(RightWing.org) – Former President Donald Trump is facing another legal battle after a federal grand jury returned a 37-count indictment against him for allegedly mishandling classified documents. The charges are based on documents authorities say were found in his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, where he also has a private residence.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) released the indictment just as a number of candidates began throwing their hats into the ring for the 2024 presidential election. Naturally, every single one of them will have an opinion (maybe two or three, given that they ARE politicians) and will, in turn, share their comments publicly to either defend or condemn him.
The Charges
The 44-page indictment claims that as Trump “departed the White House [he] caused scores of boxes, many of which contained classified documents, to be transported to Florida but was not authorized to possess or retain those” papers. They claim he haphazardly stored these boxes around the resort, including the ballroom, his bedroom, and “a bathroom and shower.”
The DOJ indictment claims Trump had several hundred documents with various levels of classification markings on them, including some that were so secretive they should not have been taken outside of specialized facilities. However, much of what they do show in the allegations seems to come mostly from witnesses dubbed “Trump Employee 1 and 2” who work for The Office of Donald J. Trump. According to other court documents, Trump could be facing 100 years in prison and $1.75 million in fines if convicted on all counts, which incidentally is more than the $1.6 million a president earns for a four-year term in office.
What They’re Saying
The Trump Save America fundraising committee posted a statement from the former POTUS, which, in his signature no-holds-barred style, left no room for doubt on why he believes this indictment was handed down. He made reference to the indictment brought earlier this year by “Soros-backed” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg linking them together as attempts by the Democrats to “amass total control over our country.”
One could assume that Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, who has also announced his intent to seek his party’s nomination in 2024 and would likely become the front-runner should Trump leave the race, would see this as good news. They would be wrong. Soon after the indictment was announced, he took to his Twitter page and slammed the move as a “mortal threat to a free society” and questioned why they were targeting the former president while being “so passive about Hillary [Clinton] or Hunter [the son of President Joe Biden].”
Nicky Haley, the former governor of South Carolina and ambassador to the United Nations in Trump’s administration, also came out swinging, claiming the move is “prosecutorial overreach, double standards, and vendetta politics.” However, there are those like Asa Hutchinson, the one-time governor of Arkansas, who went in the complete opposite direction, blasting “Trump’s actions — from his willful disregard for the Constitution to his disrespect for the rule of law” calling on him to drop out of the race.
Copyright 2023, RightWing.org
