Former Attorney General Bill Barr said the investigation into classified documents at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate could pose a serious threat to Donald Trump.
In October, The Justice Department began investigating whether the former President violated three federal statutes when he brought back White House materials with him to Mar-A-Lago instead of turning them over to the National Archives as required.
Barr – who was once a loyal defender of Trump – said that the former President ‘played games’ with federal investigators, and maintained that prosecutors had ‘very good evidence’ against him.
‘He had no claim to those documents, especially the classified documents. It belonged to the government,’ Barr said on ABC’s ‘This Week’ on Sunday. ‘I think he was jerking the government around.’
‘The government is investigating the extent to which games were played and there was obstruction in keeping the documents from them. I think that’s a serious potential case, I think they probably have some very good evidence there,’ Barr continued.
Barr warns Trump faces more threat from classified docs case than over hush money
It comes even as Barr dismissed the indictment of Trump over his alleged involvement in the 2016 ‘hush money’ scandal
It comes even as Barr dismissed the indictment of Trump over his alleged involvement in the 2016 ‘hush money’ scandal as an ‘abomination,’ and ‘the epitome of the abuse of prosecutorial power,’ on Fox News last week.
Trump made history as the first ex-president in U.S. history to be indicted with charges of 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree.
Barr argued how the legal theory behind the indictment was ‘pathetically weak’ and that the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office is ‘going after the man, not a crime.’
‘Obviously, we don’t have the indictment, so there’s a little bit of speculation involved, but based on the news reports, if they’re accurate, this is an abomination,’ Barr said on Fox News.
‘It’s the epitome of the abuse of prosecutorial power to bring a case that would not be brought against anyone else. They are going after the man, not a crime. And the legal theory, frankly, is pathetically weak,’ he suggested.
‘The legal theory is pathetically weak. The case is held together by chicken wire and paper clips and rubber bands. It’s a lousy case. And it’s a shameful episode in our history where this local prosecutor is trying to effect the political process by bringing this case,’ Barr railed.
He delved into the legal arguments that will likely be made, noting how the case likely revolved around how Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen recorded the reimbursements paid to him from Trump as ‘legal payment’.
Barr explained how the statute requires that any such misclassification of funds be done with the intent to defraud, which may not be the case in this situation.
‘The claim is that [recording the Cohen reimbursements as legal payments] is false and therefore violated a misdemeanor statute in the first instance against false documents,’ Barr said.
He added on Sunday’s ABC airing: ‘If it was fraud, it was committed in the course of fraud. And I don’t see anywhere specified in here exactly what the fraud was,’ Barr said. ‘These were his own business records. He was paying himself the hush money and the business records were his own company. He’s the owner of the company.’
He maintained that the Mar-a-Lago case was a bigger potential instrument in the former President’s downfall, however.
The Mar-a-Lago case began when Trump voluntarily turned over 15 boxes of documents to the National Archives in January and the DOJ opened an investigation in February after discovering classified materials were brought back to Mar-A-Lago.
They eventually served a subpoena for additional materials in June and then searching Mar-A-Lago in August when it appeared Trump’s attorneys did not actually turn over all the documents.
Some of the classified documents had the most top-secret designations, and the Washington Post reported that documents may include details on other countries’ nuclear capabilities.
The government has alleged in court filings that there is evidence Trump and his team ‘concealed and removed’ documents from a storage room at Mar-A-Lago, which could constitute obstructing its investigation, and has accused Trump of storing classified materials in unauthorized locations.
The DOJ is investigating whether Trump violated three federal statutes, including the Espionage Act, which broadly deal with the mishandling of government and national security documents and carry potential punishments of fines or maximum prison sentences between three and 20 years, depending on the statute.
Former AG Bill Barr tells Jon Karl the case against former Pres. Trump aims to ‘get into the middle of the Republican primary process and turn it into a circus.’ ‘They want him to be the nominee because he is the weakest of the Republican candidates.’
The Former Attorney General also slammed Trump as the weakest of the Republican candidates, saying he would ultimately lose to Joe Biden in the 2024 presidential election.
‘I think ultimately the savvy Democratic strategists know [the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office probe] is going to help Trump, and they want him to be the nominee because he is the weakest of the Republican candidates, the most likely to lose again to Biden,’ Barr said on Sunday.
‘I don’t think anything’s going to happen before a nomination is made and even perhaps until the election, the 2024 election,’ Barr said when asked about the likelihood of Trump being convicted and sent to prison. ‘This stuff is going to drag out through ’24, and it’s going to stymie and disrupt the whole Republican primary process.’
