I have waited for a year for this raid. Trump had a melt down because he allegedly destroyed documents, which bars him from office ever again
quote
WASHINGTON (AP) — The FBI searched former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate as part of an investigation into whether he took?classified records from the White House?to his Florida residence, people familiar with the matter said Monday.?Trump?disclosed the action in a lengthy statement, asserting that agents had broken into his safe in a search he decried as evidence of “dark times for our nation.”
The search, which the FBI and Justice Department did not immediately confirm, marks a dramatic escalation in law enforcement scrutiny of Trump and comes amid a?separate but intensifying probe?into efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
end of quote
Well, Donald, here is the problem with your remark above
quote
Former federal prosecutor Harry Litman and Democratic elections lawyer?Marc Elias?both noted that if the reports are true that the decisions behind the FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago has to do with the documents he took from the White House, it would be a crime that, if he was convicted, could bar the former president from ever holding office again.
"This, is by far, not one of the biggest crimes he's been charged with, but, it carries the penalty, that someone who is convicted of it is disqualified from running for future federal office," said Litman. "So, 18 USC 2071, if you destroyed records, when they came and talk to him a few months ago, and carted stuff away. Much of it was documents that have been ripped up. You had, just today, pictures of them stuffing things down the toilet.
end of quote
and now the Trump MAGA faithful are in a rage. Oh, you mean the RULES apply to TRUMP? What about that famous boast by Trump that he could possibly shoot someone in 5th avenue, NYC and get elected anyway ?
Destruction of documents, would bar Trump from office forevermore in the future. Too bad
I can see it in the RNC, YOU MEAN THAT OUR DEAR TRUMP has to adhere by the RULES ? Perish the thought !
Not exactly a winning legal argument
quote
I understand he's out of town, maybe he will have his aides try to do something. But rest assured, they will keep the site secure and free from anyone tampering with what they are doing," said Figliuzzi. "No one will be allowed to destroy any evidence. That won't happen."
He went on to confirm, "I have a medium to high degree of certainty that this at least is focused in part on national archives case...The time to negotiate and turn everything over is long gone, and now we've reached the point where agents are convincing a judge that they have evidence of a crime."
end of quote
BUT, BUT BUT, you mean the RULES APPLY TO DONALD TRUMP? Wailing by distressed Trump voters as to how UNFAIR it is, that the man they love has to be rule abiding does NOT cut it
quote
August 08, 2022
?????
Donald Trump (Photo by Saul Loeb for AFP)
Former federal prosecutor Harry Litman and Democratic elections lawyer?Marc Elias?both noted that if the reports are true that the decisions behind the FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago has to do with the documents he took from the White House, it would be a crime that, if he was convicted, could bar the former president from ever holding office again.
"This, is by far, not one of the biggest crimes he's been charged with, but, it carries the penalty, that someone who is convicted of it is disqualified from running for future federal office," said Litman. "So, 18 USC 2071, if you destroyed records, when they came and talk to him a few months ago, and carted stuff away. Much of it was documents that have been ripped up. You had, just today, pictures of them stuffing things down the toilet. They may have decided to go after this, disqualify him from future office, secure a conviction, and have that be the broad resolution of the whole problem of Trump. That, in any event, it's huge, but this feature of it that he couldn't run for office in the future is really an enormous aspect of it."
Elias made the same point, saying that the media is missing the big reason why the raid is important. He showed a screen capture of the code that Litman cited, that mentions "concealment, removal, or mutilation generally" of documents. It goes on to proclaim that anyone convicted "shall forfeit his office and be disqualified from holding any office under the United States."
"Yes, I recognize the legal challenge that application of this law to a president would garner (Since qualifications are set in Constitution). But the idea that a candidate would have to litigate this during a campaign is in my view a 'blockbuster in American politics,'" said Elias.
end of quote
And of course this one
quote
Trump says FBI conducted search at his Mar-a-Lago estate
By ERIC TUCKER and MICHAEL BALSAMO
52 minutes ago
WASHINGTON (AP) — The FBI searched former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate as part of an investigation into whether he took?classified records from the White House?to his Florida residence, people familiar with the matter said Monday.?Trump?disclosed the action in a lengthy statement, asserting that agents had broken into his safe in a search he decried as evidence of “dark times for our nation.”
The search, which the FBI and Justice Department did not immediately confirm, marks a dramatic escalation in law enforcement scrutiny of Trump and comes amid a?separate but intensifying probe?into efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
Trump and his allies immediately sought to cast the search as part of a Democratic-driven effort to keep him from winning another term in 2024, even though the Biden White House said it had no prior knowledge of it and the current FBI director, Christopher Wray, was appointed by Trump five years ago and served as a high-ranking official in a Republican-led Justice Department.
ADVERTISEMENT
领英推荐
“After working and cooperating with the relevant Government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was not necessary or appropriate,” Trump said in his statement.
He added: “These are dark times for our Nation, as my beautiful home, Mar-A-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, is currently under siege, raided, and occupied by a large group of FBI agents. Nothing like this has ever happened to a President of the United States before.”
Justice Department spokesperson Dena Iverson declined to comment on the search, including about whether Attorney General Merrick Garland had personally authorized the search.
