Mar-a-Lago raid

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About two dozen boxes of presidential records stored in then-President Donald Trump’s White House residence were not returned to the National Archives and Records Administration in the final days of his term even after Archives officials were told by a Trump lawyer that the documents should be given back, according to an email from the top lawyer at the record-keeping agency. “It is also our understanding that roughly two dozen boxes of original presidential records were kept in the Residence of the White House over the course of President Trump’s last year in office and have not been transferred to NARA, despite a determination by Pat Cipollone in the final days of the administration that they need to be,” wrote Gary Stern, the agency’s chief counsel, in an email to Trump lawyers in May 2021, according to a copy reviewed by The Washington Post. The email shows NARA officials were concerned about Trump keeping dozens of boxes of official records even before he left the White House — concerns that only grew in the coming months as Trump repeatedly declined to return the records. It also showed that Trump’s lawyers had concerns about Trump taking the documents and agreed that the boxes should be returned — at least according to the top Archives officials — while Trump kept the documents.

Archives asked for records in 2021 after Trump lawyer agreed they should be returned, email says

• This goes back as far as to the final days of his government
  
• Even Trump's own lawyer agreed the documents should be returned. 
  

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Much of that evidence is still under seal, but, as a letter dated May 10 from acting US archivist Debra Steidel Wall to Trump’s attorney Evan Corcoran indicates, the 15 boxes the government retrieved in January contained hundreds of pages of documents with classified markings, up to the level of Special Access Program (SAP) — security protocols which heavily restrict access to some of the government’s most sensitive information. Those documents were intermingled with “newspapers, magazines, printed news articles, photos, miscellaneous print-outs, notes, presidential correspondence, [and] personal and post-presidential records,” according to the affidavit. Furthermore, the evidence presented in the affidavit indicates that at least some of those records discuss clandestine human intelligence operations — spying — as the New York Times’ Julian E. Barnes and Mark Mazzetti wrote Friday. 

Should information about those sources, the information they collect, and how they collect it get into unauthorized hands, not only could it jeopardize US intelligence gathering, but it puts the lives of people who spy on behalf of the US at risk. Though Trump claimed he had a standing order to declassify information at Mar-a-Lago, documents of this sort would be marked HCS for Human Intelligence Control System; that system is tightly guarded to keep the information, techniques, and people used to gather it safe. “It would be reckless to declassify an HCS document without checking with the agency that collected the information to ensure that there would be no damage if the information were disclosed,” former legal adviser to the National Security Council John Bellinger III told the Times.

The Mar-a-Lago affidavit, explained - Vox

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As a first-time presidential candidate, Donald Trump repeatedly demanded that Hillary Clinton be sent to jail. “Lock her up” emerged as a battle cry for the 45th president and his fans. He also pledged that his presidency would properly handle the nation’s secrets. “In my administration, I’m going to enforce all laws concerning the protection of classified information,” he intoned at a 2016 rally in North Carolina. “No one will be above the law.” As promises go, this one aged badly – much like his commitment to release his tax returns..

In early June, Trump and Bobb, Trump’s attorney and a former marine, delivered to the government a packet of documents in a sealed folder. A certificate signed by Bobbattested to the fact that “any and all responsive documents accompany this certification”. Apparently not. Instead, the government subsequently “developed evidence” that “efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government’s investigation”. Who was involved in the conspiracy is an unanswered question.

New legal filings paint Trump as a flailing liar surrounded by lackeys | Lloyd Green | The Guardian

• Early bluster no comes back to bite him
  
• Lawyer signed that all documents were returned after having been subpoenaed in June, but there were lots more documents that showed up outside of the storage locker. 
  
• The Lawyer didn't check this but was informed, but by whom? Trump?
  

