'Pants on fire': Trump attorney invokes debunked rumor about Obama to justify his client ignoring subpoenas

18 May 2023

Former President Donald Trump's lawyer Jim Trusty implied Wednesday night that his client is not obligated to comply with subpoenas.

Trusty spoke with CNN's Sara Sidner about the former president's refusal to comply with a subpoena in DOJ special counsel Jack Smith's investigation into the classified documents that Trump stashed at Mar-a-Lago. The former president has released several "angry videos" to Truth Social maligning the special counsel, accusing him of being "a harasser" and "an abuser" for conducting the ongoing investigation.

@Acyn shared a clip of the Trusty interview via Twitter, writing, "Sidner: If I ignored a subpoena, there would be hell to pay Trusty: Well, you also don't have the powers under The Presidential Records Act.. and I'm pretty sure you're not president right now."

Last month, The Washington Post reported:

Trump and his legal team failed to comply with a subpoena in May demanding he return all documents with classified markings. The Washington Post reported last week that [DOJ special counsel Jack] Smith's team has gathered new evidence pointing to potential obstruction by Trump, and Smith is seeking to determine whether there is enough evidence to ask a grand jury to charge him with obstructing the investigation.

During her interview with Trusty, Sidner asked, "I guess the question is, why should a president — no president is above the law, no one in this country is supposed to be above the law — so why is he able to just ignore a subpoena? Should that be okay?"

The Trump attorney replied, "He didn't ignore a subpoena. I, we talked about the 15 boxes. We talked about the fact that in every other case in history, it is a long drawn-out process of negotiation. That probably explains the patience NARA had with a 2018 letter from Obama that said, we have millions of documents, including classified ones. You'll get 'em eventually."

Reuters, The New York Times, and USA Today debunked that claim last year. Politifact even awarded it the dreaded "Pants on Fire."

Sidner then said, "OK, but after the FBI asked for the boxes, they came back to find 15 more boxes. And so, [Trump] did not pay attention to the subpoena. Why is that OK is what I'm asking. If, if I did that as a citizen, uh, there'd be hell to pay."

Trusty responded, "Let me just say this, you are ignoring the fact that for the first time in history, a weaponized DOJ, much like the one described in the Durham Report — but the same culture, maybe not always the same individuals — they decided to use the Presidential Records Act as a Trojan horse. By the way, the last time the president had contact with the DOJ, before that subpoena, he said, 'Attorney, show them where the stuff is in the storage room,' and the attorney did that. And he said to the office that has led much of the charge here — the trophy hunt — 'If you need anything else just ask.' He was in a negotiating stance from the beginning through the end. They said, 'Put a lock on that door,' and then they were the first ones to go quiet and break the lock two months later in an unprecedented raid. This is the only president that would face this type of ends justifies means behavior, and as one of his attorneys we're gonna fight it."

According to the National Archives, "Under the Presidential Records Act (PRA), incumbent Presidents have exclusive responsibility for the custody and management of the Presidential records of their administration while in office."

Watch the video below or at this link.

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