'Very Mafioso': Watergate prosecutor slams Trump's reported offer to pardon his body man
April 23, 2024
Former Watergate prosecutor Nick Akerman had some harsh words for former President Donald Trump over his apparent desire to preemptively pardon body man Walt Nauta for his assistance in concealing stolen classified documents in the Mar-a-Lago case.
This comes after federal Judge Aileen Cannon unsealed a trove of documents about the case, revealing the extent to which Trump was warned to return the records he took from the White House.
"This is typical Donald Trump," said Akerman to MSNBC's Joy Reid. "There is nothing new here. The fact that he was telling Walt Nauta that he would pardon him, even if he lied to the FBI, don't worry about it, hang tight, I'm going to pardon you. We have seen that story before."
Ackerman compared Trump's promise to the one he made Roger Stone, the adviser convicted in 2019 of attempting to protect the former president from investigators.
"We saw it with Roger Stone, who the judge in that case when he was convicted found that he was covering up for Donald Trump," Akerman continued. "And lo and behold, what happens? He gets pardoned by Donald Trump. You have Paul Manafort, who was supposedly going to cooperate until Donald Trump started dangling a pardon in front of him. Paul Manafort could have broken open this entire Russian investigation. He knew where the bodies were buried, he knew about the Russian agent that he was dealing with and providing detailed information about various parts of the battleground states, in order to microtarget voters. He wound up clamming up, and lo and behold, he was pardoned. So when Walt Nauta listens to Donald Trump, he sees a history of an individual that's covered a few people's backs. And this is all part of Donald Trump's pattern that he's been conducting since he got into office."
"There's something about all of this that feels very Mafioso," said Reid.
"Very Mafioso," Akerman agreed. "It definitely is. It's like you have to pledge allegiance to the capo ... like the feudal system of providing benefits to the feudal people out there, the serfs, so they do the work for you. They'll take care of destroying tapes so that the government doesn't get evidence of people moving boxes in and out. I mean, it's like he is the guy in charge, and what he says goes. And you have two people that are now defendants in this case in Florida, that it really explains why they haven't cooperated."
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