special master to review these materials?” she asked. “What I’m wondering from the government – what is the harm beyond delaying the investigation?”

She also suggested that she could feasibly carve out an exception which would permit U.S. intelligence officials to continue conducting their national security damage assessment pending the appointment of the special master before the criminal probe can continue.

“Would your position change if the special master were allowed to proceed without affecting the [Office of the Director of National Intelligence] review for intelligence purposes, but pausing any use of the documents in a criminal investigation?” she asked federal prosecutors.


Thursday’s hearing came less than two days after prosecutors laid out fresh details about their ongoing criminal investigation into whether Trump illegally retained government records and sought to obstruct the government’s probe by concealing some of them from the FBI.

t records and sought to obstruct the government’s probe by concealing some of them from the FBI.


Trump’s attorneys in a filing late on Wednesday downplayed the government’s concerns about the discovery of classified material inside his home, and accused the Justice Department of escalating the situation even after he handed over boxes of documents to the National Archives and allowed FBI agents in June to “come to his home and provide security advice.”


“Simply put, the notion that Presidential records would contain sensitive information should have never been cause for alarm,” his lawyers wrote.

A special master is an independent third party sometimes appointed by a court in sensitive cases to review materials potentially covered by attorney-client privilege to ensure investigators do not improperly view them.

In Trump’s request to the court, his attorneys claimed that the former president wanted to protect materials that were subject to a legal doctrine known as executive privilege, which can shield some presidential communications.

But the Justice Department has argued that such a claim is illogical.

Trump “has no property interest in any presidential records(including classified records) seized from the premises,” prosecutors told the court on Tuesday, noting that a former president cannot assert executive privilege against the executive branch itself.

Prosecutors have also said the department’s filter team, a group of agents who are not part of the investigation, had already reviewed the materials, and determined only a limited number may be covered by attorney-client privilege.

U.S. judge signals willingness to appoint special master in Trump search case

A federal judge on Thursday declined to rule immediately on whether to grant Donald Trump's request to appoint a special master.

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

Trump says he will look 'very favourably' on pardons for Capitol rioters
Author of the article:Reuters
Reuters
Publishing date:Sep 01, 2022 • 9 hours ago • 1 minute read • Join the conversation

Former U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday said he was giving financial help to some supporters involved in the Jan. 6, 2021 assault on Congress and would look very favourably on giving pardons if he were again elected to the White House.


Thousands of Trump’s supporters stormed the Capitol after a fiery speech in which he repeated his false claims that his election defeat was the result of widespread fraud, an allegation repeatedly rejected by multiple courts, state election officials and members of Trump’s own administration.


“I will look very, very favourably about, about full pardons. If I decide to run and if I win, I will, I will be looking very, very strongly about pardons, full pardons,” Trump, who is considering a new run for president in 2024, told radio host Wendy Bell.

The onslaught on Congress, aimed at preventing certification of Democratic candidate Joe Biden’s victory in the November 2020 presidential election, led to several deaths and injured more than 140 police officers.

Around 850 people have been arrested for crimes related to the attack, including more than 250 charged with assaulting or impeding law enforcement.

Several members of the right-wing group, the Oath Keepers, were charged with seditious conspiracy.

Trump has consistently denied any wrongdoing regarding the events of Jan. 6 and said on Thursday he was providing help for some of those involved.

“I am financially supporting people that are incredible and they were in my office actually two days ago. It’s very much on my mind. It’s a disgrace what they’ve done to them,” he said.

Trump says he will look 'very favourably' on pardons for Capitol rioters

Donald Trump on Thursday said he was giving financial help to some supporters involved in the Jan. 6, 2021 assault on Congress.

torontosun.com

 

[Ron in Regina]

From the outside looking in, there’s a whole Lotta smoke (which usually means there’s so fire somewhere), but what has Donald Trump actually been charged with?

I’m not talking about convictions, But just charges that he’ll have to defend himself (or have a fleet of lawyers do this) against in court.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

From the outside looking in, there’s a whole Lotta smoke (which usually means there’s so fire somewhere), but what has Donald Trump actually been charged with?

I’m not talking about convictions, But just charges that he’ll have to defend himself (or have a fleet of lawyers do this) against in court.

He hasn't been charged yet. There are many possibilities.

 

[The_Foxer]

He hasn't been charged yet. There are many possibilities.

I guess the argument would be that they have to sift through all the stuff to find out ALL the things he could be charged with and make decisions about what to charge him with and that makes some sense, but it still seems weird. If the cops raid a drug den and find 10 lbs of coke, they charge the guys right now and note that additional charges will be laid.

They make it sound like at least SOME charges are pretty cut and dry - It's illegal to have classified files they say and they say they found classified files. What's the hold up?

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

You've already expressed your unshakable conviction that this cannot be legitimately prosecuted, so what's the point in explaining anything to you?