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In itemizing the contents of boxes of seized materials, the inventory, put together by the justice department, showed the FBI retrieved 71 empty folders from Trump’s office and 19 empty folders from a storage room when agents executed a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago earlier this month. The empty folders carried one of two designations, according to the inventory: some files had “Classified” banners, while other files were labeled “Return to Staff Secretary/Military Aide”, appearing to indicate that highly sensitive documents were not returned as designated. The startling discovery immediately raised, for the first time, the prospect that some of the US government’s most closely guarded secrets could remain unaccounted for, even after the FBI went through Mar-a-Lago and retrieved vast amounts of materials from the property.

FBI materials seized from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home included 90 empty folders | Donald Trump | The Guardian

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The FBI recovered a document describing a foreign government’s nuclear capabilities during its search of Mar-a-Lago, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday... Among the records recovered by the FBI were documents detailing top-secret US operations that require special clearances “on a need-to-know basis”, beyond a top-secret clearance, according to the Post report. Some of the Biden administration’s most senior national security officials were not authorized to review some of the documents because they are so restricted, the Post said. Trump is under investigation by the justice department for his unauthorized removal of highly sensitive government records from the White House and for allegedly improperly storing them at Mar-a-Lago.

FBI found document on foreign nuclear defenses at Mar-a-Lago – report | Donald Trump | The Guardian

Shawn Turner, former director of communications for US national intelligence, was searing in his criticism during an interview Wednesday on CNN’s New Day: The fact we now know there were highly classified, restricted access documents about another country’s nuclear defense capabilities stored at Mar-a-Lago is a gamechanger with regard to the risk it poses to our national security. That these documents may have been seen by unauthorized personnel … tells individuals what our capabilities are with regard to intelligence collection related to nuclear programs. More important is it identifies or exposes our gaps with regard to intelligence collection. The bottom line is others are going to look at this information and determine what we know and don’t know, and they’re going to make decisions about their nuclear programs based on that information. And that is an extremely dangerous thing.

Nuclear secrets reportedly found at Mar-a-Lago are ‘gamechanger’, experts say – live

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But U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon (photo), nominated by then-President Donald Trump and confirmed after he lost the 2020 election, has once again defied convention. Her first headline-grabbing act was to accept the case Trump’s legal team filed when they went “judge shopping” and bypassed the court and judge handling Trump’s lawsuit against the Government of the United States for executing a “search and seizure” warrant on Mar-a-Lago.

READ MORE: ‘Almost Impossibly Stupid’: George Conway Slams Trump-Appointed Judge’s Opinion on Special Master

Her second headline-grabbing act was to announce, without hearing any argument from the U.S. Dept. of Justice, that she intended to appoint a “special master,” and her third headline-grabbing act was to go through with that declaration, despite, as legal experts have made clear, there is no reason to do so, and these independent third-parties are almost always appointed only in criminal cases after charges have been filed.

Headline-grabbing act number five: rejecting an amicus brief from seven top Republican legal experts, represented by a team of top-notch legal experts, not even explaining why. “New,” The Guardian’s Hugo Lowell reports. “Judge Cannon — overseeing Trump special master case — rejects proposed amicus brief submitted by former DOJ and state officials who served in GOP admins that opposed appointing a special master, per new paperless order.”

'Can’t recall ever seeing this happen before': Legal experts blast MAGA judge for rejecting GOP filing - Alternet.org

• Trump's gotten way better treatment than any other person would have in similar circumstances.
  

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Judge Aileen Cannon’s order suspending one of the Justice Department’s criminal investigations into former President Donald Trump, at least until a court-appointed official can review documents the FBI seized from Trump, is a trainwreck of judicial reasoning. Cannon mangles the law so completely that it’s hard to know where to even begin in criticizing her opinion in Trump v. United States.

For starters, Cannon, who was appointed to the federal bench by Trump days after he lost the 2020 election, argues fairly explicitly that Trump is entitled to special rules that apply to virtually no other criminal defendant, because he used to be a powerful person. Seriously, Cannon argued that the rules don’t apply to Trump in large part because, as a former president, he faces “reputational harm” that is of a “decidedly different order of magnitude” than that facing another person who may be indicted.

