Former President Donald Trump's superseding indictment presents a new, much worse threat for him in the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case because the worker newly charged in the scheme, Carlos De Oliveira, poses the most black-and-white evidence yet of the former president ordering his subordinates to commit obstruction of justice.
That's the view of former Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO), herself a former prosecutor, on MSNBC Monday.
"NBC News reports, quote, 'asked about De Oliveira after the federal indictment was unsealed Tuesday, one person close to Trump responded, 'Who the hell is that?''" said anchor Ayman Mohyeldin. "Does that speak to the obscure nature of De Oliveira's position in the broader Trump world, or is this a classic 'coffee boy,' 'never knew the guy' strategy where he tries to separate himself from aides under scrutiny?"
It was actually intentional that such an obscure person was picked for the job, argued McCaskill — and it further speaks to his guilt.
"If Trump would have talked to some of the people higher up and around him, maybe lawyers that have now fallen away, they obviously would have said, no, you can't delete the security tapes after receiving the subpoena for the security tapes," said McCaskill. "Instead, he reached out to someone he perceived was very loyal to him, that would have access to the people that would have the security tapes."
The upshot of this, she continued, is that "for the first time, we have now a direct line from Donald Trump to a conspiracy to break the law, and what we have is we have this property manager who went to others it try to do what Donald Trump wanted and would delete this tape."
"They have come forward and they have provided credible evidence and testimony about what they were told, and they have the phone records. They have the videotape," McCaskill continued. "So this is really a big deal. This would be like us having Pence testifying that Trump said, I want to steal the election. Or this would be like Mark Meadows admitting to a grand jury that, yes, Trump was trying to make up that the election was a fraud when he knew it wasn't. This is a big deal, and if you read the indictment it is unbelievably powerful, what they have laid out in this indictment. This is a very strong case."
Watch the video below or at the link here.
Claire McCaskill says Carlos De Oliveira offers a "direct line" to Trump committing crimeswww.youtube.com
