The most egregious aspect for former President Donald Trump’s indictment for maintaining classified documents in unauthorized locations is the breathtaking sensitivity of the intelligence he was allegedly hoarding.
The most interesting aspect of the 44-page indictment drafted by Biden Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith is its elaborate descriptions of that intelligence.
Having worked for years on national-security cases, I confess to being surprised at the Biden DOJ’s position that there is no risk in making such descriptions public.
Presumably, House Judiciary Committee chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) is observing all of this, mindful of his oversight duties regarding the constitutional imperative of holding the Biden administration accountable.
Jordan should thus issue a subpoena to special counsel Robert Hur and FBI Director Christopher Wray, who are jointly responsible for conducting the investigation of President Biden’s hoarding of classified documents in several unauthorized locations — a decades-long pattern of illegal conduct that stretches back to Biden’s years in the Senate.
Jordan should demand that the special counsel and the FBI produce a general description of the documents Biden maintained in such unauthorized locations as his Wilmington, Del., home (including, remarkably, his garage) and his private office at the University of Pennsylvania think tank that — much like the Biden family influence-peddling business — appears to have been backed by prodigious Chinese funding.
Baring the brazenness
In the Trump indictment, Biden’s prosecutor has taken the position that the highly sensitive nature of the intelligence Trump illegally maintained calls for 31 separate felony counts, computing to a potential 310-year prison sentence.
And that’s before you even get to the indictment’s obstruction charges.
Because of the seriousness of Trump’s misconduct, and the breach of the public trust it demonstrates if proven, the Biden DOJ concluded that the public has a right to know the specifics in Trump’s case.
Obviously, since we are talking about the nation’s most closely guarded secrets, the indictment doesn’t give granular detail of exactly what American and allied military vulnerabilities Trump’s behavior might have exposed.
It does not lay out chapter-and-verse of American military contingency plans outlined in the Mar-a-Lago documents, nor name exactly which countries attack plans might involve.
Still, the Biden administration has taken the position that national security will not be compromised by this eye-popping description, in its indictment, of intelligence Trump kept in unauthorized locations:
The classified documents Trump stored in his boxes included information regarding defense and weapons capabilities of both the United States and foreign countries; United States nuclear programs; potential vulnerabilities of the United States and its allies to military attack; and plans for possible retaliation.
Quite rightly, the indictment asserts that “the unauthorized disclosure of these classified documents” — which is the vulnerability created by their being stored in unauthorized, insufficiently secure locations — “could put at risk the national security of the United States, foreign relations, the safety of the United States military, and human sources and the continued viability of sensitive intelligence collection methods.”
Then, the indictment more specifically describes 31 documents containing national defense intelligence. In doing so, it itemizes what each document concerns — e.g., “military activities and planning of foreign countries,” “nuclear capabilities of a foreign country,” “communications with a leader of a foreign country,” “military operations against the United States,” and “handwritten annotation in black marker” on “intelligence briefing” material.
As to each document, it also sets forth the time frame of Trump’s illegal possession — e.g., Jan. 20, 2021 (the day Trump left office) through Aug. 8, 2022 (the date Mar-a-Lago was searched by the FBI). In addition, we are told the classification level of each document — e.g., top-secret, NOFORN (not releasable to foreign nationals), SCI (sensitive compartmented information related to intelligence methods and sources, and SAP (special access program, meaning distribution is extraordinarily limited).
Dangerously careless
To anyone who cares about national security, a former president’s recklessness in maintaining such information — which could be catastrophically damaging if it’s seen by people not trusted to have it — is simply shocking.
But Trump is not alone in this.
The White House has conceded that Biden retained highly classified materials in multiple locations, for years.
That’s why Attorney General Merrick Garland, having appointed a special counsel to review Trump’s mishandling of intelligence, had no choice but to appoint Hur when it became embarrassingly public that Biden had also violated the Espionage Act.
Biden’s offenses appear to be alarming.
It has been reported that some of the documents were highly classified — meaning, as in Trump’s case, their exposure could have done great damage to the nation.
Especially disturbing is the fact that some of the documents are said to stem from Biden’s time in the Senate.
Given that — unlike executive officials who are in 24/7 national-security jobs — senators are not permitted to remove classified intelligence from safekeeping; they may only view it in secure locations on Capitol Hill.
If Biden had such documents, he had to have taken them, not accidentally ended up with them.
What’s more, the FBI is said to have seized notes from Biden’s private locations.
Officials with security clearances are generally told to avoid taking notes, which must be classified at the same level of whatever classified document or briefing they annotate.
Notice that one of the felony charges against Trump relates to notes he made.
Such notes may not be maintained in unauthorized locations — yet Biden apparently made them and kept them in just such locations.
With respect to classified information recovered from Biden’s unauthorized locations, Jordan should issue a subpoena demanding that the Biden Justice Department and FBI provide to Congress and the public the same kind of disclosures as are set out in the Trump indictment.
There should be a general description of the classified information, an accounting of how many documents and pages there are, and a list setting forth for each document: a more specific description, the classification level, and the duration of its illegal retention (which could be decades with respect to several documents).
In announcing the charges against Trump last week, Biden special counsel Jack Smith insisted that there is only one standard of justice, applicable to all Americans, even those who’ve held the highest public office in our government.
This seems laughable given that the Obama-Biden administration gave its secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, a complete pass for offenses similarly heinous to Trump’s.
But Jordan should employ a subpoena demanding that Biden prove there is only one standard of justice.