This opinion is an affront to anyone who believes that all Americans, whether a pauper or a former president, are subject to the same laws.
On a practical level, it could also allow Cannon or other judges to delay this criminal investigation into Trump indefinitely. Cannon’s opinion is not simply wrong, it plays with legal concepts, such as executive privilege, which she seems to barely understand. And it races to grant relief to Trump that could impose countless hurdles between the Justice Department and its ability to investigate Trump.

Indeed, just the portions of Cannon’s opinion dealing with executive privilege, which make up only a small part of the decision, are complicated and uncertain enough that they could potentially force months or even years of litigation to resolve. And, Cannon ordered the United States to halt its criminal investigation into the documents seized from Trump — something she decidedly does not have the power to do — until after the process she set up to review those documents is complete...

Because Cannon’s opinion is so riddled with legal errors — my analysis of the opinion only scratches the surface of the many problems with this decision — a higher court could potentially permit DOJ to resume the investigation on appeal. But the DOJ’s first line of appeal is the 11th Circuit, a GOP-dominated court where six of the 11 active judges were appointed by Donald Trump. In the fairly likely event that the DOJ draws a panel of Trump appointees (or other similarly ideological judges) to hear its appeal, that panel could sit on the case for months before issuing a decision that mirrors Cannon’s. And what then, appeal to the Supreme Court, where Republican appointees enjoy a 6-3 supermajority?

That “special master” decision could delay the FBI investigation into Trump by years - Vox

• Another partisan judge handing out free get out of jail cards
  

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On Monday, Judge Aileen Cannon — a Trump appointee to the federal bench — issued a surprising order that effectively halted much of the Justice Department’s criminal investigation into classified records it recovered last month from former President Donald Trump. Cannon’s legal reasoning has been widely mocked by lawyers from across the political spectrum. Today, the Justice Department made its first attempt to regain control over the classified documents.

In a motion asking Cannon to stay parts of her order, the Justice Department warns that the order risks “irreparable harm to our national security and intelligence interests” by sabotaging the intelligence community’s efforts to determine whether any of the sensitive information contained in the seized records has leaked beyond Trump. To understand why, you have to understand a bit about what makes Cannon’s order odd..

DOJ warns Judge Cannon: delaying the FBI’s Trump investigation risks national security - Vox

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Former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance, on MSNBC, says the additional information appears to confirm that Donald Trump likely played a role in instructing his attorney, who ultimately certified there were no classified documents remaining at Mar-a-Lago, before federal agents entered the Trump resort and retrieved more than 100 classified and top secret documents. “This does in large part make the information that’s been revealed consistent between the D.C. and the Florida investigations,” Vance, a professor of law, told Nicolle Wallace. Vance suggested that the newly revealed information appears to confirm that Trump was at least involved in the events that led his attorney to tell DOJ there were no more classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.

Unsealed Mar-a-Lago affidavit shows Donald Trump 'did play a role' in hiding documents: legal analyst - Alternet.org

• Oops..
  

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A onetime White House lawyer under President Donald J. Trump warned him late last year that Mr. 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 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.

The account of the conversation is the latest evidence that Mr. Trump had been informed of the legal perils of holding onto 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 Mr. Herschmann, Mr. Trump turned over to the National Archives 15 boxes of material he had taken with him from the White House. Those boxes turned out to contain 184 classified documents, the Justice Department has said.

But Mr. Trump continued to hold onto 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 by F.B.I. agents last month.

• Misleading Information: The National Archives told the Justice Department that a lawyer representing Mr. Trump indicated to the archives last year that boxes the former president had taken to Mar-a-Lago from the White House included only nonclassified material, according to a person briefed on the matter.
  

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

• He was warned, but held on to most of the documents until he was subpoenaed
  
• Then he returned more documents and had a lawyer say that everything was returned
  
• This too turned out to be false, as the FBI found stacks of documents, some of which with the highest security classification in the court-ordered search.