Former President Donald Trump says that he has been charged in special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into his alleged mishandling of classified records at his Florida resort home of Mar-a-Lago.
Trump said he had been summoned to appear at the federal courthouse in Miami on Tuesday at 3 p.m.
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He faces an indictment of seven counts, though it was not immediately clear the charges brought against the former president. The unprecedented news makes Trump the first former president to be indicted on federal charges.
“The corrupt Biden Administration has informed my attorneys that I have been Indicted, seemingly over the Boxes Hoax,” Trump posted on his Truth Social social media site on Thursday evening, declaring that “I AM AN INNOCENT MAN!”
Trump lawyer Jim Trusty said Thursday night Trump had received a summons, rather than a charging document, and said “it breaks down to the retention charge, obstruction, and false statement” and said that “I think there is a conspiracy count” also.
“It doesn’t perfectly mirror an indictment, but it does have some language in it that suggests what the seven charges would be,” Trusty said on CNN. “I’m not 100% clear that all of those are separate charges, but they basically break out from an Espionage Act charge — which is ludicrous under the facts of this case, and I can certainly explain it — and several obstruction-based type charges, and then false statement charges, which again are kind of a crazy stretch just from the facts as we know it.”
Trusty said that one charge related to 18 U.S.C. 793, part of the Espionage Act, which the FBI’s August search warrant said was related to “willful retention of national defense information.”
The Trump lawyer said there were also “several” obstruction charges related to 18 U.S.C. 1512, which deals with “tampering with a witness, victim, or an informant,” and related to 18 U.S.C. 1519, which deals with “destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in Federal investigations.”
Smith is known to have convened grand juries in the nation’s capital and in southern Florida, with the Florida grand jury reportedly receiving testimony on the classified documents saga in recent days. Trump’s former chief of staff, Mark Meadows, has reportedly testified before one of Smith’s grand juries. It is still possible that charges could be handed down in both districts.
Trump lamented that “I never thought it possible that such a thing could happen to a former President of the United States.”
“This is indeed a DARK DAY for the United States of America,” the former president said. “We are a Country in serious and rapid Decline, but together we will Make America Great Again!”
The search warrant application cover sheet for the Mar-a-Lago raid, unsealed in late August, provided more details on what the DOJ was looking for when they searched Trump’s Florida resort. The records showed Trump was being investigated under 18 U.S.C. 793 and 18 U.S.C. 1519, and also pointed to 18 U.S.C. 2071, specifically the “concealment or removal” of government records.
The special counsel was handpicked by Attorney General Merrick Garland last year with Garland insisting Smith would make an “independent” decision on bringing charges. Smith has been tasked with investigating Trump related to the Capitol riot and to his alleged mishandling of classified information at his Florida resort home of Mar-a-Lago. Garland had the power to reject the charges, but apparently allowed the indictment to proceed.
“Throughout his career, Jack Smith has built a reputation as an impartial and determined prosecutor, who leads teams with energy and focus to follow the facts wherever they lead,” Garland said when announcing the special counsel pick in November. “As special counsel, he will exercise independent prosecutorial judgment to decide whether charges should be brought.”
Trump’s statement on Thursday evening also pointed to President Joe Biden’s own apparent mishandling of classified information.
Joe Biden is being investigated by another Garland-appointed special counsel, Robert Hur. Biden’s personal attorneys said they first discovered classified documents in early November at the Penn Biden Center, located in the nation’s capital. Biden’s lawyers later found more classified documents at his Wilmington home in Delaware, and the DOJ found more when it conducted its own search.
Trump shared a May letter from his lawyers to Garland on Truth Social with the attorneys contending that “unlike President Biden, his son Hunter, and the Biden family, President Trump is being treated unfairly.”
Hunter Biden’s lawyers met with DOJ officials representing the tax division and the U.S. attorney in Delaware in late April. Trump’s lawyers met at the DOJ with Smith and others on Monday.
National Archives acting archivist Debra Wall sent a letter to Trump last month telling him it would be handing over records to Smith, writing that “the 16 records in question all reflect communications involving close presidential advisers, some of them directed to you personally, concerning whether, why, and how you should declassify certain classified records.”
Trump returned an initial batch of 15 boxes from Mar-a-Lago to the National Archives in January 2022. However, the National Archives said it had found some records with classified markings and believed Trump continued to possess other records, and in February 2022, it referred the issue to the Justice Department.
Wall sent a May 2022 letter to Trump lawyer Evan Corcoran, saying an initial review “identified items marked as classified national security information.”
The archivist said this resulted in Joe Biden and the White House being made aware of the situation as the FBI sought access to the records.
The National Archives told Trump’s lawyers in early May 2022 that it “will provide the FBI access to the records in question, as requested by the incumbent President [Biden].” Corcoran argued in a letter back to the DOJ that “A President Has Absolute Authority To Declassify Documents” and that “Presidential Actions Involving Classified Documents Are Not Subject To Criminal Sanction.”
The Archives letter in May 2022 was followed the next day by a grand jury subpoena, then by a June 2022 visit to Mar-a-Lago by investigators, and finally by the August 2022 raid.
A decadeslong DOJ veteran prosecutor, Smith had most recently been a prosecutor at The Hague, where he investigated alleged war crimes in Kosovo.
“I will exercise independent judgment,” Smith said in a rare public statement in November.
Smith previously served under Holder, leading the DOJ’s Public Integrity Unit from 2010 to 2015. Smith led a team of 30 prosecutors in conducting public corruption cases throughout the United States, including a mixed track record of going after high-profile politicians.
Smith also inserted the DOJ into what would become the Lois Lerner IRS scandal targeting conservative nonprofit groups during the Obama years, which Trump has criticized him for since he became special counsel.
Trump had been lashing out at Smith and the Justice Department on Truth Social this week.
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Trump said Sunday that “reports are the Marxist Special Prosecutor, DOJ, & FBI, want to Indict me on the BOXES HOAX, despite all of the wrongdoing that they have done for SEVEN YEARS, including SPYING ON MY CAMPAIGN.” And the former president said Monday that “the Boxes Hoax being perpetrated upon me by the DOJ for purposes of interfering with the upcoming 2024 Presidential Election.”
Trump called Smith “a Trump hater!” on Tuesday, claiming that “they are using the DOJ & FBI against me to Rigg [sic] the 2024 Election.”
