FBI search warrant executed at Mar-a-Lago (Update: Trump Indicted!)

[Hindsight was 2020]

It’s really interesting how paper thin conservatives love for law enforcement really is

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It's so crazy that none of these Republicans have stopped for one second to think... maybe, just maybe, Trump is actually guilty of wrongdoing and there's a reason he's seeing consequences for those actions.

It's almost like a make-believe world where there's just *no way* that Trump could be guilty of any wrongdoing whatsoever. Like it's not even possible in their mind.

I think your giving far too innocent of an explanation when it’s far more likely they feel he’s above the law so he can never be held accountable

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https://mobile.twitter.com/jdawsey1/status/1557117185964785666
I find it more concerning that Trump lied about security docs he had than what the fbi did

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https://mobile.twitter.com/jimsciutto/status/1557144491995250689

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Totally innocent!

https://twitter.com/jesserodriguez/status/1557310571367759875?s=21&t=LBebA-r...

This is how f***ing mobsters talk 🙄

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Given the latest news, it unsurprisingly looks like the GOP and their acolytes are going to have serious eggs on their faces when this is all said and done, and made themselves out to look like fools, and for what?

You can’t have egg on your face if you just argue in bad faith and have no shame

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DT these past 5 or so pages
https://mobile.twitter.com/dril/status/134787490526658561?lang=en

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JFC

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With the FBI agents names not redacted because Trump is a douche

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Tuned into Fox. They're basically going with he thought he declassified the stuff and if it was such a big deal it would have been retrieved a lot sooner.

Welp we now know what Fuzzy’s next talking points will be

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Who cares how many votes Trump got? How many people watched the Cosby Show at one point or another? Popularity doesn't make you above the law, no matter how much conservatives wish that were the case.

Honestly people who love bringing up his votes seem to be making more of a threat of how many Americans will do violence if Trump is held accountable than an argument that his votes make him above the law

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Fuzzy: is the warrant a forgery? Or is the FBI lying? If so, what are they lying about? Did Trump have those documents at Mar-a-Lago, having declassified them before he left office, or did the FBI plant evidence?

You should honestly not even bother. Fuzzy will never engage on any of your questions and will just run away from the thread, hope things die done then come back with a new round of talking points. It’s better to just call him out on his absurdities and leave it at that

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Fuzzy: is the warrant a forgery? Or is the FBI lying? If so, what are they lying about? Did Trump have those documents at Mar-a-Lago, having declassified them before he left office, or did the FBI plant evidence?

You should honestly not even bother. Fuzzy will never engage on any of your questions and will just run away from the thread, hope things die done then come back with a new round of talking points. It’s better to just call him out on his absurdities and leave it at that

He clearly has an attachment to Trump beyond “logic” and that doesn’t make it less valid, it just means understanding it can’t be done through a scientific lens.

It’s quite easy to understand. Fuzzy is a typical cranky old fart who’s mad the world isn’t the same as when he grew up in and Trump hurts and upsets the various groups and elements Fuzzy blames for the changes 

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To get the thread back on track https://mobile.twitter.com/maggieNYT/status/1558860524837806081

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This seems like a stretch.

They're going to put Trump in jail for ten years for possessing unclassified documents?  That doesn't pass the smell test

I'm late to the party here but let me get this straight: according to you, Trump stole a bunch of documents which legally were supposed to return to the government upon his exiting office, including numerous top secret and nuclear documents; used his psychic legal powers asserted by the Heritage Foundation to declassify these documents, without ever communicating that they were declassified; stashed them in his beach house; refused to turn them over to the government for a year and a half, breaking a law which says that keeping government documents carries a legal penalty; and finally gets them snatched back once his beach house is raided. And the part of this saga you find objectionable is that the law Trump broke did not differentiate between government documents which were and were not declassified by Trump's mind powers.

No, that's not what I'm saying.  Stop enjoying listening to yourself so much and consider this nuance:  not all documents presidents are supposed to return to NARA under the PRA would be classified.  If the Espionage Act is being used to potentially prosecute Trump for not returning these records upon "demand of an officer or employee of the United States" then that is prosecutorial overkill.

So you’re arguing that documents pertaining to our nuclear weapons is no big deal for Trump to have and not return?

[Hindsight was 2020]

I do love when Fuzzy says “I'll let the facts come out” because he never does. Once he has his talking points in he sticks to it regardless of the facts lol. Case in point “I'll let the facts come out” was a phrase he used to love when he and others started the “2020 was rigged” rhetoric and despite the fact the facts overwhelmingly disproved that he just ignored it and kept saying it was rigged lol

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One thing is for sure: We are going to reign in Merrick "Craptastic" Garland if Republicans take over the House.

Merrick Snarkland, you are fired.

The House of Representatives does not have the power to fire the Attorney General, cry harder.

The House of Representatives does have the Power to impeach Merrick Garland and I think he will be impeached should Republicans have House Control in January.

Of Course he always could resign before he is impeached.

Fyi making you butthurt isn’t impeachable

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Like Fuzzy when you guys realize that 2016 argues in bad faith and isn’t worth the effort it will save time

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This seems like a stretch.

They're going to put Trump in jail for ten years for possessing unclassified documents?  That doesn't pass the smell test

I'm late to the party here but let me get this straight: according to you, Trump stole a bunch of documents which legally were supposed to return to the government upon his exiting office, including numerous top secret and nuclear documents; used his psychic legal powers asserted by the Heritage Foundation to declassify these documents, without ever communicating that they were declassified; stashed them in his beach house; refused to turn them over to the government for a year and a half, breaking a law which says that keeping government documents carries a legal penalty; and finally gets them snatched back once his beach house is raided. And the part of this saga you find objectionable is that the law Trump broke did not differentiate between government documents which were and were not declassified by Trump's mind powers.

