When an ex-president feels the need to assure you that he wouldn’t take classified files and send them to another country, red lights, flags, and hats should go flying. Trump has a way of “giving himself away” by what he denies even before anyone made an accusation or even thought to.
Why, without a single fact, would Trump accuse Biden of sharing files with China? Is it to make an accusation that either matches or exceeds what he did with the files he kept? Is he also tacitly acknowledging that he didn’t declassify the documents? (He did not declassify them. Declassification by “looking at them” doesn’t exist.)
**By the way. Democrats are going to line up for the next three months to tell you this is no big deal. It is an utter political disaster, and pay no attention to anyone who says it isn’t. The facts can be 100% innocuous, totally different than Trump’s files at Mar-a-Lago. And it won’t matter at all. The GOP has enough to run with and won’t acknowledge key differences. It will be compelling to an average MAGA. This. Is. a Disaster.**
Back to the story from Mediaite:
These were documents the White House says that were found by the current president’s attorneys in November as they were closing out an office that the former vice president, Biden, of course, had set up an office with the University of Pennsylvania at the Penn Biden center here in Washington.
They were closing out these offices when they found what they say were fewer than a dozen documents that were labeled as classified. Now, a number of these documents were also subject to the presidential records act, and according to the White House, these were now turned over to the National Archives, which has asked the Justice Department to look into it.
Okay, everyone did their jobs as it should be, except Biden, who should not have had the files. Again, it doesn’t matter that he discovered them (his lawyers) and turned them over immediately. These not-very-subtle details mean nothing to a MAGA. Watch Trump leap:
“Biden giving China Highly Classified Documents would be a bridge too far,” Trump wrote in a social media post. “I certainly wouldn’t do that. Not a good situation for our Country to be in!”
Given that they were in an office he was closing and – if – Biden knew about the classified files, they wouldn’t be there in the first place, it’s pretty safe to say that Biden had forgotten or was never aware of the fact that he held those classified files. The MAGAs on Twitter are already saying that “the big difference is Biden didn’t have the power to declassify them, whereas Trump did.” Not a single lawyer for Trump has, in court – where it matters, asserted that Trump declassified the files because the lawyers know a president cannot declassify files by simply looking at them. The MAGAs don’t know it or don’t care, that’s their position.
(Melania wishes you could get a divorce by simply looking at him, especially now that the new wife, Kari Lake, has practically moved in.)
Isn’t it interesting that when they find files in Biden’s office, one of Trump’s first assertions is that Biden probably shared them with China, and he’d never do that? Why would he even assume that he needed to say such a thing?
But it sucks. This makes it infinitely harder to prosecute Trump for the Mar-a-Lago files.
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[email protected], @JasonMiciak,FREE VIEW: SUBSTACK: HAKEEM JEFFRIES, POWERFUL, PASSIONATE, PRESIDENTIAL
shit. Now we can be as certain as we possibly could be that former guy gave information from classified docs to various and sundry countries–china likely tops the list although I wouldn’t discount N. Korea.
I always assumed such, Spike. In fact, that assumption of mine is why I’ve been extraordinarily patient with the J6 investigation. Everyone keeps acting like this was strictly a domestic affair, totally self-contained. But stuff like this is the sign that it may well have international links that any of the overt cathartic actions too many people keep demanding may well ruin. Russia, Saudi Arabia, North Korea, Brazil, Qatar and now China…how deep were either their governments or wealthy/prominent citizens involved in all Trump did?
If you’re still trying to figure out why Brazil could just round up its idiotic would-be insurrectionists faster than us, well, THAT’S why. Our national security became a sieve under Trump. Wrecking what’s left of it would be stupid.
It also helps that the new Brazilian government was already in office and didn’t have to deal with recalcitrant officials (except for a state governor, who’s been suspended from office).
Also true, P J, which is a bit surprising. You’d think an alleged strongman would be better prepared. But as one favorite memes put it, “Oh no! Anyway…”
We better hope that the FBI can prove it, too.
I had the exact same thought when I heard he said it, that he’s trying to match the two in seriousness or action.
Typical Trump projection – accuse someone else of what HE’S guilty of doing!
The 10 or 15 docs at the Biden center were in a box in a *locked* closet. Not in an open storage room at a private hotel/club. And the attorneys who found them when clearing and closing the place reported them immediately.
