With 2024 presidential election in the United States of America less than 17 months away, leading candidate for the presidential ticket of the Republican Party, former President Donald Trump has been indicted by a grand jury on a 37-count charge for crimes that could earn him 10 years in prison if convicted.
On Friday the grand jury indictment was unsealed accusing Trump of hiding documents detailing US nuclear weapons programmes that could put at risk the national security of the United States. Some of the document were allegedly hidden in his bathroom, ballroom and bedroom.
The indictment also detailed how Trump allegedly concealed these documents from investigators and his own lawyers, taking boxes of material to his personal residence in Mar-a-Lago and, from there, on his plane to his Bedminster, New Jersey, estate.
The charges also accuse the former president of suggesting that his attorney falsely represent to the Federal Bureau of Investigation and grand jury that he did not have documents called for by the grand jury subpoena.
The grand jury indictment read in part; “National security information was information owned by, produced by, produced for, under the control of the United States government.
“Information was classified as TOP SECRET if the unauthorized disclosure of that information reasonably could be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security that the original classification authority was able to identify or describe.”
The indictment makes Donald Trump the first former president of the United States to face federal criminal charges, and only the second presidential hopeful to be contesting under a criminal indictment making the development nothing short of a political earth quake.
The former president, skilled in using social media platforms to communicate with his followers had previously called for mass protests if he is charged, at different times and has taken to Truth Social, a platform he owns to describe the indictment as a political warfare against him, the greatest witch hunt of all time and accused the Joseph Biden led Democratic Party administration of attempting to “weaponise our legal system” to get rid him as a presidential candidate.
Late on Thursday, when news of the indictment first broke, Trump declared on Truth Social, I am an innocent man! Since the indictment, his political aides have engaged in aggressive fund raising.
The charges he is facing include willfully retaining national defense secrets in violation of the Espionage Act, conspiracy to obstruct justice, and making false statements. The former president is expected to appear in a federal court in Miami, Florida on Tuesday.
The charges relate to his handling of top secret government documents, which he took with him after leaving the White House in January 2021.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation, would later seize some 13,000 documents home, the Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida in 2022 even though his lawyers had declared that all sensitive government materials had been returned. One hundred of the documents were marked as classified.
According to the New York Times, Trump declared at a meeting in July 2021, six months after leaving the White House, that a document in front of him was “classified” and “highly confidential.”
That meeting, with people helping his former chief of staff with a book, has been previously reported but new details of Mr. Trump’s specific comments appear to demonstrate explicitly that he was aware that materials he had taken with him from the White House included classified information. The recording is expected to be a key piece of evidence in the case against him that the special counsel Jack Smith brought this week, with seven counts related to his possession of reams of classified material.
Mr. Trump also indicated he couldn’t show the document to the people in front of him — many if not all of whom didn’t have security clearances that would allow them to see sensitive government material — and added, “As president, I could have declassified them, now I can’t,” the New York Times quoted person briefed on the matter.
Meanwhile, members of his political party have rallied around him with Speaker of the House of Representatives, Kevin McCarthy vowing to hold the brazen weaponisation of power accountable. Refering to President Joe Biden, McCarthy said, “It is unconscionable for a President to indict the leading candidate opposing him.”
Reacting on Twitter shortly after the news broke, the House SpeakerI, and every American who believes in the rule of law, stand with President Trump against this grave injustice.”
Even rivals for the Republican presidential ticket have aimed their criticism towards the Biden government rather than try to undermine Trump’s campaign with the indictment.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and U.S. Senator Tim Scott were among the candidates accusing the Justice Department of political bias, highlighting a stance that has become central to many of their own campaigns.
“The weaponization of federal law enforcement represents a mortal threat to a free society,” DeSantis, who is running a distant second behind Trump in the polls, wrote on Twitter. “We have for years witnessed an uneven application of the law depending upon political affiliation.
On his part, President Biden has stressed the independence of the department, reflecting the tightrope he must walk in dealing with a prosecution into his main political rival.
The White House said on Friday that Biden did not have advance knowledge of the indictment.
“I have never once, not one single time, suggested to the Justice Department what they should do or not do relative to bringing a charge or not bringing a charge,” Biden told a press conference on Thursday before the news broke.
Trump was indicted by a federal grand jury for illegally retaining classified documents and for obstruction of justice.
He faces seven criminal counts, including conspiracy and obstruction of justice but says he is innocent of any wrongdoing. He said he has been summoned to appear at the federal courthouse in Miami on Tuesday.
Former US Vice President, Mike Pence, who is also seeking his party’s nomination for president in 2024 was one rival that did not spare. In an interview on Friday, Pence declared; “No one is above the law.”
Pence who spoke before the US Department of Justice unsealed the indictment said, ““I think the Justice Department should immediately move to unseal the indictment,” Pence said. “I think the sooner we bring the facts forward to the American people, the better.”
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