Donald Trump indicted in classified documents probe

CNN  —  Former President Donald Trump has been indicted in the special counsel’s classified documents probe, sources familiar with the matter tell CNN, a stunning development that marks the first time a former president has faced federal charges. Trump has been charged with seven counts in the indictment, according to another source familiar with the matter. The former president wrote on Truth Social that he had been informed by the Justice Department he was indicted and that he was “summoned to appear at the Federal Courthouse in Miami on Tuesday, at 3 PM.” “The corrupt Biden Administration has informed my attorneys that I have been Indicted, seemingly over the Boxes Hoax,” Trump wrote. The special counsel declined to comment. The Justice Department is moving additional resources to Miami ahead of the expected appearance, a law enforcement source tells CNN. The federal indictment is the second time that Trump has been charged criminally this year. In April, the Manhattan district attorney charged Trump with 34 counts of falsifying business. But the indictment from the special counsel marks a new and more perilous legal phase for a former president, who is running for president again in 2024 while facing criminal charges in two jurisdictions – and with two additional investigations into his conduct still underway. The charges against Trump come just seven months since Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Jack Smith as a special counsel after Trump announced he was running for president, in order to keep the investigation independent from the Biden Justice Department. Now Trump travel will face federal charges from the special counsel at the same time that he is trying to unseat President Joe Biden in next year’s presidential election. The White House declined to comment Thursday evening. Trump has railed against the special counsel investigation and the other probes into his conduct, claiming they are all efforts to stop him politically. The former president has insisted that any criminal charges will not stop his 2024 campaign. Trump has long avoided legal culpability in his personal, professional and political lives. He has settled a number of private civil lawsuits through the years and paid his way out of disputes concerning the Trump Organization. As president, he was twice impeached by the Democratic-led House, but avoided conviction by the Senate. But after leaving office, the Justice Department criminal investigations into the retention of classified information at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort and his efforts to overturn the 2020 election cast dark clouds over Trump. Smith’s investigation into January 6 and efforts to overturn the election is still ongoing. And in addition to the Manhattan district attorney’s April indictment, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is expected to announce in August whether there are any charges in her investigation into attempts to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia. 02:17 – Source: CNN
Fmr. prosecutor: Why it’s difficult to send powerful people to prison The Justice Department’s investigation into Trump’s actions related to documents from his time in office burst into public view in August when FBI agents executed a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago and seized thousands of documents, including about 100 marked as classified. The FBI also subpoenaed the Trump Organization for surveillance video from the resort. Prosecutors had said in court filings they were pursuing possible criminal mishandling of national security information and obstruction of justice. The DOJ previously alleged that the classified documents were “likely concealed and removed” from a storage room at Mar-a-Lago as part of an effort to “obstruct” the FBI’s investigation into Trump’s potential mishandling of classified materials. After Trump returned 15 boxes of materials to the National Archives in January, the Justice Department subpoenaed Trump in May, seeking documents with classification markings that were still at Mar-a-Lago. According to a lawsuit he later filed, Trump directed his staff to search for any remaining classified material to comply with the subpoena. After federal investigators retrieved documents from the resort in June, his lawyers later told investigators that they had searched the storage area and that all classified documents were accounted for. Prosecutors said in August that that some documents were likely removed from a storage room before Trump’s lawyers examined the area, while they were trying to comply with the subpoena. In recent months, prosecutors heard from dozens of witnesses, including Trump aides and employees of Mar-a-Lago and the Trump Organization. The bulk of the witnesses appeared before a grand jury in Washington, DC, but in recent weeks multiple witnesses testified before a grand jury in southern Florida. Prosecutors obtained an audio tape of Trump talking about a classified Pentagon document during a 2021 Bedminster, New Jersey, meeting. On the recording, which was first reported by CNN, Trump acknowledged that the document was still classified, undercutting his argument that everything he brought with him to Mar-a-Lago had been declassified. This story has been updated with additional developments.