Trump is 'his own worst enemy' as he battles the DOJ over Mar-a-Lago documents: legal expert

Donald Trump's ongoing battle with the Department of Justice over a three-week-old search of his Mar-a-Lago resort -- mainly conducted in rants posted to his Truth Social account -- is giving a big hand to investigators as they firm up their case using the Espionage Act and accusations of criminal obstruction.

According to Jessica Levinson, a professor at Loyola Law School, the former president is unwittingly helping the DOJ's case and it will come back to haunt him.

Writing for MSNBC, Levinson stated right from the beginning that Trump has become "his own worst enemy" with not only his almost daily attacks on the FBI and the DOJ, but also the legal maneuvering his lawyers are doing, likely at his urging.

The FBI, in the affidavit used to justify the August 8 raid of Mar-a-Lago, said it was conducting a criminal investigation into "improper removal and storage of classified information" and "unlawful concealment of government records."

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The heavily-redacted FBI affidavit released last week laid out the basis for a Florida judge authorizing the unprecedented raid on the home of a former president, a move which ignited a political firestorm in an already bitterly divided country.

The Republican Trump, who is weighing another White House run in 2024, accused the Justice Department and FBI under Democratic President Joe Biden of conducting a "witch hunt" and said the judge "should never have allowed the Break-in of my home."

According to the law professor, the former president's challenges to the search, as well as his legal defense are "largely incoherent and legally irrelevant."

Pointing out that Trump "... intimated that the FBI planted documents at his estate in Palm Beach, Florida," Levinson burst that bubble by adding, " The problem with that, in addition to the fact that there is no basis for this claim, is that Trump has also argued that there is no problem with his having said documents not only because they are privileged but also because he declassified them."

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According to the affidavit, the FBI opened the investigation after the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) received 15 boxes of records in January 2022 that had been improperly removed from the White House and taken to Mar-a-Lago.

It said sensitive National Defense Information (NDI) was among the records recovered including 67 documents marked as confidential, 92 documents marked as secret and 25 marked as top secret.

Among the documents was intelligence information from "clandestine human sources," which are among the most tightly-held government secrets.

"We learned from the warrant that the investigation involves the possible violation of three federal criminal statutes, related to obstruction of justice, the Espionage Act and the unlawful taking of retention of government documents," she wrote before adding, "The second set of documents includes a redacted version of the affidavit submitted in support of the search warrant. The additional information should cause additional concern for Trump. Taken as a whole, the affidavit includes information directly belying Trump’s claims that he would have simply given over documents that the government requested.

Cautioning that "Perhaps we shouldn’t take Trump’s semi-coherent bluster seriously anymore," designed to rile up his base, Levinson wrote that "two things are clear."

"The more Trump says, the worse this investigation is getting for him. And the more we learn, the more evidence we have that Trump isn’t a person who should ever be in a position of power again," she concluded.

With additional reporting by AFP

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