Special counsel slams idea that Trump could claim classified docs as personal records

Accepting such an argument would be “pure fiction,” the special counsel argued.

Special counsel Jack Smith, responding on Tuesday to the judge overseeing former President Donald Trump’s classified documents case, urged her to reverse course on entertaining the idea that Trump had any personal ownership over the classified materials he has been charged with unlawfully possessing.

In a late-night filing replying to an order last month from Judge Aileen Cannon requesting proposed jury instructions that appeared to accept at face value what legal experts have argued is one of Trump’s most fringe defenses – that the former president had unchecked ability to claim all classified records as his personal property – Smith argued that accepting such an argument would not only be “pure fiction,” but “meritless and fatally undermined” by all the evidence gathered by the government as part of their case.

Among that evidence, according to Smith, are interviews with Trump’s own Presidential Records Act representatives and “numerous” high-ranking officials from the White House, none of which “had heard Trump say that he was designating records as personal,”

Crowfiend,

Can we actually just ban articles that use ‘slam’ in the title? Unless it’s two physical objects colliding? You know, actually slamming into each other?

I’m so fucking sick of this piece of garbage hyperbole.

recapitated,

“Crowfiend blasts author of article about prosecution slamming idea”

Toneswirly,

Cmon and SLAM and welcome to the JAM

LodeMike,

I don’t read any article with “slam” in the headline.

TropicalDingdong,

Im so sick of that word in journalism.

Rapidcreek,

The Presidential Records Act makes no mention of the criminal statutes under which The Messiah has been charged and there is no conflict between the Act and those criminal laws. See Carcieri v. Salazar, 555 U.S. 379, 395 (2009) (“Absent a clearly expressed congressional intention, an implied repeal will only be found where provisions in two statutes are in irreconcilable conflict, or where the latter Act covers the whole subject of the earlier one and is clearly intended as a substitute.”)

formergijoe,

Executive Order 12958 was amended on March 25, 2003, by Executive Order 13292, to read as follows:

Sec. 4.1. General Restrictions on Access.

(a) A person may have access to classified information provided that:


<span style="color:#323232;">(1) a favorable determination of eligibility for access has been made by an agency head or the agency head's designee;
</span><span style="color:#323232;">
</span><span style="color:#323232;">(2) the person has signed an approved nondisclosure agreement; and
</span><span style="color:#323232;">
</span><span style="color:#323232;">(3) the person has a need-to-know the information.
</span>

© Classified information shall remain under the control of the originating agency or its successor in function.

(d) Classified information may not be removed from official premises without proper authorization.

Seems pretty cut and dry to me, but I’m not a paid shill for Trump.

federatingIsTooHard,
@federatingIsTooHard@lemmy.world avatar

(d) Classified information may not be removed from official premises without proper authorization.

seems to me that the president probably has the power to properly authorize himself to remove classified information, being the chief executive and the commander in chief. is there any reason to suppose he doesn’t?

neptune,

A) he said he doesn’t

B) he’s not the declassification authority on all classified information

federatingIsTooHard,
@federatingIsTooHard@lemmy.world avatar

A) he said he doesn’t

he’s not a constitutional lawyer

neptune,

OK so normally when you are accused of a crime, you hire a lawyer who advises you not to talk about the charges. Why? Because then you say dumb shit like “well it was manslaughter because he robbed me” when your defense was focused on casting doubt it was you who pulled the trigger.

In this case, Trump may not be an authority, and that’s the point, it speaks to his INTENT. His intent was clearly to circumvent rules. Why is this even a discussion? This has all been thoroughly parsed.

federatingIsTooHard,
@federatingIsTooHard@lemmy.world avatar

OK so normally when you are accused of a crime, you hire a lawyer who advises you not to talk about the charges. Why? Because then you say dumb shit like “well it was manslaughter because he robbed me” when your defense was focused on casting doubt it was you who pulled the trigger.

this felt a little condescending, but i suppose some people might need to understand this.

federatingIsTooHard,
@federatingIsTooHard@lemmy.world avatar

Why is this even a discussion? This has all been thoroughly parsed.

i don’t hang on every bit of news about trump.

federatingIsTooHard,
@federatingIsTooHard@lemmy.world avatar

B) he’s not the declassification authority on all classified information

can you cite that?

neptune,

brennancenter.org/…/government-classification-and…

Uh yeah, even the stuff the president has authority for, he’d need an executive authority, which is more than just shouting I DECLARE IT’S DECLASSIFIED in a hallway of the Pentagon.

formergijoe,

Brian Butler said he helped Trump aide Walt Nauta load about 10 to 15 boxes onto Trump’s plane at the West Palm Beach airport near his resort in June 2022,

