Former President Donald Trump is facing a federal 37-count indictment for unlawfully removing classified information and concealing it at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, along with allegedly urging subordinates to destroy records under grand jury subpoena.
The problem for him, argued CNN's Abby Phillip on Friday, is that he is caught dead to rights by his own words — including audio of him admitting he did not declassify the information.
"In the details here, in the meticulous listing of the chronology and the documents and the stakes and the classified markings and the text messages from Trump aides, the notes to Trump attorneys, at first glance here it seems to be that [special counsel] Jack Smith not only studied the law but studied the Mueller report, the impeachments, and how Trump works," said panelist John King.
"It bears repeating that this was the crime that really didn't have to happen," said Phillip. "He didn't have to face these charges. It's pretty simple, you just give the documents back. And honestly, the federal code — if he wanted to see these documents, all he had on this do was ask to see them."
"There's — it's not to say that a former president cannot seek to have records that memorialize his time in office," Phillip added. "He can ask for them, but he kept them, did not give them back, and tried to apparently based on evidence tell his attorneys not to. And using the language, the really bad stuff in that note from went one of his attorneys — this is Trump, largely in his own words, basically saying, I know I'm not supposed to have this, I'm not supposed to show it to people, I know it's bad. And that's going to be really strong evidence, I think."
Abby Phillip says Jack Smith as Trump admitting to crimes "in his own words"www.youtube.com
