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| Trump Tower: Home to classified documents (Business Insider) |
Donald Trump kept classified documents at two other locations besides his Mar-a-Lago estate, according to a report at Newsweek. The information comes from court documents recently filed in Trump's classified-documents case before Judge Aileen Cannon in Florida. The revelations raise questions that are both curious and alarming.
On the curious side, we have these questions:
(1) Why did Trump store or hide documents at locations other than Mar-a-Lago, where documents have been known to be stored for months now?
(2) What was Trump planning to do with these newly disclosed documents? To whom was he planning to show them, to whom has he already shown them?
These questions fit under the category of "alarming," especially since several experts have expressed concerns that Trump is a national-security risk, especially with his finances in a state of disarray. Would Trump sell, or give, sensitive documents to foreign adversaries? Would he be open to bribery from international bad actors as a way of upgrading his personal treasury? Experts suggest the answer to these questions is yes, and that raises the issue of treason, which has hung over Trump like a specter, especially give his apparent fondness for Russia and other authoritarian regimes.
Newsweek provides background on the newly discovered documents under the headline "Donald Trump Kept Classified Documents in Trump Tower, Lawyers Reveal." Reporter Sean O'Driscoll writes:
Donald Trump held classified documents at both Trump Tower and his New Jersey estate, his lawyers have revealed in court documents.
Trump held the documents there, as well as in his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, even before his inauguration in 2017, according to the filings. The contents of the classified documents remain unclear.
Trump is facing trial in Florida for allegedly retaining classified documents from his presidency, keeping them in various parts of Mar-a-Lago—including a bathroom—and obstructing federal officials' attempt to retrieve them.
The location of Trump's classified documents beyond the Florida resort had been redacted in previous court filings.
The locations were revealed in proposed jury instructions filed by Trump's lawyers to U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon.
The discovery of documents at Trump Tower and Bedminster dovetails with other recent news in the classified-documents case, O'Driscoll reports:
The new information appears to confirm revelations by Trump's former valet, Brian Butler, that he helped load boxes of presidential records onto the Trump private plane in Florida while the former president and his family were flying to their Bedminster, N.J., mansion for the summer two years ago.
Butler told CNN last month that the plane was loaded on June 3, 2022, which was the same day Trump and his lawyer met with the Justice Department at Mar-a-Lago to discuss the missing classified documents.
Butler said he later realized that the white boxes of documents were at the center of the federal indictment against Trump.
Until he went public, Butler had only been known as "Trump Employee 5" in court documents filed to Cannon.
Butler is expected to testify against Trump in the Florida trial. His version of events may have been bolstered by the latest filing in the case.
Cannon has been criticized by chief prosecutor Jack Smith for suggesting that the jury may be allowed to consider that Trump had held presidential records as his personal belongings that he was allowed to keep after leaving the White House.
Trump's claim that he designated presidential files as personal items before leaving the White House is a fundamental part of his defense in the classified documents case.
In the coming weeks, we will examine the concerns of national-security experts about Trump and the issue of treason, which continues to hang over Trump -- perhaps now more than ever.
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