Even if President Trump authorized the movement to Mar-A-Lago, in June 2022 citizen Trump did not have the authorization to have classified documents moved. Now you could argue it was just Butler and Nauta moving these documents and not Trump himself, but that still doesn’t mean Trump had need-to-know to keep these documents on site and that the documents now belong to their authorizing agency. Even if the executive branch was the authorizing agency, the Biden administration is the successor of function and owns these classified documents.

federatingIsTooHard,
@federatingIsTooHard@lemmy.world avatar

i have to say that this does not seem cut-and-dry. i’m not interested in defending any politician, and trump less than most, but i also think that laws are bad and would err on the side of ignoring or abolishing the law in about every case. given this proclivity, my lack of expertise, and the lack of clarity, i’m of the opinion that this whole endeavor is a big waste of time and energy.

crystalmerchant,

S L A M S

R962U8_Lem,

Apparently this is only word news agencies know anymore. Ugh…

ripcord,
@ripcord@lemmy.world avatar

o shit he slammed

SLAMMED

WraithGear,
@WraithGear@lemmy.world avatar

How far can she go before someone calls her on these? And who should i be looking at to intervene? Usually corrupted judges have to at least appear unbiased.

Fredselfish,
@Fredselfish@lemmy.world avatar

Nothing apparently she will do this and our DOJ will do nothing. I truly believe all the cases against Trump are a show. No one wants to prosecute him because they fear his deranged base.

So they going play this out then wait until after November. If he wins then America is fucked. If he doesn’t then maybe then they will do something.

Until then it’s all a big show so might well not be surprised about anything you hear or see in these cases.

Ranvier,

While I share your frustration, “doj will do nothing” makes no sense. You’re commenting on an article about the department of justice literally doing something, that’s what the article is about. They’re making more filings opposing her ridiculous questions. They made this one out of the blue, just demanding she make a decision on a bunch of pending questions she’s asked so they can appeal her probably dumb decisions. And the department of justice is the one bringing this criminal case in the first place, what do you mean “do nothing?”

The problem is she’s only telegraphed verbally and with the kinds of questions she’s asking for arguments on that she’s going to do something dumb to provide cover for Trump, but until she does the dumb thing and makes her decision there’s nothing for the department of justice to appeal. And even if they want to get her kicked off the case, which I suspect they do at this point even though that’s risky and delays things further, they need more evidence of her making dumb rulings to get that to happen. Until she actually makes the ruling and doesn’t just hint at doing something dumb, they’ve got nothing though. Point is, save your hatred for the Judge Cannon and the many other judges rated “not competent” by the American bar association that Trump and Republicans in the senate pushed through.

Ranvier, (edited )

The problem is she’s not issuing actual rulings. She keeps asking for arguments from lawyers, telegraphs she’s going to do something stupid, and then just let’s the motion hang undecided, for months. No rulings so nothing to appeal. The fear being she won’t make decisions until the trial is underway and they would essentially be not appealable at that time. Prosecutors/department of justice here are just demanding in legalese that she make some rulings so it would be appealable before the trial and they can have the appeals court shoot her down again like they always do, but ultimately they can’t really force her to do so. I think some of her insane questions and continuing to ask for arguments and not issuing rulings is just general incompetence, at least based on other cases she’s been involved in where she’s making constant very basic mistakes and her extreme inexperience (rated not competent during her nomination by American bar association). But of course all of this has the effect of delays, delays delays, even more than the Trump lawyers themselves were hoping to delay it. And by the time she finally makes some (dumb easily overturnable) decisions on these things, and Jack Smith appeals them, well there’s another delay waiting for the appeal, and then even more delay if they raise enough questions to have a new judge appointed. I think a lot of these dumb questions she’s asking and entertaining from lawyers is because she legitimately doesn’t understand the laws at play here and is having the lawyers explain it to her.

While she seems quite incompetent at her job, it certainly seems like she must be doing this deliberately at least to some degree too. It’s just getting harder and harder to see this actually getting done by the time of the election, thanks to this judge’s hard work to provide cover for Trump’s criminal activities. She also provided a lot of delays before the trial proceedings with the initial investigation and the whole stupid search warrant challenge case before the appeals court told her stop this bullshit with no basis in law and dismissed the whole case out of hand. I think any objective observer looking at this situation would come to the conclusion that Judge Cannon is only interested in helping Trump politically however possible and couldn’t give two shits about the law.

rayyy,

she seems quite incompetent at her job, it certainly seems like she must be doing this deliberately at least to some degree too

Maybe, lots of coaching from Putin’s Pals.

Ranvier,

I think little of column A, little of column B, a mix of malice and incompetence.

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