WaPo: Trump Mar-A-Lago docs were clearly marked “Classified”, were top-secret

[GermanSuplex]

So, nothing new. Trump breaks the law. This also puts his staffers at legal risk. I’m really curious to see how the guy who ran against Hillary’s emails and bashed her relentlessly for her server will downplay this, although there’s zero doubt he will. He’ll claim absolute authority - then and now - to possess those documents in any manner he wants, he’ll claim any investigation is a “witch hunt”, and we all know his supporters won’t care, including those in congress, because their beef with Clinton was never about national security or breaking the law. It was about a political win.

Trump’s spokesperson is calling this “fake news” and says the National Archives are the only ones who can speak on this:

Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich said: “It is clear that a normal and routine process is being weaponized by anonymous, politically motivated government sources to peddle Fake News. The only entity with the ability to credibly dispute this false reporting, the National Archives, is providing no comment.”

Looking forward to see how they shift the narrative when it turns out this isn’t fake news at all, but cold facts.

Some Trump records taken to Mar-a-Lago clearly marked as classified, including documents at ‘top secret’ level — The Washington Post

Some of the White House documents that Donald Trump improperly took to his Mar-a-Lago residence were clearly marked as classified, including documents at the “top secret” level, according to two people familiar with the matter.

apple.news

 

[SuperMatt]

So, nothing new. Trump breaks the law. This also puts his staffers at legal risk. I’m really curious to see how the guy who ran against Hillary’s emails and bashed her relentlessly for his server will downplay this, although there’s zero doubt he will. He’ll claim absolute authority - then and now - to possess those documents in any manner he wants, he’ll claim any investigation is a “witch hunt”, and we all know his supporters won’t care, including those in congress, because their beef with Clinton was never about national security or breaking the law. It was about a political win.

Some Trump records taken to Mar-a-Lago clearly marked as classified, including documents at ‘top secret’ level — The Washington Post

Some of the White House documents that Donald Trump improperly took to his Mar-a-Lago residence were clearly marked as classified, including documents at the “top secret” level, according to two people familiar with the matter.

apple.news

Yes, I would love to see Republicans chanting “lock him up” in response to this illegal destruction of government documents and mishandling of classified documents.

 

[Chew Toy McCoy]

His supporters will probably just use some "You know when you're moving and you just have to throw a bunch of shit in boxes because the movers are there?" defense.

 

[SuperMatt]

His supporters will probably just use some "You know when you're moving and you just have to throw a bunch of shit in boxes because the movers are there?" defense.

I went to the Fox News website. No mention of this AT ALL. I did a search for the world “classified” and saw nothing related to this story, but a few older articles attacking Hillary.

The only story they seem to care about at the moment is something about Biden traveling across America on Air Force One in a Santa suit, jumping down chimneys and giving crack pipes to all the little boys and girls! Ho ho ho!

 

[Chew Toy McCoy]

I went to the Fox News website. No mention of this AT ALL. I did a search for the world “classified” and saw nothing related to this story, but a few older articles attacking Hillary.

The only story they seem to care about at the moment is something about Biden traveling across America on Air Force One in a Santa suit, jumping down chimneys and giving crack pipes to all the little boys and girls! Ho ho ho!

It's sometimes astonishing how Fox can completely ignore the biggest story in the news on every other source except Fox. I guess there are some things that not even their spin wizards can fix. A good sign that they are avoiding a major national story that they can't defend is when their top story is an isolated event of some minority person doing something bad. Bonus if the victim is white.

 

[Huntn]

So, nothing new. Trump breaks the law. This also puts his staffers at legal risk. I’m really curious to see how the guy who ran against Hillary’s emails and bashed her relentlessly for his server will downplay this, although there’s zero doubt he will. He’ll claim absolute authority - then and now - to possess those documents in any manner he wants, he’ll claim any investigation is a “witch hunt”, and we all know his supporters won’t care, including those in congress, because their beef with Clinton was never about national security or breaking the law. It was about a political win.

Trump’s spokesperson is calling this “fake news” and says the National Archives are the only ones who can speak on this:

Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich said: “It is clear that a normal and routine process is being weaponized by anonymous, politically motivated government sources to peddle Fake News. The only entity with the ability to credibly dispute this false reporting, the National Archives, is providing no comment.”