No, that's not what I'm saying.  Stop enjoying listening to yourself so much and consider this nuance:  not all documents presidents are supposed to return to NARA under the PRA would be classified.  If the Espionage Act is being used to potentially prosecute Trump for not returning these records upon "demand of an officer or employee of the United States" then that is prosecutorial overkill.

The only provision of the Espionage Act that he's actually being accused of violating merely concerns the unauthorized retention of national defense information. Just because it's called the "Espionage Act" doesn't mean that the DoJ is acting as if he transmitted state secrets to hostile nations because, flashy title aside, it's still one of its provisions that criminalizes the willful mishandling of these documents, which is still, y'know, a blatant federal crime even if/when it doesn't rise to the level of active, spy-like espionage. So if he's alleged to have not only retained & mishandled records that he was unauthorized to retain, but then willfully concealed his retention & mishandling of such documents from investigators, then where exactly is this supposed prosecutorial overkill that you speak of? What's wrong here??

Any charge under the Espionage Act is prosecutorial overkill because there is separate legislation that regulates presidential records, and Trump should be charged under that statute as he once had presidential custody over the documents in question (which is not a situation the Espionage Act was written to consider, per the legislative history of the act.) 

…

The search warrant literally cited that separate legislation, 18 USC 2071, the PRA. "Whoever, having the custody of any such record… willfully and unlawfully conceals [or] removes… the same, shall be fined… or imprisoned not more than three years, or both." You clearly seem to misunderstand how criminal investigations work, because when an investigation into potential instances of one crime, like violating the PRA, uncovers evidence of not only such violations but also of other crimes, like violating the Espionage Act & concealing the violations of both acts from investigators, then the accused will be liable for those actions too.

And yes, his alleged actions clearly fall under the purview of 18 USC 793, the section of the Espionage Act concerned, if, in undertaking those actions, he was retaining information related to the national defense that could be used to injure the U.S. or to the advantage of a foreign government without the necessary authorization to retain such information. That's a blatant violation of the provision at hand, not something that wasn't considered within the legislative history of the act, & we know that because it's been consistently prosecuted, except without the initial good-faith effort to treat the accused with a great amount of deference in light of their former job & figure all of this out cooperatively.

The Espionage Act is only at play here because the DOJ believes certain documents recovered from Mar-a-Lago contain "national defense" information (whatever that means.)  A former president or anyone else retaining presidential records is a violation of the Presidential Records Act, and should be prosecuted as such.  A lesser charge under the PRA is entirely appropriate given a "great amount of deference in light of [Trump's] former job" and no indication that he was attempting to transmit the information to hostile governments or individuals.

No offense, DT, but the cognitive dissonance that's being displayed here by you right now is frankly staggering. If I didn't know any better, then I'd presume that you were actively trying to portray a caricatured exemplification of the party of "law & order" & "national defense" now ironically being the party that doesn't give a sh*t about either at the altar of Donald Trump. Wow.

The only cognitive dissonance to see here are those giddy to defend the DOJ's heavy-handed approach here while the likes of Sandy Berger and Hillary Clinton were given great deference and administrative slaps-on-the-wrist for similar mishandlings of classified info.

Two wrongs don't make a right.  But different treatment for two equal wrongs is a third wrong, especially if AG Garland's high-minded rhetoric from last week about the "evenhanded application of the law" is to be believed. 

Unless you have proof that Sandy or Hillary refused to cooperate with the FBI for almost a year the way we now know Trump did that somehow wasn’t well reported on at the time then no you are flat out wrong in stating that those cases are the same as this

[Hindsight was 2020]

Prosecutors are prepared to hit Trump and his allies with new charges, sources say
Prosecutors could bring between 30 to 45 additional criminal charges against the former president in the coming weeks, The Independent has learned

The Department of Justice is prepared to seek indictments against multiple figures in former president Donald Trump’s orbit and may yet bring additional charges against the ex-president in the coming weeks, The Independent has learned.

According to sources familiar with the matter, the department has made preparations to bring what is known as a “superseding indictment"

...

The Independent understands that prosecutors’ decision on whether to seek additional charges from a grand jury — and where to seek them — will depend in part on whether they feel the Trump-appointed district judge overseeing the case against him in the Southern District of Florida, Aileen Cannon, is giving undue deference to the...former president.

...

The team of federal prosecutors working under Special Counsel Jack Smith is currently prepared to add an “additional 30 to 45 charges” in addition to the 37-count indictment brought against Mr Trump on 8 June, either in a superseding indictment in the same Florida court or in a different federal judicial district. In either case, they would do so using evidence against the ex-president that has not yet been publicly acknowledged by the department, including other recordings prosecutors have obtained which reveal Mr Trump making incriminating statements.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-giuliani-more-charges-b2366597.html

🥜

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What Trump did is ten times worse than Hillary between the blatant mishandling of serious classified information along with the absurd levels of obstruction. The argument of it being a double standard is disingenuous rw hackery

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Serious question:

Does trump seriously think that repeatedly blatantly lying about what the Presidential Records Act says (it does not let him do "whatever he wants" with classified info for example, that info is solely the property of the Executive, which he stopped being on January 20, 2021) is going to get him off the hook in a real court of law when his defense is going to be unable to produce one single legal expert who will repeat that lie (and the prosecution will call about a thousand law enforcement officials who will testify to the exact opposite)?

I think he’s hoping to say it enough to get at least 1 sympathetic juror use it to cause a mistrial