'They give them back': Ex-prosecutor disassembles Trump’s deflection to Biden and Pence documents

19 June 2023

Former Manhattan District Attorney Special Narcotics Prosecutor and MSNBC Deadline: Legal Blog author Jordan S. Rubin appeared on Sunday's edition of Ayman and discussed the nexus of why United States Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith charged ex-President Donald Trump with thirty-seven federal felonies last week.

Smith in his forty-four-page criminal complaint alleged that Trump "endeavored to obstruct" the Federal Bureau of Investigation and "grand jury investigations and conceal hiscontinued retention of classified documents" using five illegal maneuvers:

a.suggesting that his attorney falsely represent to the FBI and grand jury that Trump did not have documents called for by the grand jury subpoena;
b. directing defendant Waltine Natua to move boxes of documents to conceal them from Trump's attorney, the FBI, and the grand jury;
c.suggesting that his attorney hide or destroy documents called for by the grand jury subpoena;
d. providing to the FBI and grand jury just some of the documents called for by the grand jury subpoena, while claiming that he was cooperating fully;
and e.causing a certification to be submitted to the FBI and grand jury falsely representing that all documents called for by the grand jury subpoena had been produced—while knowing that, in fact, not all such documents had been produced.

Turning to Rubin, host Ayman Mohyeldin alluded to Trump's insistence that his indicted mishandling of highly sensitive materials was no worse than when marked files were discovered among former Vice President Mike Pence and President Joe Biden's inventories.

"More contemporary, contemporary wise, can you debunk for us the GOP comparisons to both the Biden and the Pence cases?" asked Mohyeldin, who assessed that Trump implicated himself:

I mean, in those instances, both men opened their doors to investigators and actually cooperated with the investigations. And I think it's important to remind our viewers that of all the documents Donald Trump took from the White House, he's only charged over, I believe the thirty or so documents that he did not give back. The others that he actually gave back before the raid at Mar-a-Lago, he was not charged for those. So he could have possibly never been charged had he just, you know, given over all of the documents to the FBI.

Rubin concurred with Mohyeldin:

That's exactly right. I had a piece that was headline not long ago that was titled, It's the Obstruction, Stupid. And if Donald Trump had gotten that simple memo, we might not even be in this place, even if he should have been charged with some of the underlying crimes. Now we could do a whole hour segment on the differences between all of these cases, but one thing that we know for sure is based on past Justice Department practice, whether it's the Hillary situation, whether it's Mike Pence just not being charged. We don't know what's gonna happen with Joe Biden yet, but it doesn't seem like he's going to be charged. We'll revisit that if he is. But really it comes down to, look, so, sometimes politicians have had records that they shouldn't have. But what you see with Pence, and what it looks like with Biden is they cooperate with the government. They give them back, and so even if the underlying conduct seems like it's criminal — and Donald Trump's underlying conduct is way more severe than what we know about the Pence and Biden situations. For example, even then had Donald Trump just cooperated, we might not even be having this conversation.

Mohyeldin quipped that "the chances of" Trump "doing that were slim to none."

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