Looking forward to see how they shift the narrative when it turns out this isn’t fake news at all, but cold facts.

Some Trump records taken to Mar-a-Lago clearly marked as classified, including documents at ‘top secret’ level — The Washington Post

Some of the White House documents that Donald Trump improperly took to his Mar-a-Lago residence were clearly marked as classified, including documents at the “top secret” level, according to two people familiar with the matter.

apple.news

Simple cause and effect. That shit head needs to be in jail and if he does not end up there, then we deserve the bad outcome.

 

[GermanSuplex]

There seems to be so much corruption. around Trump that I’m starting to become more hopeful he will be indicted, maybe in both state and federal courts. He may be popular, but Americans have a short attention span. They’ll be pissed if he’s indicted and serves even a day in prison, but they’ll get over it quickly.

I mean. It’s a dangerous precedent to allow this much BS to go unanswered. Bill Barr spent a lot of time defending Trump, and was too busy kissing his ass and acting as his personal attorney to push the scams Trump wanted. Merrick Garland has no criminal doofus in the White House, and his time isn’t spent defending Biden. So hopefully he gets to the bottom of this - and other crimes - and starts prosecuting these scumbags, all the way up to and including Trump.

Republicans are facing a lot of heat since the RNC censured Kinzinger and Cheney. The twisting and knitting these folks are getting themselves into trying to not embrace January 6 without condemning it is having a domino effect on local parties. This needs to be drilled into American minds every bit as much as “but her emails”. January 6 and taking protected and classified documents out of the White House and to a private golf club should be used to hammer every Republican who embraces Trump and/or the big lie.

 

[SuperMatt]

There seems to be so much corruption. around Trump that I’m starting to become more hopeful he will be indicted, maybe in both state and federal courts. He may be popular, but Americans have a short attention span. They’ll be pissed if he’s indicted and serves even a day in prison, but they’ll get over it quickly.

I mean. It’s a dangerous precedent to allow this much BS to go unanswered. Bill Barr spent a lot of time defending Trump, and was too busy kissing his ass and acting as his personal attorney to push the scams Trump wanted. Merrick Garland has no criminal doofus in the White House, and his time isn’t spent defending Biden. So hopefully he gets to the bottom of this - and other crimes - and starts prosecuting these scumbags, all the way up to and including Trump.

Republicans are facing a lot of heat since the RNC censured Kinzinger and Cheney. The twisting and knitting these folks are getting themselves into trying to not embrace January 6 without condemning it is having a domino effect on local parties. This needs to be drilled into American minds every bit as much as “but her emails”. January 6 and taking protected and classified documents out of the White House and to a private golf club should be used to hammer every Republican who embraces Trump and/or the big lie.

Multiple polls are showing that only about 30% of people want Trump to run again in 2024. Maybe the Republicans haven’t gotten that memo? Bending over backwards to appease Trump looks like it’s a losing strategy for the party.

 

[Cmaier]

Lock Him Up™

 

[Huntn]

There seems to be so much corruption. around Trump that I’m starting to become more hopeful he will be indicted, maybe in both state and federal courts. He may be popular, but Americans have a short attention span. They’ll be pissed if he’s indicted and serves even a day in prison, but they’ll get over it quickly.

I mean. It’s a dangerous precedent to allow this much BS to go unanswered. Bill Barr spent a lot of time defending Trump, and was too busy kissing his ass and acting as his personal attorney to push the scams Trump wanted. Merrick Garland has no criminal doofus in the White House, and his time isn’t spent defending Biden. So hopefully he gets to the bottom of this - and other crimes - and starts prosecuting these scumbags, all the way up to and including Trump.

Republicans are facing a lot of heat since the RNC censured Kinzinger and Cheney. The twisting and knitting these folks are getting themselves into trying to not embrace January 6 without condemning it is having a domino effect on local parties. This needs to be drilled into American minds every bit as much as “but her emails”. January 6 and taking protected and classified documents out of the White House and to a private golf club should be used to hammer every Republican who embraces Trump and/or the big lie.