AND they were in a secure office at a think tank, not Mara-Lardo for all his crazy goons to play with. Biden didn’t steal them, hide them or show them to our enemies and turned them over to the national archives immediately. But Cult45 has no critical thinking skills and many are functionally illiterate.
And NO, it won’t make it harder to prosecute trump (an absurd comment, btw). One of these things is NOT like the other.
You raise ana interesting point. Think Tanks have people with experience both academic and in govt., the latter often at a fairly high or even high level. Since they often consult many hold active security clearances including some of them at a very high level. I’d imagine what happened here is that a subject was being worked on, some type of discussion for a position paper on some matter/policy and someone sent a request through channels for related documents. Whatever agency(s) was involved reviewed the request and provided the information within established protocols. And guess what? There will be a record of who made the request(s) – to whom and when. On the receiving end there will also be a record. Of course, keep in mind these were the Trump years so who knows what the fuck was going on on the govt. end of things. Anyway, where the breakdown likely happened is when they were done. A notice SHOULD have been sent to the agency(s) that provided the documents that they were ready for return and could be picked up anytime. At that point again there are protocols. Unless I miss my guess those documents were secured, which in civilian speak means locked up in a secure place until someone came to pick them up. And my bet is that nobody showed up to pick them up! A Think Tank under the name and sometimes participation of a VP, even a former one is a busy place with some impressive people working on multiple things. Having completed whatever work the documents had been requested for, sending notice to come and pick them up those who’d requested them forgot about them as they moved on to other things, assuming someone would have come and retrieved them. (I’ll bet the remember them NOW. And will for the rest of their lives!) In any case I suspect none of these will turn out to be Top Secret, and perhaps not even Secret in classification. However, rules and laws too apply even to stuff marked Confidential.
The ball got dropped in returning those documents. Again, I’d bet that when all is said and done it was the govt. agency(s) that dropped the ball. Even places where they had their shit together had to have been affected by the chaos of the Trump administration. And does anyone out there believe for a second that under Trump, if those documents were all that important someone wouldn’t have said something? An “October Surprise?” Classified or not they were insignificant enough that EVERYONE forgot about them! Sadly, the GOP will for years to come scream their heads off in “what aboutism” nonsense and conflate this to Trump’s stealing, admitting he did so and still maintianing the docs he took to Mar-A-Lago are his and demanding they be given back to him.
Absurd comment? It will make it harder to prosecute Trump?
You are thinking like a liberal, making sense, differentiating. Almost half the country doesn’t think that way and all we’re looking at is one or two people for jury nullification, along with how everything looks politically.
From now on, please – by all means – call me absurd. I relish it. Then tell me why. Not just because you said it.
I happen to think that this is one of the worst things that could have happened to the streamlined, easy, prosecution of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago files. But that’s bc I have to read what MAGAs think. If you are going to prosecute a president, you need to know what everyone thinks and they’ve already jumped on this.
I don’t mind disagreement, I relish it. But please explain. How do you waive away the hysteria now on Fox and all conservative news sites?
That there would be any attempt at calling this in any way similar to TFG’s abject criminality is infuriating & appalling. It riles me even more that the intentional stultification of our people has been so effective that there would emerge a ‘movement’ such as MAGA, Q, etc.
Please explain more. Intentional stultification of our people doesn’t apply to this column so I would need some help. Saying that it is disastrous from a political point of view is obvious. They are already all over it when 2 days ago they had nothing. It’s a problem. I am not some Q for saying it, just a realist.
When you come at an ex-president you best do so with clean hands. I would – if I was Biden, declassify everything, let everyone talk, allow a special prosecutor to be appointed, all of that and more.
Bc I agree there is no comparison. But there is enough for the GOP to lash on to, which they already have, and so I’d start differentiating it again. Already.
Trump is a projectionist.
A few docs, promptly brought to the proper authorities as they should be, doesn’t seem to compare very favorably to shit-wit’s doco problems.
I do find it quite convenient these were “found” at the start of a G.Q.P.-controlled house. It would not surprise me to find THESE docs were planted. I’m not saying that actually happened but planting a few docs is pretty easy especially if the office in question has few or no employees. Again, maybe they were forgotten or mixed in stuff that was allowed to leave. Big difference between this cache and the treatment of it vs. shit-wit’s doco cache and his complete and utter lack of cooperation with the authorities. Oh, and that there might be more in shit-wit’s keeping. Yeah, I’m just not seeing a very good comparison here.
Of course he wouldn’t give them to China. He’d sell them.