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On Aug, 18, 2016, then-presidential candidate Donald Trump said, “In my administration, I’m going to enforce all laws concerning the protection of classified information. No one is above the law.” He repeated this over and over at his campaign rallies. As he always does, he was lying to his supporters.
On June 8, 2023, former president Trump announced on the Truth Social website that he had been summoned to appear in court related to a federal indictment that alleges mishandling top secret classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.
The indictment includes 37 counts. These are a few of the documents found in trump’s possession:
>> A document marked: TOP SECRET: “Nuclear capabilities of a foreign country.” This document cannot be disseminated outside the United States without prior approval from the department that originated it.
>> A document marked: TOP SECRET: Military capabilities of foreign countries and the United States. This document is marked not to be shared with a foreign government because of its origin.
>> Six TOP SECRET documents marked TK, standing for Talent Keyhole, a classification for materials related to U.S. spy satellites.
>> A document marked SECRET// FORMALLY RESTRICTED DATA that the indictment says concerned “nuclear weaponry of the United States.”
Trump‘s carelessness and total disrespect for the law has put U.S. national security in danger.
Indictments No. 1 to 31 have to do with mishandling national defense information, war plans, nuclear secrets, putting ours and our allies intelligence assets at risk.
Anybody who cares about national defense should be horrified with how carelessly Trump threw these top government secret documents around.
Even Bill Barr, who defended Trump during his impeachment, says Trump has put the U.S. in great danger.
It is astounding that many upper-level Republican government politicians like Speaker of the House Mike McCarthy think it’s no big deal that Trump kept national secrets in a bathroom. This is the man who is third in line in our government. How crazy and dangerous is that?
As usual Trump’s defenders are objecting, “What about President Biden and ex-vice-president Michael Pence documents?” Biden and Pence immediately notified authorities and turned in the documents. What about Hillary? Hillary was investigated by Trump’s Department of Justice and no evidence was found and no charges were filed.
It’s all deflection from Trump’s guilt. Although many top Republicans are pointing at Biden and Hillary, not one of them is saying Trump is innocent, not one of them is defending what he did. Trump took more than 300 classified documents and when they were subpoenaed it took more than a year and still Trump didn’t turn in the documents. At this point the government had no choice but to issue a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago, where they confiscated hundreds of classified documents. This disregard for the law has cost Trump the very serious charge of obstruction of justice.
Bottom line: Trump’s disregard and disrespect for the laws of the United States has put the country in danger. Trump believes rules and the law don’t apply to him. He, by any stretch of the imagination, is not qualified to be president of the United States.
Donald Trump has destroyed the credibility of the Republican Party. Genuine patriotic Republican Party members should read the indictment and think twice about keeping this reckless, self-indulgent egomaniac as leader of their party.
Beto Conde lives in Rancho Viejo.