Fingers crossed but I’m a pessimist. I want to see Donny wearing unfashionable stripes, but you don’t always get what you want.

 

[fooferdoggie]

looks like really nothing can be done it is a law thats unenforceable. all trump has to say is he declassified them. now it can be used to show how little he takes security and such but legally he will be fine. but really it jsut needs to be used to show How worthless he was as a president.

 

[Cmaier]

looks like really nothing can be done it is a law thats unenforceable. all trump has to say is he declassified them. now it can be used to show how little he takes security and such but legally he will be fine. but really it jsut needs to be used to show How worthless he was as a president.

He can’t retroactively declassify them and he would need to have documented that he did so

 

[fooferdoggie]

He can’t retroactively declassify them and he would need to have documented that he did so

The president’s classification and declassification powers are broad
Experts agreed that the president, as commander-in-chief, is ultimately responsible for classification and declassification. When someone lower in the chain of command handles classification and declassification duties -- which is usually how it’s done -- it’s because they have been delegated to do so by the president directly, or by an appointee chosen by the president.

The majority ruling in the 1988 Supreme Court case Department of Navy vs. Egan -- which addressed the legal recourse of a Navy employee who had been denied a security clearance -- addresses this line of authority.

"The President, after all, is the ‘Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States’" according to Article II of the Constitution, the court’s majority wrote. "His authority to classify and control access to information bearing on national security ... flows primarily from this constitutional investment of power in the President, and exists quite apart from any explicit congressional grant."

Steven Aftergood, director of the Federation of American Scientists Project on Government Secrecy, said that such authority gives the president the authority to "classify and declassify at will."

In fact, Robert F. Turner, associate director of the University of Virginia's Center for National Security Law, said that "if Congress were to enact a statute seeking to limit the president’s authority to classify or declassify national security information, or to prohibit him from sharing certain kinds of information with Russia, it would raise serious separation of powers constitutional issues."

The official documents governing classification and declassification stem from executive orders. But even these executive orders aren’t necessarily binding on the president. The president is not "obliged to follow any procedures other than those that he himself has prescribed," Aftergood said. "And he can change those."

Indeed, the controlling executive order has been rewritten by multiple presidents. The current version of the order was issued by President Barack Obama in 2009.

The national-security experts at the blog Lawfare wrote in the wake of the Post’s revelation that the "infamous comment" by President Richard Nixon -- that "when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal" -- "is actually true about some things. Classified information is one of them. The nature of the system is that the president gets to disclose what he wants."

Two caveats
So Risch’s comment holds water when it comes to the extent of the president’s powers. But some experts said that Risch’s formulation leaves out some notable aspects of the particular case involving Trump.

The first caveat: While Trump has the power to declassify information, he doesn’t appear to have done that in this case, at least at the time the story broke.

"There’s no question that the president has broad authority to declassify almost anything at any time without any process, but that’s not what happened here," said Stephen I. Vladeck, professor at the University of Texas School of Law. "He did not, in fact, declassify the information he shared with the Russians, which is why the Washington Post did not publish that information."

 

[Cmaier]

The president’s classification and declassification powers are broad
Experts agreed that the president, as commander-in-chief, is ultimately responsible for classification and declassification. When someone lower in the chain of command handles classification and declassification duties -- which is usually how it’s done -- it’s because they have been delegated to do so by the president directly, or by an appointee chosen by the president.

The majority ruling in the 1988 Supreme Court case Department of Navy vs. Egan -- which addressed the legal recourse of a Navy employee who had been denied a security clearance -- addresses this line of authority.

"The President, after all, is the ‘Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States’" according to Article II of the Constitution, the court’s majority wrote. "His authority to classify and control access to information bearing on national security ... flows primarily from this constitutional investment of power in the President, and exists quite apart from any explicit congressional grant."

Steven Aftergood, director of the Federation of American Scientists Project on Government Secrecy, said that such authority gives the president the authority to "classify and declassify at will."

In fact, Robert F. Turner, associate director of the University of Virginia's Center for National Security Law, said that "if Congress were to enact a statute seeking to limit the president’s authority to classify or declassify national security information, or to prohibit him from sharing certain kinds of information with Russia, it would raise serious separation of powers constitutional issues."

