Over this past week, we’ve learned of Donald Trump’s most recent scandal, involving his apparent destruction of official White House documents during his presidential term — including ripping documents up that reportedly ended up in a “burn bag,” tearing papers up to the point that staff had to go behind them and tape them back together in an effort to preserve the documents, packing up boxes of official White House documents and taking them with him to his post-presidency Mar-a-Lago home, and even going so far as to allegedly tear up and try to flush wads of papers down the White House toilets, leaving them clogged.
Frankly, it’s left us wondering why in the Hell Donald Trump is once again getting away with violating federal law, as the destruction of those official documents is a direct violation of the Presidential Records Act, and it’s getting pretty damn old to see him continually skirt repercussions for pretty much everything — especially after we watched firsthand what he did to Hillary Clinton.
We’ve learned since that many of Trump’s top officials found themselves so concerned about Trump’s mental state during those brutally chaotic final days of his term, afraid that he would ultimately try to refuse to leave the White House at all, that they weren’t able to even take into consideration what the outgoing president was destroying or packing up to take with him when he left as his term came to a tumultuous end. According to a new report from the Daily Beast, one former senior Trump official who served under number 45 until his very last day, said, “You have to remember that many of us just wanted him to leave the building without any more violence occurring. I remember a rushed and confused packing process in those final weeks, often when the president wasn’t consulted at all.”
The Beast report goes on to cover the chaotic pandemonium that was the final days of the Trump administration, through the eyes of his top officials. But they go on to point out one particular comment made by a Justice Department lawyer in open court in connection to lawsuits filed against the federal government by two different associations of professional historians in the final two weeks of Donald’s term trying to ensure that the records didn’t disappear or end up destroyed. And it’s that remark that the Beast says could come back and bite Trump in the ass.
Stay up-to-date with the latest news!
Subscribe and start recieving our daily emails.
Long story short, following all of the recent developments we’ve been hammered with regarding Trump’s handling of official White House documents, DOJ attorney Elizabeth Shapiro argued on Dec. 7, 2020, that a federal judge should not issue the temporary restraining order to secure documents that the lawsuits were seeking because White House officials already knew good and well that documents were required to be kept intact.
“Preservation instructions were already conveyed to the White House,” Shapiro stated at the time, per court transcripts. “Every litigant is under a duty to preserve records. We’ve already done that. And there’s absolutely no need for a preservation order because we have complied with our litigation obligations… there was no need to bring a motion, particularly an emergency motion, because preservation measures are in place.”
Liberal watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and the transparency fighters at the National Security Archive, both entities that played a part in the aforementioned lawsuit, are now pushing the DOJ to investigate this as a criminal matter.
In a letter penned to the DOJ and FBI this week, those entities wrote, “President Trump was put on notice that this conduct violated the law in multiple ways and on multiple occasions, yet he persisted in destroying and mutilating presidential records of enormous historical value.”
The Beast reports:
These calls would normally amount to little more than a press release. And given the early indications from the DOJ, prosecutors are unlikely to be pursuing charges. But if they did, the punishment accompanying prosecution could be historically significant: Anyone who violates that law is ‘disqualified from holding any office under the United States.’
It’s a powerful hammer that was used to convict Rear Admiral John Poindexter and Lt. Colonel Oliver North for the Iran-Contra affair in the 1980s. And while criminal charges against Trump may seem far-fetched, Trump critics say this could be used to crush Trump’s dream of returning to the White House in 2025.”
The Daily Beast takes a deep dive into the potential of the bizarre law and why it’s likely that the Biden administration will probably never use it. However, if you ask me, it’s high time this man be held accountable for his actions. Enough is enough. Something has to take him down before it’s too late.
Featured image via Political Tribune gallery