Trump did not elaborate on the basis for the search, but the Justice Department has been investigating the potential mishandling of classified information after the National Archives and Records Administration said it had retrieved from Mar-a-Lago 15 boxes of records containing classified information earlier this year.
The National Archives referred the matter to the Justice Department. Trump has previously maintained that presidential records were turned over “in an ordinary and routine process.”
There are multiple federal laws governing the handling of classified records and sensitive government documents, including statutes that make it a crime to remove such material and retain it at an unauthorized location.
Two people familiar with the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation, said the search happened earlier Monday and confirmed that agents were also looking to see if Trump had additional presidential records or any classified documents at the estate.
Though a search warrant does not suggest that criminal charges are near or even expected, federal officials looking to obtain one must first demonstrate to a judge that they have probable cause that a crime occurred.
In his first public remarks since news of the search surfaced, Trump made no mention of it Monday evening during a tele-town hall on behalf of Leora Levy, the Connecticut Republican he has endorsed in Tuesday’s U.S. Senate primary to pick a general election opponent against Democratic U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal. Trump gave his public backing to Levy late last week, calling her on Monday the best pick “to replace Connecticut’s joke of a senator.”
But in a social media post Monday night, he was much more unguarded, calling the search a “weaponization of the Justice System, and attack by Radical Left Democrats who desperately don’t want me to run for President in 2024.”
During the 2016 presidential election, Trump sought to exploit an FBI investigation into his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton, over whether she mishandled classified information through a private email server she used as Secretary of State. Then-FBI Director James Comey concluded that Clinton had sent and received classified information but the FBI did not recommend criminal charges because it determined that Clinton had not intended to break the law.
Trump lambasted that decision and then stepped up its criticism of the FBI as agents began investigating whether his campaign had colluded with Russia to tip the 2016 election. He fired Comey during that probe, and though he appointed Wray months later, he routinely criticized him too while he was still president.
ADVERTISEMENT
The probe is hardly the only legal headache confronting Trump. A separate investigation related to efforts by Trump and his allies to undo the results of the 2020 presidential election — which led to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol — has also been intensifying in Washington.
And a?district attorney in Fulton County, Georgia,?is investigating whether Trump and his close associates sought to interfere in that state’s election, which was won by Democrat Joe Biden.
____
Associated Press writers Zeke Miller and Meg Kinnard contributed to this report.
end of quote
And this is why Trump wailing , and his MAGA base rioting will NOT stop; the outcome
quote
August 08, 2022
?????
FBI agent (AFP)
Former FBI official Frank Figliuzzi walked MSNBC viewers through what the Miami Field Office had to do to execute today's search warrant on Mar-a-Lago.
"High degree of certainty that it is related to the national archives documents," he told MSNBC
"So, Jason, yeah, not only did I spend 25 years in the FBI but I spent a significant portion of it in the Miami field office which is responsible, of course, for West Palm Beach and the Mar-a-Lago location," explained Figliuzzi. "So, look, not a lot of time right now for internal intersection going on in the Miami field office and/or any other agents from other field offices that came in but rather let's do this job right. They clearly understand the public scrutiny that will be involved. The gravity of the situation and, of course, what's coming next, which will be endless rhetoric from Donald Trump about how horrible the FBI is and how this is a targeted fishing expedition. What we don't know, of course, is really what the substance of this is."
He went on to say that if it was connected to Jan. 6 it is unclear. However, the New York Times and CNN have sources confirming that the raid focused on the National Archives documents. Figiluzzi also confirmed it with as much certainty as he could.
"If you want, if you haven't done this already, to just walk through the process of a federal agent obtaining a search warrant," he continued. "If you want to just go through that and what it means and what it doesn't mean so it simply means that the agents decided and, of course, at this level when you're talking about a former president, this will be cleared at the highest level of the FBI, U.S. Department of Justice and likely crossed the desk of the attorney general of the United States and you have to go to a United States magistrate with a prosecutor and assistant U.S. Attorney and say, 'we have evidence, probable cause, that a federal crime has been violated, and, number two, that evidence of that crime is located in the location we wish to search.' That's the big one, right?"
READ:?'Raid-a-Lago': Legal experts speculate which of Trump's actions prompted FBI search at Mar-a-Lago
ADVERTISEMENT
The magistrate or judge would then look at that and decide how they would move forward.
"Imagine the federal judge or magistrate that may have gotten out of bed this morning," said Figliuzzi. "I've done that before, right, and he's reading through a lengthy affidavit, and he's got to like have his coffee or her coffee and go through it and say holy cow, that's Mar-a-Lago."
He explained the irony of Trump attacking former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for her treatment of classified emails. But when he had explicitly top-secret and classified documents, he paraded them around from the White House to Mar-a-Lago.
"I understand he's out of town, maybe he will have his aides try to do something. But rest assured, they will keep the site secure and free from anyone tampering with what they are doing," said Figliuzzi. "No one will be allowed to destroy any evidence. That won't happen."
He went on to confirm, "I have a medium to high degree of certainty that this at least is focused in part on national archives case...The time to negotiate and turn everything over is long gone, and now we've reached the point where agents are convincing a judge that they have evidence of a crime."
end of quote
Andrew Beckwith, PhD