The official documents governing classification and declassification stem from executive orders. But even these executive orders aren’t necessarily binding on the president. The president is not "obliged to follow any procedures other than those that he himself has prescribed," Aftergood said. "And he can change those."

Indeed, the controlling executive order has been rewritten by multiple presidents. The current version of the order was issued by President Barack Obama in 2009.

The national-security experts at the blog Lawfare wrote in the wake of the Post’s revelation that the "infamous comment" by President Richard Nixon -- that "when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal" -- "is actually true about some things. Classified information is one of them. The nature of the system is that the president gets to disclose what he wants."

Two caveats
So Risch’s comment holds water when it comes to the extent of the president’s powers. But some experts said that Risch’s formulation leaves out some notable aspects of the particular case involving Trump.

The first caveat: While Trump has the power to declassify information, he doesn’t appear to have done that in this case, at least at the time the story broke.

"There’s no question that the president has broad authority to declassify almost anything at any time without any process, but that’s not what happened here," said Stephen I. Vladeck, professor at the University of Texas School of Law. "He did not, in fact, declassify the information he shared with the Russians, which is why the Washington Post did not publish that information."

None of which contradicts what I said. He is not president, so he can’t declassify anything. So he’d have to have evidence that he declassified stuff when he was still president. He has no such evidence, and it sounds like there’s plenty of evidence that he did not.

 

[fooferdoggie]

None of which contradicts what I said. He is not president, so he can’t declassify anything. So he’d have to have evidence that he declassified stuff when he was still president. He has no such evidence, and it sounds like there’s plenty of evidence that he did not.

I don't think you can prove he did not already declassify something. Plus the law has no teeth there is no punishment for it. just like the hatch act he defied that over and over. I Was listening to PBS news hour and the legal expert explained it pretty well.

 

[Cmaier]

I don't think you can prove he did not already declassify something. Plus the law has no teeth there is no punishment for it. just like the hatch act he defied that over and over. I Was listening to PBS news hour and the legal expert explained it pretty well.

If only I knew a very handsome legal expert.

You can prove intent from circumstantial evidence. For example, he actually did document when he declassified stuff every other time he did it, so the fact that there are no documents this time tends to show he did not this time.

And it’s punishable by up to 3 years in prison and/or fine, PLUS disqualification from future office. See 18 USC 2071.

 

[fooferdoggie]

If only I knew a very handsome legal expert.

You can prove intent from circumstantial evidence. For example, he actually did document when he declassified stuff every other time he did it, so the fact that there are no documents this time tends to show he did not this time.

And it’s punishable by up to 3 years in prison and/or fine, PLUS disqualification from future office. See 18 USC 2071.

is that for the president or for a flunky? yep a flunky the president can declassify anything he wants to all he has to do is say it it seems. no one did anything when he broke the hatch act why would they do anything with this?

 

[SuperMatt]

Former presidents cannot declassify after they leave office. But it will be hard to prove either the gross negligence or intentional disclosure required by the law. There was some classified information in Hillary’s emails, but it was determined to be unintentional leakage, not criminal, and not even gross negligence. This looks to be worse, but I still think it’s a bit of a high bar to get over.

 

[Huntn]

He can’t retroactively declassify them and he would need to have documented that he did so

And I think there is a law about handling of Presidential papers. You just can’t empty your White House offices out into the trunk of your car. Another interesting aspect is that this may be one of the most prolific cases of classifying documents to hide your crimes But I am speculating about that.

 

[Cmaier]

And I think there is a law about handling of Presidential papers. You just can’t empty your White House offices out into the trunk of your car. Another interesting aspect is that this may be one of the most prolific cases of classifying documents to hide your crimes But I am speculating about that.

Yes, it may also have been obstruction of justice. My point is that there is a nice law with real teeth that is directly on point, contrary to what a lot of TV lawyers seem to say. (To be fair, I’ve also heard a lot of TV lawyers get this correct - the issue isn’t that the law has no teeth, the issue is that it may be difficult to prove and not worth the political mess)