CNN broke bombshell reporting in the early hours of this morning, publishing a damning audio recording that hears disgraced former US President Donald J. Trump openly sharing top-secret, highly-classified government documents that he stole from the White House with biographers during a July 2021 meeting at his Bedminster, New Jersey, golf club.
In the damning recording, Donald Trump is heard admitting that he was holding a classified Pentagon document containing intel about a potential US attack against Iran that he stole from the White House upon the end of his presidency.
“These are the papers,” the ex-president is heard saying in the audio recording released by CNN, referencing what he indicated was a Pentagon document containing secret intel containing attack plans, while actively discussing those classified, confidential attack plans with biographers.
The former president can be heard cracking jokes and laughing with his aides, talking about former Sec. and 2016 opponent Hilary Clinton, as Trump declared that he would “lock her up” for having classified intel on her home email server.
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“Hillary would print that out all the time, you know. Her private emails,” a Trump staffer can be heard saying at one point in the recording.
The reactions to this bombshell development have been rippling through the nation all morning.
Former Trump aide Alyssa Farah Griffin — who first worked for Joint Chiefs Gen. Mark Milley before going to the Trump White House to work directly under Vice President Mike Pence — caught wind of the explosive audio recording and gave her reaction on this morning’s segment of ABC’s The View, where she now serves as a co-host on the show.
“The two things that stand out to me other than the staffer laughing, which makes my blood boil, as someone who used to handle classified documents,” Griffin told the panel and viewers on this morning’s segment.
“War plans are among the most classified secrets, and the Iranian people are great people. We stand in solidarity with them. The Iranian regime is a rogue regime and one of the most dangerous on the planet. They’ve directed our U.S. service members to be killed abroad. They recently — Iranian-backed officials supported a U.S. journalist being assassinated on U.S. soil. Luckily we broke up that plot. I say it because if these documents got into the wrong hands, American lives could be lost.”
Griffin’s co-host, Whoopi Goldberg, interrupted at this point, adding, “They’re in the wrong hands!”
The former Trump aide was quick to agree with Goldberg but added that, even worse still, is the fact that Trump is using these highly classified, dangerous documents just to even the score on a petty personal fight with Milley.
“Even worse, why was he doing it, is my question,” Griffin said. “Because has a little tiff with my former boss Mark Milley, a patriot, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. And he wanted to be like, ‘Look!’ Mark Milley was wrong! Look at our war plans and secrets!’ And he cared more about winning a spat with Mark Milley than protecting national security.”
Hostin raised the question of why Trump willingly returned some documents, but not others. Sara Haines posed the theory that we’ve all been thinking all along — the ex-president cherry-picked what he felt was juiciest, with the most potential benefit to himself, and handed over the leftovers.
“Everything about him is making money, so why not?” Joy Behar noted.
Hostin added, “Exactly. I’m not saying it. I don’t want to get sued.”
Griffin chimed back in, speculating, “But to be honest, I wondered if some of the documents reportedly about the Saudis, as well. He has financial interests, like the golf tour. I don’t want to speculate too much, but that is, I think, it’s what this prosecution is going to have to go into. He’s already broken enough laws, whether there is intent in trying to undermine our U.S. national security behind it, but I mean that’s something.”
You can see The View panel discussion here:
Featured image via Political Tribune Gallery
