The federal indictment against former President Donald Trump revealed that he kept information about the country’s nuclear secrets and even had plans to retaliate against a foreign attack.
Trump kept “hundreds” of classified documents in boxes at Mar-a-Lago, federal prosecutors said in the indictment document that federal authorities unsealed Friday, in a historic move that the former president has denounced as a “witch hunt.”
The indictment document details for the first time information that federal agents uncovered following a raid on Mar-a-Lago last summer following negotiations with Trump’s team for the return of government documents.
It contains 31 counts of deliberate withholding of national defense information – including those pertaining to some of the country’s most secretive.
Former President Donald Trump ranted against the seven-fold charge. He said he will be in federal court in Miami on Tuesday
“The unauthorized disclosure of the material” may pose a risk to United States national security, foreign relations, the security of the United States military and human resources, and the continued viability of sensitive intelligence gathering methods,” the statement said. charge.
The FBI says Trump “caused” dozens of boxes, including those containing classified information, to be transported to his home at Mar-a-Lago, a private club in West Palm Beach.
The documents state in dry language that Mar-a-Lago – an “active social club” – “was not an authorized location for the storage, possession, review, display” or discussion of classified documents.
The upload document contains black and white images of boxes of documents stored at Mar-a-Lago
Mar-a-Lago’s architectural details are revealed in grainy images of boxes of government equipment found in the white-and-gold ballroom
Documents were moved from the building’s business center to a bathroom and shower in MAL’s Lake Room, employees told the FBI
The indictment refers to a previously reported July 2021 event at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, where he described and showed a “plan of attack” that he claimed was drawn up by the Pentagon. That turned out to be a reported document about a US attack plan for Iran that Trump used to convince Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Mark Milley, who he said drafted it.
It also says that in September 2021, Trump showed a representative of his PAC, also in Bedminster, a secret map about an unidentified “military operation.” He told the rep not to show it — language suggestion prosecutors could use to try to establish guilt.
The indictment was unsealed shortly after news broke that former “bodyman” and assistant Walt Nauta was also charged, and the names of both men appear on the indictment document.
The document notes the March 2022 grand jury subpoena for information requiring the return of documents, and says Trump “attempted to obstruct FBI and grand jury investigations and conceal his continued retention of classified documents.”
It provides new information about a months-long dispute with National Archives officials trying to secure the return of government documents.
The indictment shows that Trump went through several boxes of documents before returning them to the National Archives — and he did so with the help of Nauta.
Between November 2021 and January 2022, Nauta and another associate brought boxes of documents to Trump’s social club residence and sent the former president a photo to confirm they were there, the indictment revealed.
Nauta told the aide that Trump was “working” on the boxes. There were reports that the former president went through the material before sending it to the National Archives.
The indictment includes multiple text messages between Nauta and another associate about moving several boxes to the residence for Trump.
On January 17, 2022, Nauta returned 15 boxes to the archive.
The indictment accuses Nauta of making false statements to detectives where he had denied moving the boxes.
It says that Trump ordered Nauta to move boxes of documents “to hide them from Trump’s attorney, the FBI and the grand jury,” and that Trump suggested to his attorney to “falsely represent” the FBI that Trump had no documents to comply with the subpoena.
That comes after attorneys for special counsel Jack Smith persuaded a judge to compel Trump attorney Evan Corcoran to testify by citing the crime-fraud exception.
He also provided the FBI with “only a few documents,” saying he had produced a certificate falsely claiming that all documents had been submitted.
The indictment names Nauta as a co-conspirator and notes that he served as Trump’s