What a week, huh gang? And not the one that President Biden wanted. The FBI search of Trump’s gaudy dump in Florida stomped all over not one, but major bill signings. And it may not improve much next week when Biden signs the Inflation Reduction Act.
Trump’s late day announcement of the search of his private residence was a total shock. For once the FBI acted like the FBI and kept its mouth shut.It was Trump who blabbed, for what he mistakenly thought was short term political gain. What a moron. Would you want anybody to know if the FBI searched your man cave?
But ever since the news broke on Monday, I’ve been haunted by one simple question. Why now? I mean, it’s not like they got some hot secret tip, they’ve known where the shit was for a year and a half now. Let’s do a quick timeline as a refresher.
Before Traitor tot left office in January of 2021, word got out that he was planning on taking documents covered by the Presidential Records Act, as well as possibly confidential information back to Florida with him. Both the National Archives, as well as his National Security Advisor told him not to do it. He did it anyway.
Once the National Archives completed their Transition of power catalog, it was clear that the documents were missing. And it was clear who had them. The Archives contacted Trump, and started negotiations for their return. After months of jerking around, Trump returned 12 boxes of material in January. When that inventory turned up short, the Archives asked the DOJ to open a criminal investigation and retrieve the documents.
This is what has confused the hell out of me. The DOJ knew where the shit was! Trump never denied it, instead his legal team negotiated. When Trump dug his heels in, the DOJ went to a grand jury to get a subpoena to return the listed documents. And that’s what confuses me.
The DOJ had to provide the grand jury with probable cause to get their subpoena. Which meant the information had to be fresh. But here’s the McGuffin. I don’t see anything in the search warrant that the DOJ didn’t already know back in March! Why not get the search warrant then, or in April or May when Trump defied the subpoena? I couldn’t close my mind around it.
Enter journalist Charlie Savage. In an interview earlier today on MSNBC, he turned the golden key when he said, The way I see it, this kind of a high publicity search is something that is normally done towards the end of an investigation, not at the start. Because it tips the subject and his lawyers that the DOJ is on to them, and exactly what they’re looking for.
BINGO! If all the DOJ wanted to do was to get their sensitive shit back, they could have done that in April or May, after Trump defied the subpoena. Instead they pootled around for 3 more months negotiating. Why? because they had bigger fish to fry.
The precedent is as endless as it is current. The first thing that NY AG Letitia James did when she announced her civil investigation against Trump was to send her team out for a document and evidence blitz. Get all the information you can before you begin interviewing witnesses, or hauling them before the grand jury. That way you know exactly what to ask, and you’ll know if they lie. The same is true of the Fani Willis Fulton County DA investigation, as well as the G6 committee. Learn everything first, and then start asking questions.
Now the delay makes perfect sense. After all, if somebody is hauled up in front of a grand jury to testify about the Capitol riot, how likely are they to notice, or have alarm about a few questions regarding Trump’s handling of classified material? They’re just trying to save their ass. And my head may well be up my ass again, but I’ve got a funny feeling about this. And so far, my record has been pretty good. Don’t touch that dial.
I like presidents that don’t STEAL boxes of Top Secret Nuclear Documents !
PERP WALK, PERP WALK….I’M SOOO READY FOR THE PERP WALK!!!! 🙂
They were perfect papers in perfect boxes given to perfect Saudis for perfect dollars. I did nothing wrong.
They asked, he returned some. They knew what he still had, they issued a subpoena. And something they learned made them go with a search warrant.
(WTF was he doing keepign TS/SCI stuff? That’s not his property.)
This case may beat out the NY AG’s and Fulton County DA’s cases for first prosecution. Those were our secrets, not his. This is a documents case, they were found at his tacky resort, where they were not allowed to be. They were in his possession. This would not be a long trial.
I still think they have had a tipoff from some foreign recipient of a document or two, who isn’t particularly fond of tffg, but just wanted to see how far he’d go. tffg always thinks everyone else thinks he is wonderful. The majority of them? Not so much.
I’m trying to understand why the National Archives had to negotiate for the return of the documents in the first place. He took them illegally and negotiates to release them?
WHOOT yes, scared me for a second.. but Charlie fixed that.. ONWARD
AND THIS ONE FOOD TOO