John Bolton claims Trump kept documents he thought were “cool.”

Former Trump National Security Advisor John Bolton speculated Monday that his former boss kept classified and classified documents because they were “cool.”

The former UN ambassador – who has turned against Trump and has not ruled out running for president again in 2024 – was speaking after the Justice Department released a detailed indictment accusing him of violating the espionage law by keeping documents about nuclear information, plans for an attack on another nation, and even defending the US from attack by an adversary.

“During my 17 months there, it is perfectly clear that Donald Trump treated almost everything that came before him through the prism of the question: How does this benefit Donald Trump?” wrote Bolton, who infuriated Trump in his memoirs but did not participate as a witness in Trump’s initial impeachment.

“And so I think a lot of these documents, he just thought maybe they were cool, a lot of them he thought were keepsakes. Many of them he thought might come in handy later on. I can’t answer the question until I see the document,’ he said CNN, days after the DOJ unsealed the stunning indictment. He spoke after Trump protested the charges as a witch hunt, and prepared to fly to his Doral golf club in Florida on Tuesday to attend federal court in Miami.

Bolton may have been referring to references in the indictment to the full conversation he had with the author and publisher of ex-chief of staff Mark Meadows’ book where he admitted that he had not released any documents about a military ‘plan of attack’.

According to the indictment, Trump also showed a secret card to someone who did not have security clearance — and admitted he was not allowed to share it — and had files related to the US nuclear program, the CIA and the Pentagon.

Previous press reports have identified the “love letters” Trump exchanged with North Korean dictator Kim Jon-un as president, among those found in his Mar-a-Lago home.

Not only did Bolton spend a lot of time with Trump as an adviser. He was also familiar with classification rules for US officials and noted that his entire former office was considered a secure facility.

But he said why Trump took the material was not the root of the problem.

“Well, there are many theories that he could use it as information against his enemies, that he could give it to people in exchange for favors. We don’t know, and frankly I don’t think speculating about the reasons is all that helpful. The simple fact that he had the documents for any reason or no reason should subject him to prosecution,” he said.

Bolton, who was known as an Iranian hawk before Trump put him on the White House staff, described his tenure with Trump before the president fired him.

Unfortunately, Trump didn’t pay too much attention to much of what he got. but he paid enough attention to it to be constantly fixated on holding on to documents. many things we got back from him, of course many things we didn’t.

He was relentless in describing GOP candidates repeating Trump’s attacks on law enforcement rather than criticizing the alleged conduct in the indictment.

“You know, Republicans used to think that not prosecuting criminals led to more crime. The answer here is take the politics out of the decision and in this case go ahead with the prosecution and do the same for anyone who does anything remotely fun,” he said.

“Me at the RNC [Republican National Commitee] could email a copy of the indictment to every registered Republican in the country. And I would just say, I’m not going to argue with them much, just read the indictment and ask yourself, if the government can prove what they’re claiming here, shouldn’t this man go to jail?’ Bolton said.